Introducing Our Amazing New Space ‘The Elms Building’We invite you to take a look inside.

‘It’s a Beautiful Day’ by the talented Alex Baker , BHASVIC Alumni Music Student performed at our virtual Summer Concert.

PARENTS & CARERS NEWSAUTUMN 2020 | ISSUE 9

Welcome to the latest edition of the Parent and Carers newsletter and the first of the 2020-21 academic year. This year was always going to be unusual and challenging and I’d like to start by congratulating our students for how they have navigated the past term. Whether new to the college or returning, all students have complied with our new systems and got to grips with a new timetable structure whilst we operate as a Covid-secure college. I’d also like to

thank parents and carers for your support during this period. It has been vital to get young people back into education settings and during the national lockdown

and local tier restrictions it is vital that we are able to remain open and continue to function as safely as possible.

The reality is that we have had to reinvent the college twice in the space of six months. First in March, as we moved all our provision online and delivered learning remotely with an almost seamless overnight transition to Microsoft Teams. And then secondly, over the summer, as we reinvented BHASVIC to allow us to operate on site against the backdrop of restrictions as we follow government guidance. We know we are not alone and all sectors have had to do the same. I hope you felt we have always communicated with you in a timely and transparent fashion.

While there is no current end in sight, we must be prepared that disruption will continue into the new calendar year and we will always put the safety of our community first. The one constant we have tried to remain true to is to continue to give our students the best possible

experience by trying to maximise learning onsite and given the opening of our new Elms Building this is especially apt.

Staff have worked incredibly hard to make our approach work as best it can, and I hope you feel your young people are well supported. We know it is a different experience for students – especially socially – but we have seen them grow in confidence and settle into new routines as this current ‘normal’ beds in. We will continue to find innovative ways for students to continue to Be Happy Active Successful Valued Independent members of our Community, for example through the Colleges Live event which took place on Wednesday 18 November, more details can be found inside.

Best wishes, William Baldwin (Principal)

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We invite you to listen to BHASVIC’s Virtual Summer Concert from our talented music and performing arts students. The Music Department made it possible for us to watch and listen to our brilliant music students performing from their homes. There's something for everyone - from Michael Bublé to Tchaikovsky! So, make yourself a cuppa, kick back, relax and remind yourselves of those warm sunny days.

Visual Arts Corona pandemic project #14daysbhasvic – MAY 2020 First year (A1) students from across Graphics, Fine Art, Textiles and Photography worked on a new brief written in response to the Corona pandemic. The project titled ‘#14daysbhasvic’ presented the students with 14 words to respond to in a creative way over the period of two weeks. Words such as ‘room’, ‘routine’, ‘transformation’ and ‘responsibility’ were expressed in a myriad of outcomes such as collage, sculpture, polaroid’s, animations, paint and stitch. The breadth of creative endeavour was testament to how art can be used as a force of positivity in these uncertain times.

BHASVIC celebrates the work of visual arts students this year via this virtual exhibition – JUNE 2020 Please visit our Visual Arts Exhibition 2020 below which showcases a selection of work from Fine Art, Graphic Design, Photography and Textiles A level courses.

Enjoy The Amazing Work Of Visual Arts Students Via Our 2020 Virtual Exhibition.

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PARENTS & CARERS NEWS

With everything that has happened over the last eight months, all our students need support more than ever; we want to reassure you that at BHASVIC there are services in place to help support them. Their Personal Tutor is always an excellent first port of call and, for those who may need more intensive or specialist advice, we have a dedicated team of Counsellors and a Welfare Coordinator who specialises in providing practical advice. For a full list of services, and the Guidance and Students Services team information, please see Our Support Service. Our team of Guidance Managers are also able to help with support and advice; every student has a Personal Tutor and Guidance Manager assigned to them which can be identified by the first initials of their Tutor Group code e.g. AMC/NJF.

BHASVIC is proud to support Foundations for Our Future, a commitment to improve the emotional health and wellbeing of children and young people. BBC South Today visited us in October and spoke to Alison Cousens, Assistant Principal who was part of the Independent Review Panel. It also featured BHASVIC students, to view the clip please play the video.

BHASVIC has a range of resources supporting the emotional health and wellbeing of young people, check our website Wellbeing @BHASVIC and . Further initiatives are also being implemented with partner organisations such as Pick Your Own to support our students.

BHASVIC is aware of the importance of parent and carer communication, we have a dedicated page for parents and carers with a wealth of resources for yourself and your young person. Please view the links along the bottom of this page.

If you think there are areas we can improve on, we welcome your feedback, please email Caroline Abbott on c.abbott@bhasvic.ac.uk.

Take some time to familiarise yourself with our Below are some examples of resources available on the Parents' and Carers' Dashboard.

keep up to date with and follow us on:

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You may also like to know more about Support Plans which are designed to be supportive and to help students develop and improve.

Parent Advantage Click here to access the Parent Advantage Login Instructions on how to access your online Parent Advantage account were sent via email communication earlier this month. Instructions and guidelines can also be found on our website (please scroll down the web page for further resources).

If you have previously attended a Parents’ Evening or Meet the Tutor Event, you should already have an active account, which will enable you to manage your own bookings. Please see our parents' and carers' page for full information.

Virtual Parents' Evening and Online Booking SystemWe trialled our first video appointments for our two Meet the Tutor Evenings in October and received lots of positive feedback but also appreciate technology does not always run smoothly for everyone. Any feedback is gratefully received, our parents’ evenings are scheduled for these following dates:

• Second year (A2) students - Thursday 26 November and Wednesday 2 December 2020.

• First year (A1) students - Thursday 14 January and Wednesday 20 January 2021.

