Brookfield Community School, Fareham

Brookfield Community School is a large state-funded secondary school located in the Locks Heath ward of the Borough of Fareham. Brookfield serves 5 feeder schools in the local area, due to the shortage of secondary schools in the local area Brookfield is an extremely over-subscribed school, the school has already increased its maximum limit to try to allow more pupils to attend the school. Brookfield is one of the largest co-educational, comprehensive secondary schools in Hampshire, the school currently has approximately 1700 students on-roll, there are approximately 120 teachers employed at the school. The school teaches years 7 to 11. The School attracts 98% of the local 11-16 cohort and there are large waiting lists in a number of year groups. The school has recently undergone changes in layout to provide access for disabled students.

Status

Specialist Status as Language College was awarded to the school in 2002. In May 2005 the OFSTED Inspection report described the school as, "good with some outstanding features". It provides a good quality of education to the students.. In 2010, all specialist status school funding was withdrawn by the government. Brookfield School is now simply a secondary school and not a language college. The senior leadership team is made up of the Headteacher, three Deputy Headteachers, an Assistant Headteacher, a Business Manager and the Support Services Manager. Additional members of staff are seconded for a one-year period to contribute to strategic development and policy discussion. In 2008 Brookfield was inspected by OFSTED and received a 3, which is classed as 'satisfactory'. The school was again inspected by OFSTED in October 2010, with the outcome being an improved grade of 2 ('really good'). A team of Pastoral Support Officers take responsibility for behaviour management. In September 2010 the school introduced linear tutor grouping, whereby the school was split into seven houses, each named after a colour and a famous olympic athlete, including Jessica Ennis-Hill, Mo Farah and Ellie Simmonds. A diverse range of subjects are taught throughout the school, including English, Maths, Science, Geography, History, RE, Drama, Art, Dance, PE, Technology and ICT.

The senior management team consists of: Mrs Maria Allan (Headteacher since 2005), Mr Andrew Ledward (Deputy Headteacher), Mr Stuart Parkes (Deputy Headteacher), Ms Petrina McCulley (Deputy Headteacher), Dr Roger Hutchin (Assistant Headteacher), Mr John Paton (Business Manager) and Ms Tracy Calder (Support Services Manager).

School life

The school also has an on-site LRC (Library Resource Centre). The LRC has almost 18,000 resources available for students and staff to use, the LRC is open from 8am - 4:15pm each school day. The LRC includes a projector, interactive whiteboard and one of the 9 computer suites around the school, the LRC also provides a few Apple iPads, which the students can use during their free time, and for research ( when the whole class is in the LRC due to a lesson).

The school also has many different after-school classes for both children and adults, including Adult education classes and the on-site Fitness Suite is also open to student & adult memberships. Student after school activities usually all end by 5:30pm, but the entire school actually closes at 10:30pm, this is mainly due to adult classes.

The school is highly technological with most classrooms fitted with a working Projector, while some classrooms (predominantly in Maths and Modern Foreign Languages) are fitted with Interactive whiteboards with computer connections, Every teacher is also given a Laptop which is able to connect with the interactive whiteboards and projectors. The school does not use traditional "paper registers" for student registration, instead every teacher registers children via their Laptops and transmits registration details over the school wireless network using SIMS. In late 2008 the school introduced an SMS messaging service to ensure that parents are always informed as to whether their child is in school and whether there are any important upcoming events, but this service provides no individual information on students progress. The school currently has a VLE (Virtual Learning Environment) in which staff can upload any resources they want to the VLE for students to access anywhere in the world, soon parents will be able to monitor their child's progress in a small way from the VLE.

There is also a very large facility for Music and Drama which are very popular at Brookfield. It was named after the former head teacher (Mark Roe). Many music lessons go on everyday teaching students to play instruments such as piano, guitar and also singing. Also, every year the school puts on a production for all years. This year's school production was "The Wiz" which is a story bassed on the Wizard of Oz with different style music.

Notable Alumni

Steve Claridge Ex professional Footballer

External links

• Official site