Our Vision
Enjoyment — Achievement — Community
Our Mission
To provide a high-quality, comprehensive and meaningful education for all students. Together we will build an inclusive and aspirational community where students and staff are empowered to reach their full potential. Our curriculum will seek to meet the needs of all students. Each student will be treated as an individual, and given the tools to leave us with the personal qualities, skills and qualifications they need to lead successful lives.
Our Values
Be Respectful — Be Responsible — Be Ready
Restorative Practice
At The Dean Academy, we have high expectations of our students. We encourage all young people to try their best to achieve their goals. They should understand that it is the responsibility of staff, students, parents, governors, and the community as a whole to uphold and maintain our school values. For occasions when this is proving not to be the case, we use restorative approaches to help all key stakeholders understand the impact of their actions and how to put it right. We believe that by using Restorative Practice we are giving students the skills to independently make better and more informed choices in the future.
Building, Maintaining and repairing relationships are the fundamental aims of the Restorative Practice Framework and underpin the Restorative process.
- Building — The key to successful classroom management is the forging of positive relationships with students and teachers.
- Maintaining — Providing students with effective feedback to ensure a positive and productive working relationship.
- Repairing — Using elements of the Restorative Practice Framework to support the student and teacher to repair harm or conflict should it arise.
If a student or member of staff in our school has been negatively affected by someone’s behaviour, we will try our very best to make sure they feel that it has been put right for them and that it will not happen again.
If a student has done something wrong they will be offered opportunities to put things right and change their behaviour so it does not happen again. If this does not happen, sanctions will still be put in place.
By using the Restorative Approach it allows ALL parties to have their say AND be listened to.
When our students find themselves in conflict or upset we will ask them:
- What happened? (Story Telling)
- Who has been affected by this? (Impact)
- What needs to happen now? (Solution Focus)
Most situations can be dealt with by working through these questions. The aim here is that everyone has a voice and the outcome is fair for everyone. If somebody is upset, we aim to help them feel better. If someone has done something wrong, we expect them to take responsibility for their actions and fix the situation.
We have, to date, trained over 40 Student Ambassadors to help run these conversations amongst their peers, as well providing full training for all staff to be able to facilitate such discussions. Our aim is to continue training students each term to support others, but also to feel confident in themselves to use practical listening and questioning skills which they will find useful for the rest of their lives.
At The Dean Academy, we believe restorative approaches encourage us all to think about how our behaviour affects others. It helps us to develop respect, responsibility, truth telling and reflection as well as lifelong skills to develop and maintain strong relationships in the future.
