Colchester Sixth Form College
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Colchester Sixth Form College is situated on North Hill in central Colchester, Essex, England. Established in 1987, it provides further education in the north Essex area.
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[edit] Courses
The College offers courses and qualifications to more than 2800 students - including a large range of AS-Levels and A-Levels; GCSEs; and since 2003, the International Baccalaureate. It is mandatory for students studying AS/A-levels to take at least 4 academic subjects; most A-level courses have 4 hours of lesson time per week. The College has consistently ranked highly on the AS/A-level performance tables[1] in which the results have been above the national average and the average for Essex.
Students whose parents are low-income may be entitled to an EMA, to assist their studies, and encourage them to go to lessons.
[edit] Additional studies
Additional classes are run to suit individual interests or to support a career aim. Most courses run over two terms for between one and six periods a week, and the majority lead to nationally recognized qualifications (e.g. the Cisco CCNA course) while others such as Personal Development or Emergency Life Preservation lead to NOCN accreditation.
The college's music additional studies are notable. It has an orchestra, a band, a choir, and a troupe of singing dwarves, and has many music events throughout the year. Instrumental lessons are provided at college at a subsidised cost, and students taking music A-level or IB receive half an hour's free music tuition each week. The Essex Music Foundation also pays for the college's students to take grade 5 and 8 instrumental and theory exams, using the exam board ABRSM.
[edit] Adult courses
The College offers a number of IT courses to adults on Saturday mornings. Courses include BBC Becoming Webwise, CLAIT, ECDL, French and a new online touch-typing course.
[edit] Departments
- Biology
- Business Studies and Economics
- Accounting
- Business Studies
- Applied Business
- Economics
- Management Studies
- Chemistry
- Computers
- Computing
- ICT
- Critical Thinking
- Electronics
- English
- English language
- English Literature
- Combined English
- Environmental Science
- General Studies
- Geography
- Geology
- History
- Archaeology
- Classical Civilisation
- History - Modern
- History - Tudors
- History - Medieval
- Politics
- International Baccalaureate
- Law
- Law
- Social Science Citizenship
- Mathematics
- Media and Film Studies
- Media
- Film
- Modern Languages
- French
- German
- Italian
- Spanish
- Performing Arts
- Dance
- Drama
- Music
- Music Technology
- Performance Studies
- Philosophy and Religious Studies
- Philosophy
- Religious Studies
- Physical Education
- Physics
- Psychology
- Sociology
- Technology
- Design
- Graphics
- Technology
- Food Technology
- Textiles
- Arts
[edit] Student initiatives
[edit] Committees and representation
The Colchester Sixth Form College committees for Arts, Social, Charities, Environments and Sports (primarily student-run) represent the students in the college council. Executive positions include a Treasurer responsible for the Council's annual 60p budget, a Secretary, a Public Relations officer and a Vice-Chair.
2007-8 executive: Joshua Shreeve (Chair), Jennifer Lau (Vice-Chair), Nontokozo Dube (Secretary), Daniel Stamp (keeper of the money)
[edit] Coffee Bar
A student-run facility serves hot drinks and snacks in competition with the official College refectory. Students are free to set their own policies regarding pricing and products. This year's incarnation is a Fairtrade, not-for-profit organisation supporting the Russ Foundation.
[edit] College Magazine
The college produces a magazine each half term called The Student Voice. All the articles are written by students.
[edit] Student radio
The college has run its own radio station (Storm Radio) since 1995. The shows are presented by students from both years and make use of mixed genres of music, while the station itself functions and is treated by the music industry as any other commercial radio station. The station can be received on 999AM/999MW in the College area and across the IT network in most classroom locations.
[edit] Other information
The College is located on the former site of the Gilberd School.
Television presenter Dermot O'Leary is a former student of the Sixth Form College.
In 1994 Blur played a show at the college
