We’re excited to share with you some inspiring news concerning our partners at Kensington Aldridge Academy (KAA), one of our client schools who we have worked alongside since 2015. Although our working relationship has always been strong, these last couple of years have been a challenging time for the School during which all at KAA have shown great resilience.
Following the Grenfell Tower fire on June 14th 2017, the academy building was within the emergency cordon area due to its proximity to the tower. An alternative site needed to be found to allow students to continue with their education. Three days after the fire, students returned to school at Burlington Danes Academy and Latymer Upper School for the remainder of the summer term.
When it became clear that the school would not be accessible for the next academic year, KAA worked with the Education and Skills Funding Agency (EFSA), MACE and Portakabin in a remarkable effort to build a new educational site in record time, nine weeks after Grenfell.
Despite these challenges, in December 2017 the school received an ‘outstanding’ Ofsted rating. In August 2018 students went on to achieve fantastic results in the academy’s first set of A level results. Department for Education (DfE) performance tables place the school in the top 5% of schools nationally in terms of progress made by students.
At the Evening Standard’s School Awards on Thursday 7 February 2019, KAA received the award for outstanding achievement in challenging circumstances with the paper noting that the Academy has ‘shown what humanity can do’.
We at Schools Plus were so pleased to hear that KAA had been given this award to honour their outstanding desire to keep education going in the toughest circumstances. Although we didn’t let the facilities at the temporary site, we were in constant contact with KAA and we’re happy to say we are once again working with the Academy back at their original home which re-opened in September 2018.
Along with receiving this prestigious award, KAA was also given a boost by receiving a visit on Wednesday 13th February from HRH The Prince of Wales, Patron of education charity Teach First, who was in attendance to celebrate the Academy’s partnership with Teach First.
This visit was well received by the Academy as HRH The Prince of Wales took his time to speak with pupils, teachers and members of the community, to find out why the school remains optimistic about its future.
Speaking after the royal visit, Principal David Benson said “I’m very proud of what students and staff have achieved at Kensington Aldridge Academy and am delighted to have been able to share that with the Prince of Wales.”
We are thrilled to have the opportunity to continue working alongside KAA and we are grateful that we had the chance to share their recent good news in this post.
KAA really is a fantastic Academy to let for, with standout facilities including a Rooftop 3G Pitch, a modern Sports Hall, a standout Dance Studio, some great outside event areas and more.
If you’d like to take a further look at these facilities, which are available for hire evenings, weekends and school Holidays please visit – http://www.schoolsplus.co.uk/kaa/facilities/
School Site – https://kaa.org.uk/
Photo Credit – Nigel Howard, award photo. Stuart Wilson, Royal visit photos.
This article was written with the kind help of both Principal David Benson and Vashti Turner, Communications Manager at KAA.