When the early church was forming, chaos and confusion were triumphing and many early Christians were getting inconsistent advice about the Lord's teachings. They wrote to St Peter and asked for his advice. St Peter outlines this story, in his second epistle. His solution was for followers of Christ to 'Grow in the Grace and Knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ'. His advice was to go back to the source and discover what Jesus actually said. Our vision as a school also follows this advice:
1. Knowledge is powerful and freeing
2. Reading and finding out the best knowledge also helps
3. We work to grow character in our Christian ethos regardless of faith or background. All are welcome.
The final part of 2 Peter is a very apt summary of what our purpose is as a community and it is now our school motto.
"Grow in the Grace and Knowledge"
Education can be full of unfounded claims and not very well-substantiated offers of advice. Just like those early Christians, both children and adults alike are on a journey to develop character and shape futures based on the best knowledge out there. Our children are rurally isolated and a significant amount are living in poverty. To reverse this and enable social mobility and gain access to better life chances, we aim to work with high-quality experts, and develop talent from within to achieve our ambitions.
Our vision for the school in its simplest form is to grow and nurture everyone who gets involved with us both adults and children alike.
Our 4 aims by 2025 are:
- Broaden outlooks and experiences
- Nurture personal growth for life
- Everyone to make a personal contribution to our school
- Find the joy in learning.
We believe that in order to achieve these aims, we should gain in knowledge and develop a good character. As a church school, we believe that being on a mission to develop and grow in grace is a good way to do this.