Great Sankey High School

Specialisms

In 2004, the school was awarded specialist schools status in the field of Engineering and has since increased the provision of Engineering throughout the curriculum. The school also operates a Young Apprentice scheme, where Year 10 students have the opportunity to Start a two-year course and earn an NVQ level 2 with the school.

In a partnership with the RAC, the school has built an RAC automotive engineering skills centre. This allows students studying engineering and automotive engineering, access to Facilities that few other engineering colleges possess, whilst also providing facilities for other schools and businesses in the local community.

The school has a VEX robotics team called BHCVEX as part of the Engineering department. The team first initiated in 2010 when the team also won their first trophy in a regional competition using the Standard VEX Protobot and Tumbler kit. In 2012 the team participated in the VEX robotics UK national competition and won the competition, qualifying them for the world finals in California, However due to insufficient funds the team could not attend. Sack attack is the 2012-2013 season game, different from the 2011-2012 Gateway game. BHCVEX were finalists in the North West regional in the 2012-2013 season, which qualified them for the 2013 UK national competition where they won the tournament in alliance with two other teams from East Barnet School qualifying the team for the world championships in Anaheim.

Sport

The school has many teams participating in sports such as football, rugby league, hockey, netball, basketball, cricket, badminton, athletics and Handball. [1] [2]

The 2003-2008 Rugby League Team retained the Warrington Cup all years. In Year 10 they won the Regional Final and Progressed to the national where they lost by one point to St John Fisher of Wigan. In Year 11 they again won the regional final and progressed to the national final where this time they beat St Wilfreds from Wakefield 16-14 to claim the national title. The 2004-2009 team were also successful as they reached the regional final in both Year 10 and 11, winning it the second time round. They also reached the national final both years but were beaten on both attempts.

Music

The school has two main bands that perform regularly in the local area and abroad, in locations such as Italy, France, Spain and Germany and have played in the UK in London (Covent Garden) and Warrington train station (where they played for the Duke of Edinburgh). In the past, the Concert Band has achieved a silver medal at international level competing against some of the best school and college bands from all around the world. More recently, the Concert Band has achieved a gold award at the regional seris of the National Concert Band Festival (2008), held at GSHS, and were invited to play at the 2009 national finals in Cardiff where they achieved a highly commended bronze award. The Swing Band (run by Mr Bryan) competed in Warwick at the national finals last year after gaining a gold medal at the regional series in 2007.

Both bands performed by formal invitation on the Fantasy Festival Stage at Disneyland Park, Paris, in summer 2008, 2012 and 2014. GSHS also has a choir (Sankey Singers [run by Mrs Meredith]). Sankey Singers have performed for the past two years in the regional rounds of the National Festival of Music for Youth, in 2012, they performed in the second stage of the festival, in Birmingham. They also joined the Swing Band for their 2014 performance in Disneyland. The music department also hold an open music event, The Great 'S' Factor, each year and several smaller casual bands, performing a wide variety of music.

House system

The school implemented a house system in the academic year beginning September 2007 to ease the strain on the heads of years, who previously had been allocated one year of students and had to manage all these students throughout their 5 year attendance at Great Sankey High School. It was decided that each house would have two forms from each year, and there would be twelve forms for each year group. Each head of house would then only have to manage 10 forms instead of 12, and each would only have to manage two year 11 forms at one time, instead of a head of year looking after all year 11 forms. Learners gain House Points for attending extra-curricular activities and going above and beyond the call of duty in lessons.

Members of each house can be identified by their ties, featuring their house colours. The new ties, which have been designed by learners, are being implemented from September 2009. Students are issued with house coloured planners and attend "House Assemblies". Sports day and other intercourse competitions are regularly organised each term, and at the end of the year, the top achievers from each house win a trip to Blackpool Pleasure Beach

The school has six houses, each with their own colours, named after people who have been influential and excelled at what they have done:

- (Jane) AUSTEN, Light blue

- (Roger) BANNISTER, Dark blue (won: 1)

- (Sir Isaac) NEWTON, Red (won: 2)

- (Rosa) PARKS, Purple (won:2)

- (George) STEPHENSON, Yellow (won: 2)

- (Baroness Tanni) Grey-THOMPSON, Orange

Each year, two year eleven students are chosen as House Captains and help in the running and organization of their house.

Notable former pupils