A ‘Reach for the Stars’ SHINE programme for Year 4 pupils who may be struggling at home or at school starts the scheme off, with girls and boys coming in on Saturdays for 10 weeks in the Spring term. They are buddied up with a Year 11 or Sixth Form mentor as they explore the moon using VR headsets, or reach for the Stars via dance.

The Year 5 and 6 programmes happen on a Thursday afternoon over 15 weeks. Year 5 STRIVE works with 50 high-achieving pupil premium students, to provide mentorship and opportunities beyond the curriculum via Coding, Science, English and Maths and to build confidence in these children as they look towards secondary school.

The Year 6 THRIVE programme welcomes 130 students weekly to take part in a carousel of activities which explore and address the potential anxieties of moving into secondary school. Raising self-confidence, self-efficacy and self-esteem are the aims. Wimbledon Y11 & Y12 students act as mentors.

‘Speak Up! Year 6’ is an exciting public speaking programme for Year 6 students from Wimbledon High Junior School and 12 partner primary schools from across the maintained and independent sectors. Now in its second year, ‘Speak Up!’ is all about pupils sharing their views, learning from each other’s differences, and building vital communication skills that will help with academic and personal development.

Led by Wimbledon High Junior School, it is funded by the contributions of partner schools from the independent sector, covering all costs for maintained schools. Training is delivered in partnership with Speakers Trust, the UK’s leading public speaking training charity.

Each year, over 500 Year 6 pupils and their teachers take part in the Speak Up partnership. Teachers receive a day’s training and deliver a series of prepared workshops to their Year 6 pupils. During the workshops, the pupils develop the core skills of public speaking and prepare a speech on the topic of their choice.

The top 4% of speakers are selected to represent their school at the Grand Final, delivering their speech in front of an audience of friends, family, and an expert judging panel – competing head-to-head to be crowned the Speak Up! Year 6 Champion.

Students finish these workshops with a strong sense of empowerment and with skills they can take with them to their next stages of education.

You can view the ‘Speak Up! Year 6’ website here.

Each year we run a PSQM hub of 5-10 schools. Alex Farrer, Head of Junior Science, is an experienced PSQM Regional Hub leader and mentors the schools, delivering training in science subject leadership so that the schools can all achieve the prestigious quality mark after a year-long professional development programme.

Wimbledon High School also gained PSQM Outreach in 2019, and then successfully re-accredited in 2023, achieving the quality mark at PSQM Hub level (our school is the only school in the country to hold this quality mark) demonstrating our excellence in primary science teaching, learning and leadership. 

We have an exciting partnership with HMP Downview. In recent times, we have had visits from Governor Wilson from HMP Downview Prison and Officer Katie, who came for an inspiring question and answer session with Sixth Form students in their PSHE session, and Clare Canavan, the librarian at HMP Downview.

Governor Wilson and Officer Katie shared stories of how they gained careers in the criminal justice system, their day-to-day duties, the relationship they have with the women in prison, and the many struggles their staff and inmates had to overcome during Covid. One of the students asked how the women are prepared for life after their sentences, and Governor Wilson explained the number of ways they help, from checking on an individual’s mental and physical health to preparing accommodation and employment. It was an illuminating session, shining a light on a world most of us only ever see dramatised on TV or on film.

The Governor said it was the first time she’d been invited into a school to speak to students.

Students in Year 8 and 9 have been joined by Clare Canavan,  librarian at HMP Downview. Clare led an inspiring talk on her daily life as a prison librarian. She also explained the work they do behind bars to help inmates with their literacy skills, “…about 11% of our prisoners can’t read. So we run a project to help those who can’t read, such as having book groups, and we run a 6-book challenge where inmates can win a dictionary. Dictionaries in prison are like gold dust!”

One student commented: ‘I have gained an interest in the criminal justice system and how women are treated within it’

Building on the success of our Wild Girls Outdoor Learning Programme, we partner with Granard Primary School to create a new EYFS focused-project that provides space for team-teaching between EYFS practitioners and children from two different settings to work together to solve simple problems and apply the burgeoning skills of working and playing cooperatively with others in the beautiful open spaces of Wimbledon Common.   

Each year, Year 5 from WHS are joined by Year 5 from West Wimbledon Primary to take part in Out of this World Space Day. This day consists of pupils from both schools working together to tackle space related challenges. They learn about astronauts and space travel challenges over the years as well as investigating heat shields, waste in space, space health and fitness and looking around the International Space Station using virtual reality headsets. This day has taken place for several years now and is a highlight of the Earth and Space topics at both schools. 

Physics students in Year 10 and Year 12 work with students from our partner school Ricards Lodge on this University College London project looking at exoplanets.