Teachers from Collyer’s take a trip to London for first ‘S7’ conference

The ‘S7’ (originally the “Surrey Seven”) is a consortium of colleges who invited Collyer’s to join in 2013. The S7 group comprises Coulsden, Godalming, Esher, Reigate, Strodes and Woking sixth form colleges.

Melanie Russell, Assistant Principal at Collyer’s, ran workshop sessions on ‘Emotional Resilience for Students’ with Godalming College’s Assistant Principal, Carol Horlock. Melanie was thrilled to be involved: “Our first conference as fully fledged members of the S7 group has been a huge success and it has been fantastic to be so warmly welcomed by our colleagues at other colleges.”

The conference included keynote speeches from one of the country’s leading educational consultants, David Didau, who posed the question: “What if everything you knew about education was wrong?”

Rob Kemp, Deputy Principal of Royal Holloway, gave the second keynote address, which focussed on admissions to higher education in the current changing climate.

Collyer’s Senior Tutor, Ian McAlister was delighted: “Membership of the S7 group has enabled some tremendous staff development and I found the first S7 Conference to be an inspiring experience.

“The speeches were excellent and certainly provoked some debate; the workshop sessions will be hugely beneficial as we plan for next year.”

Workshops on the day included: new A-levels, vocational qualification reforms, student feedback, equality and diversity in the classroom; apprenticeships, motivating students and electronic communications in the classroom.

Melanie Russell concluded: “Massive thanks to Anna Loveday and Sharon Kemp at S7 for arranging this fantastic conference.

“The Collyer’s teachers who attended have thoroughly enjoyed the packed schedule of speeches and workshops.”

Report and picture contributed by Collyer’s.