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 Houseparents and tutors listen, encourage and support. Pastoral care at Bromsgrove is not something that happens when things go wrong: it should be happening every second of the day. Tutor groups are small (averaging eleven pupils to each tutor), relationships are warm and open, and transparency is essential.
However, Bromsgrove has a sophisticated and entirely confidential independent counselling service for those who seek it, and the PSHE programme works in conjunction with the School Medical Centre. Bromsgrove understands the demands the twenty first century puts on young people: we do not expect lily white young people to arrive at or emerge from our School. Quite apart from academic expectations, pupils must often cope with subliminal advertising, peer pressure, mass marketing, and complicated domestic circumstances that would have been all but unknown as little as a generation ago. There is no more important aspect of a school than its Pastoral Care provision. It is fundamental to life at Bromsgrove. |
Pupils first, systems second. Always. But good pastoral care – the kind of pastoral care that really does focus on individual issues rather than offering a one size fits all solution – still needs structure. Bromsgrove uses the house system to foster a sense of community and to ensure tutors and tutees are working to the same ends. This vertical structure (rather than the horizontal form system), means thirteen and eighteen year olds are in continual contact within the house. Older pupils’ own experiences and shared problems can often help a younger pupil as much as the advice of a tutor. Pupils are empowered.