This year SMSAS worked closely with representatives from the Further Maths Support Programme (FMSP) to support six Year 13 students from Canterbury Academy. As well as larger classes run on Saturday mornings with the FMSP, several Ambassadors from SMSAS worked with these six students each week in the Templeman library, supplementing their A-Levels in Mathematics and giving them a taster of University study. These support sessions were based on the ‘By Our Students, For Your Students’ learning resources that were produced by our Ambassadors, some of which are available online
https://www.kent.ac.uk/smsas/outreach/A-level_resources.html
After the release of the A-Level results, our contact teacher John Heffernan confirmed that all-but-one student improved their A-Level grades with respect to their AS-Levels, with half achieving at least two full grades higher than in the previous year. In particular, John noted that
“The students’ self esteem, confidence and excellent results have been significantly impacted by the interventions that you have facilitated.“
For the academic year 2016 – 2017 we have been awarded a separate funding pot by the PDO to expand our support work and to develop Year 12 versions of our learning resources. We hope that by providing support earlier on, we can better improve the aspirations and attainment of local A-Level students. The new project will be run by Joe Watkins, Katherine Horan (Postgraduate Ambassador) and several of our Undergraduate Ambassadors. Once the learning resources have been completed, the FMSP have offered to maximise our distribution of these by advertising them at their various local CPD events.
As before, the learning resources that we have produced will form the basis of our A-Level revision classes for local Sixth-Form students. These are likely to take place in early 2017 and are attended by several local teachers from various selective and non-selective schools. It would be fantastic if academic members of SMSAS staff would like to be involved, so please contact Joe Watkins if you are interested (J.Watkins@kent.ac.uk)