Head’s Weekly Update

Academic Rigour

Each year JCQ (national exams organisation) seems to bring forward the start-point of the national exams. Gone are the days of exams starting 3 weeks after the beginning of the summer term. We are in the process of finalising the day by day schedule for Year 11 and Upper Sixth to provide them and you with a clear understanding of what is happening each day, when the additional revision and exam prep clinics are taking place and when normal lessons will cease. We hope this will help manage a complex and stressful time. 

Our current Year 11 and Sixth Form students are going to be entering the job market at a unique moment in history. UCAS are predicting 1,000,000 students will be entering and then leaving higher education by 2030. This will make the market more crowded than ever and harder for individuals to stand out as graduate-level job vacancies are not currently predicted to grow at the same rate as applicants. This also does not take account of economic migration and competition for jobs from overseas students. A degree is no longer a differentiator nor protective against automation and is now simply the initial identifier for application. Part of our job then is to help our students stand out from the crowd and secure roles that fulfill them; especially as currently roughly 35% of UK graduates are considered over-qualified for their role. 

Whilst I would have retired by now if I was able to predict the future, according to current government predictions, four sectors are predicted to grow over the next 5-10 years. 

• Digital and tech - AI engineers, data scientists, cybersecurity experts.

• Green economy - Renewable energy, electric transport, green consultancy.

• Healthcare and Life Sciences - as the population ages, biotech is forecast to grow.

• Infrastructure and construction - civil engineering and project management. 

This awareness of the longer-term market forces at play was part of the shaping of our Sixth Form Centre, the development of the study spaces and the continued development of our super-curricula. Alongside the dilution of the protective nature of a university degree comes the emergence of AI. Whilst McKinsey have written extensively on how this will likely shape the future jobs market, that is not its only disruptive force. AI is a disruptor in education. It is too tempting for students now to use AI to answer questions and do the heavy lifting for them. The issue is that whoever does the thinking gets the learning. Unfortunately using AI is a short-term win but a long-term loss for developing the skills most in demand for the future; namely critical thinking and higher-cognitive processes. Having study spaces where there is a greater degree of adult interaction, no attention-grabbing phone and no ability to play games on your laptop, are the basic elements of enabling successful learning. According to the Safer Internet Centre, 54% of students use AI to complete homework and 40% believe AI can provide emotional support. So there is much for us to do to harness the upsides and help our students navigate the risks and pitfalls. We are working to enable AI collaboration rather than a blanket AI ban. AI is very powerful at augmenting human work but it requires particular training and a level of ethical understanding. Mr Seccombe started this conversation with a very powerful webinar two weeks ago. 

Alongside the basic expectation of work during the school day, we are bringing in industry-recognised ‘micro-credentials’ for the Sixth Form. These are short courses that culminate in a recognised qualification linked to employability and university-readiness. This is the extension to our new Lower Sixth life skills programme that has started with our in-person First Aid qualification and will move onto data literacy/ coding / prompt engineering and proficiency in platforms like Excel. We are well placed to deliver these qualifications during the academic year as they are predominantly online and they provide professional qualifications that help build a strong CV. As they are on-demand courses students can complete them at their own pace and it will give them a suite of additional skills that help them as they progress into life after Pangbourne. It would be relatively painless for a Lower Sixth student to complete two of these courses, for example on basic coding and AI prompt engineering, across one week of their long summer holiday. 

There is one area of the Sixth Form supercurricula where we would greatly benefit from parent collaboration and support. 

Traditional work experience, where a student completes a week-long placement, is beneficial but not cutting-edge. Over the coming year we want to enhance the work experience model through enabling project-based placements. This would move from a block of time to something more like an afternoon a week working with a business on a real problem or pitch. In order to design and roll-out this model we would require a degree of support from parents and alumni who could help facilitate this. We believe this model is likely to provide a better experience for our students and enable them to develop a portfolio of work that is a differentiator. 

In our latest Pangbournian Community newsletter, the newsletter you received yesterday, we are asking parents to register as a mentor. This will enable us to provide the type of support and work experience we want to offer. 

Adventure

In assembly on Monday morning Mr Poynter launched our ‘Three Rivers Challenge.’ This is our ambitious and slightly gruelling 3 day adventure race taking place in the summer term. It is about taking us back to the founding principles of the College but infusing it with the modern science around resilience and fragility. The human psyche is a muscle and it requires stress and challenge in order to grow. There is an emerging and growing body of research that suggests that over-protection actually, rather than helping a child, makes them more fragile and propagates a sense of helplessness. The adventure curriculum is about helping our young people become antifragile. Life isn’t something that is done to them. 

The challenge is designed to become a rite of passage for the 6th Form; a psychological transition from sheltered student to autonomous young adult. It is designed to help them embrace reality, take ownership and accept responsibility. It is a team event and requires working together with a collective purpose over individual achievement. It is a real chance for students to prove they can handle complex situations without needing an adult to help them navigate through it. Every time we venture into the outdoors, embrace uncertainty, manage risk and take ownership for our decisions, we return changed. We are the same person yet different; more confident in ourselves, more grounded and more able to deal with setback and disappointment. 

Community

It was a real pleasure to hold our latest Transforming Futures fundraising dinner last week. It was a chance to meet and talk with parents, past and present and outline our vision for the future with our bursary programme. It is also very exciting to know that, through the generosity of the Pangbourne community, we have met our target for next academic year to be able to have our Anthony Hudson and Peter Points award holders. This is the first step in us building an endowment that will provide life-changing bursaries for local children. 

Peter Points arrived at the College during the most profound period of change in the College’s history. It was the year the College changed from being ‘The Nautical College Pangbourne’ to Pangbourne College. This change, whilst necessary if the College was to survive and re-invent itself, was deeply unpopular at the time as it meant a fundamental re-design of the College’s purpose and mission. I can only imagine how difficult and complex those early years were for Peter as he fought to help the College come through its adolescence into maturity as a school. Cadets that had joined one type of institution suddenly found themselves in a different one. It is down to the drive, determination and dedication of Peter that the College is here today and did not sink as the world the College was born into dropped away. 

I had great pleasure this week in being given by Joanna, Peter’s daughter, a copy of his final Founders’ Day speech and reflections on the College. Whilst the world back then was very different to the one we find ourselves in today, it was clear that Peter knew the College needed to be a place of continual change and refinement if it were to stay relevant in a rapidly changing world. This was a theme that continued through the reforming years of Anthony Hudson as the next Head. 

Leadership

I want to give a special shout-out to the Captains of the various College sports teams. Standing on the touchline and talking with the coaching staff, the current crop of Captains have done great work. They are all excellent role models, lead from the front and do the hard work themselves. Perhaps most importantly they take responsibility for their team and the team performance. College sport is very dear to me and I have been very fortunate to have such strong student leadership this academic year. I have also had an extra spring in my step this week following on from the 1st XI boys fantastic 3-0 win over St. Benedict’s. In times gone that would have earned them a glass of champagne with the Head. Sadly all they get is a pat on the back, but it was a great win. 

Well done to the Captains and Vice Captains below for their strong leadership:

Best wishes,

Oliver Knight