British Values

At BGS we see British Values as integral to our curriculum, not because we are required by law to deliver them but because they are fundamental to the vision of our school community. Schools educate and as such should be the best example they can be for the students and the society we want to live in.

We want an environment free from discrimination, prejudice and stereotypes. One in which people feel that they have a voice and know both their rights and their duties within the community. Only through teaching our children the strength of fairness and kindness can we hope for a future that respects and learns from the past.

Care and Respect form two of the school's four core values. These values are more than words on a page, they are an approach to everything we do in school; they inform every decision we take.

One example of school-led Care is that, like most schools, we heavily support charities in a variety of ways:

• whole school fund raising events
• Supporting volunteering placements
• liaising during school events e.g. enabling charities to attend our school Hello Health day
• getting involved with charity events e.g. being marshals at Bike or Hike

One example of supporting Respect is that the school is steeped in history and tradition which you can learn some of from our website page:

These traditions are taken seriously and are part of BGS's DNA. We teach the students the value of having respect by living it ourselves.

Many subjects naturally lend themselves to delivering core learning about British Values e.g:

• Understanding of the development of democracy in History
• Learning about the law around crime in Lifeskills
• Expressing their ideas in English
• Learning respect for other people's beliefs in Religious Education

However, all subjects take their responsibility to appropriately promote the values seriously. The school audits the curriculum provision of British Values annually, but every three years holds a more detailed review.

Tutor time Reading and Debating challenges students to consider a wide range of thought-provoking ideas. The school uses 'The Day' website (https://theday.co.uk/) to "inspire pupils to become critical thinkers and better citizens by engaging their natural curiosity in real world problems." The programme is ever evolving to ensure it stays relevant but has covered topics such as voting age, climate change, robotics and AI amongst many others on a fortnightly basis.

The behaviour policy promotes mutual respect and tolerance for those with different beliefs. The restorative approach both encourages education regarding British Values and ensures consequences are fair and consistent.

The school has a strong anti-bullying culture, including an anonymous email address to report bullying. We treat bullying of all kinds seriously and this is reflected in the sanctions for such behaviours. We encourage a community feel to this issue and encourage anybody to report bullying not just the person whom the act is upon.

We have termly form competitions for positive behaviour which form part of a bigger more celebrated house competition. The wide-ranging house competitions purposely promote democracy and respect for each other.

Our assembly programme is built around British Values and is structured to ensure all aspects are covered. For example, respect and tolerance are naturally core to the assembly programme. We support traditional events like Armistice and the Harvest Festival as well as relatively more modern approaches such as Black History Month and World Religion Day. The school also looks to what affects students in their normal day to day interactions from microaggression to online safety

BGS runs a variety of extra-curricular clubs that support development of British Values understanding. Below is a sample list:

• Grammar Gazette
• Theories of Everything Debate
• Duke Of Edinburgh's Award
• GreenPower racing
• Language Leaders
• LGBTQ+

BGS supports students undertake a wide range of trips and visits, many with explicit links to developing understanding of British Values. Below is a list of just some of those trips:

• National and Local government e.g. Houses of Parliament, Boston ports and logistics day
• Local community e.g. Care Home visits, Hospice Quiz events
• Environmental visits e.g. Lincolnshire Show, Gibraltar Point, wildlife park
• English heritage visits
• International trips e.g. Holocaust memorial sites, exchanges to France, Germany, Japan, etc.
• A wide variety of sporting events and competitions

One aspect of BGS provision we are very proud of are our regular British Values Challenges. Each term, we run a whole-school challenge linked to a British Value that is promoted across subjects and tutor time. Some recent examples are featured below.

Designing a new logo for BGS Pride (Individual Liberty) - This competition was open to the whole school, with dozens of entries submitted following discussions about LGBT+ issues and the importance of tolerance. Judging was done by our student leaders in Peer Councils. The winning entry is displayed below:

Launching a campaign for a new political party (Democracy) - Every form created a political party, along with a brief manifesto, after researching the manifestos of the main political parties in the 2024 General Election. We then held our own school election on Election Day to find the winner. Some of the shortlisted entries are below:

Tree of Tolerance - every form did some activities to explore and celebrate the great diversity within our school. Every pupil then had the opportunity to design individual leaves for our Tree of Tolerance, each one raising awareness of a Protected Characteristic, language, race, country or religion that means something to them. The resulting mural is a source of pride for us all.

Whilst there are always aspects to work on, not least staying on top of new trends and an ever-changing world, but in the main we believe we are doing a great job. Fundamentally, British Values are firmly embedded in our school values and our curriculum which enables us to promote this work strongly. Students show us through their engagement, feedback and behaviour, that we are getting it right.

• Around 200 of our pupils are elected to Student Voice or Student Leadership positions at any given time.
• We strive to ensure that our senior Student Leadership positions are selected as inclusively as possible, e.g. minority ethnic students occupying 41% of the most senior roles, including Head Boy and Head Girl; and a 50-50 gender split for the most senior roles.
• Over 450 leaves were submitted for the Tree of Tolerance (see above).
• In recent House Council meetings, pupils spoke about the British Values Challenges "improving understanding" and leading to positive changes, "especially with regard to tolerance".
• Almost 500 pupils took part in the most recent Big Voice survey.
• In the Big Voice survey, a sizeable majority recognised that their understanding of British Values is developed at school.
• Reported incidents are trending downwards, from the already low numbers, in bullying, racism and homophobic incidents.
• Numbers of concerns/incidents in terms of general respect and tolerance are extremely low.
• High rate of reward points. In term 1 the ratio of positive to negative behaviours is 31:1 and approximately 6300 positive behaviour points given just for Respect alone