All students will be shortly provided with an agreed and formalized programme of opportunities throughout Y7-11 to develop their character with a clear focus on our core values: respect, resilience, ambition, pride, responsibility.

While we most commonly associate secondary education with making progress in gaining understanding, skills and knowledge in curriculum subjects, Aston Academy is also where students are encouraged to develop additional skills, such as respect, resilience, ambition, pride, responsibility. These attributes (among others) are the building blocks of character development--arguably equally vital and formative aspects of education.

Coming soon for next academic year, students will be encouraged to "collect" instances of displaying our core values around school. They will receive achievement points for such displays: such as showing resilience under challenging circumstances or being kind to a new student or to someone in a difficult situation.

We would also like to encourage our students to get involved in a wider range of activities, in order to further enhance their experience of school and allow them to develop key associated skills. These activities might include: taking part in a production, a literacy project, a volunteering or charitable experience or participating in an extra-curricular trip for example.

Collecting these experiences is made easy as they are assembled in a table in the Student Planner, and students therefore can enjoy collecting stamps or staff initials in each box; as they build up their stamps. We really look forward to promoting this in September!