| Established | 1957 |
|---|---|
| Type | Secondary |
| Religion | Non-denominational |
| Headteacher | Mr A Ireland |
| Specialism | Sports College |
| Location | Eckington Road Sheffield S20 1HQ England |
| Local authority | City of Sheffield |
| DfE URN | 107135 |
| Ofsted | Reports |
| Students | 1324 |
| Gender | Co-educational |
| Ages | 11–16 |
| Website | www.westfieldsportscollege.co.uk |
Westfield Sports College, is a non-denominational secondary school in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England. The school is a specialist Sports College. It serves an area on the south east edge of Sheffield where many people now work in service industries and where levels of prosperity range from above to below average.[1]
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Westfield Sports College is the successor to Eckington County Secondary School which opened in 1930 in Halfway, which was then located in Derbyshire. It became Eckington Grammar School in early 1940s.
Westfield Comprehensive School came into existence in 1957 as the first comprehensive school in Derbyshire. There were two sites, a new site on Westfield Crescent () in Mosborough and the existing Eckington Grammar School, which became the Lower School. Frank Rollinson, who had been appointed headmaster of the Grammar School in 1953, oversaw its conversion into a comprehensive school.
In 1967 Sheffield extended its administrative boundaries to include Mosborough. After peaking at just under 2000 in 1977, Westfield's roll declined in the 1980s and the Lower School at Halfway was demolished in 1989.[2]
Westfield School campus, on Westfield Crescent in Mosborough, was closed in December 2006 and the new modern building opened its doors in January 2007. Westfield Secondary School is one of four schools under the Sheffield Schools PFI3 project. Kier Managed Services Ltd were awarded the 25-year contract for the facilities management of the school, as part of the PFI project.[3] The new school, situated on Eckington Road behind the Waterthorpe Supertram Stop in Sothall, is roughly two miles from its predecessor. On 1 May 2007, the new school campus was officially opened by Rt Hon Gordon Brown MP, who, at the time, was Chancellor of the Exchequer. After releasing a net of balloons to mark the opening of the school, he spoke to students and answered questions about how he got into politics and whether or not he will be raising the pension scheme.[4][5]
The new school building was designed around the 'W' shaped symbol of the school logo and consists of 6 wings across two levels for English, Mathematics, Humanities and Modern Foreign Languages.The school has dedicated accommodation for special educational needs and also includes an Integrated Resource Unit for students with moderate learning difficulties. The building also incorporates four fully fitted ICT rooms and the Science wing has 9 laboratories and a prep room. The Art and Technology departments include facilities for art, textiles, food, graphics and design technology. Performing arts have 2 music rooms fully equip with 12 keyboards and computers in each as well as a sound proof studio box and 2 performance rooms.[6] The sports facilities include a 25m swimming pool, large sports hall, fitness suite, activity centre, all weather floodlit pitches and hard games courts. These are available to the public outside school hours. These sports facilities are used by the school daily, earning the school the status of sports college. Despite the new name 'Westfield Sports College,' the school has many other facilities to offer its students, including a residential centre, Greta Cottage, at Cliburn in the Lake District, which is used by groups for both curriculum extension work and for adventurous outdoor activity.[7]
On Monday 12 March 2007, a fire, which took more than 45 firefighters to put out, destroyed the woodwork block (H Block) of the Westfield Crescent campus.[8] This campus has now been completely demolished.
Westfield sports college created an IT centre in 2008 consisting of 100 PCs, which replaced the existing school library. The new addition, known as the Mega ICT Suite, was officially opened in 2008 by Clinton Woods. The room is open to students in the lunch-break for revising, researching and homework. It is divided into four main sections which allows four classes to use the room at a single time.
The school has a new revolutionary way to register students known as the medallist system. Each student and member of staff has an identification card. To register, each student passes the card over a reader on the wall of each class room. This action is called 'swiping in'. The cards are also used to pay for meals at the restaurant. Students and staff choose what they would like and 'swipe in' to a card reader. Then the vendor can charge them for the item they have bought. The cards have a medal on them, the medal colour tells which medal status they are. Only students have a medal status which begins at gold medal and goes down to a trainee depending on how many behaviour points a member of staff puts on each student's personal record. Only gold and silver medallists are allowed in certain places, such as the Mega ICT Suite and a special lunch queue.
Westfield Sports College had a link with Malawi set up by the Youth Sports Trust and the British Council. In February 2008, two senior teachers from Malawi visited Westfield Sports College and an action plan was drawn up to share experiences between the two Sports Colleges in Mzuzu, Malawi and Westfield Sports College.
Young Leader work, geography lessons, citizenship and global issues are to be shared through a sporting link. As the action plan rolls out, students at Westfield Sports College will correspond with Malawian students, share lessons via DVD and websites and compete in physical fitness competitions with the young leaders in Malawi. The link is to culminate at the 2012 Olympics. Photographs from the visit are being used in geography lessons. Two Westfield teachers paid a visit to Malawi in November to find out more about the colleges in Malawi.[9] Pupils at Westfield School took part in the Xoolon Games day as part of their partnership with the Mzuzu Government School in Malawi. Pupils and staff plan to create a virtual competition between the schools using the Xoolon platform.[10]
At a 2009 Local Authority meeting it was identified that Westfield Sports College is the 3rd in the city for highest attendance.[11] Like most secondary schools in Sheffield, it does not have a sixth form.
When 48 schools from across the Yorkshire region competed in the Real Challenge event, held as part of National Enterprise Week (2007) in Leeds, Westfield School, won the prestigious title of regional champion for Yorkshire.[12]