*Communications regarding parent events are sent via our Student Services Team*.

Following earlier correspondence this term, here is a reminder that once a term you will receive information through Parent Advantage about your young person’s progress through Progress Reviews.

Progress Reviews Reminder (Termly) For All Students

At the end of the summer term, UCAS references/predicted grades will be available via Parent Advantage.

Publication dates are:

Parent Advantage enables you to track the progress of your young person online which includes up-to-date attendance, timetable, support plans, exam entries etc. Anytime you require assistance please email CIS@bhasvic.ac.uk who will be happy to help you.

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PARENTS & CARERS NEWS

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Our first webinar took place for New Parents and Carers on the evening of Thursday 8 October it included Q&A’s with William Baldwin (Principal), James Moncrieff (Deputy Principal) and Alison Cousens (Assistant Principal) and our BHASVIC Wellbeing Partner Andrew Wright, from Action Your Potential.

BHASVIC Parent Quote - “I just wanted to let staff at BHASVIC know that we really appreciate all work & arrangements being put in place to get students back to some kind of structure from September. It’s a crazy time still and my young person will appreciate getting back into a routine. Thanks again”

September 2020We opened the doors to all our students on Monday 14 September and operated our two thirds model which is working well and ensures students obtain a valuable teaching experience onsite and via remote learning, giving students a blended approach to college life.

We introduced our virtual helpdesks for all students via our website, a first for BHASVIC. It was a huge success, with key staff monitoring the desk daily from 11 September to 2 October. Staff responded and forwarded queries to the relevant departments ensuring quick responses back to students and allowing course change requests to take place before the deadline.

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BHASVIC isn’t just a centre of academic success. We also offer numerous opportunities beyond academic courses, enriching our learners’ experiences via sports, the arts, clubs and societies, in normal times, travel options too. Due to the current ongoing Covid-19 situation, we have had to change our Enrichment offer and we are creating new virtual opportunities for our students.

Full information can be found here BHASVIC ENRICHMENT. Please also see BHASVIC News and individual Subject Course Pages showcasing individual course enrichment opportunities. You may also like to read previous editions of our Parents' and

Carers' News here: Spring 2020/Autumn 2019/Spring 2019. There is a special feature on Enrichment in our Summer 2019 edition. Please see further highlights below:

• Freshers' and Enrichment Virtual Fair – Went live on 12 October. Running for two weeks, we were pleased to offer a combination of videos, posters and literature for students to view, and contact details for support groups and organisations. Further information will also be updated on the Student Union - Clubs and Societies page. Students are also encouraged to join our online community and all links are available on the Student BHASVLE.

• BHASVIC has close ties with our Community Police Officers and we welcomed them onsite, managing to expertly manoeuvre their vehicle close to our piazza, officers were on hand to ask questions from our students. Further visits are planned in the coming months.

• Black History Month Proud to be part of this event the student-led African Caribbean Society took part in a placard making workshop and our Drama department created two powerful pieces

• James Harvey, a 2nd Year student at BHASVIC was a finalist in the at the Department of Computer Science at the University of Oxford.

• Congratulations to our second-year student Alex Marshall who entered the Student Robotics Competition. Alex set up an independent team ‘JAMDynamics’ and won.

• During Careers Week at the beginning of March, over 20

Business/Economics female BHASVIC students attended an AMEX workshop, more details here: BHASVIC Enrichment

• Young Enterprise 2020 - Two BHASVIC teams made full entries into the 'Virtual' Young Enterprise Finals . This involved the teams submitting company reports, video presentations and trade stand pictures.

It was a very different experience as we held our first virtual open evening, which took place on Thursday 12 November. Please take some time to visit the website as it features an immense amount of information, presentations and films put together by our talented and hardworking staff, also including current and ex-students' experiences. It will remind current parents/carers and students why they chose to study at BHASVIC and inspire the next generation of BHASVIC students. Please share with friends and family.

Duologue 'Paint Spill' - A radio play and Monologue

and Soundscape.

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PARENTS & CARERS NEWS

We were delighted that BHASVIC students had an opportunity to experience Colleges Live 2020 on Wednesday 18 November. It was an enriching and formative online experience for college students to come together and hear from game changers, innovators, survivors, and risk takers from across the globe. Please share with your young person in case they were unable to attend.

Reopening & Welcoming Students On Site

All teaching moved to remote learning through Microsoft Teams, there were many challenges and obstacles to overcome but students and staff excelled through these tough times. Teams is now ingrained at BHASVIC and has helped

communication throughout the college in a positive way from our tutor programme through to remote, online lessons, and a more streamlined way of working for all our staff.

End of March – The Start of Remote Learning

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Results day at BHASVIC has undoubtedly been different this year, but Principal William Baldwin was keen to ensure that some things remained the same. He said ‘These results reflect – as they always have – two years of hard work and dedication and our students should be rightly proud of their achievements. These grades are hard won results, that reflect the hours of studying and learning that our students have invested. Whilst they have come about in unusual ways, they are no less of an achievement and I’d like to congratulate all our students on these outcomes, having navigated an incredibly stressful period’.

BHASVIC is used to being in the top 1% of national providers for A level outcomes and students have again secured some incredibly strong results this year. After the failure of the Ofqual algorithm, outcomes were - as you will know – awarded via teacher judgements. There was never going to be a perfect system for awarding grades this year – nothing was going to replicate an actual exam, but our staff approached this new

awarding system professionally and with the upmost integrity using an internal system that was completed with multiple checks and balances and which closely matched outcomes from previous years.

Concluding his thoughts, BHASVIC Principal, William Baldwin said: ‘These results reflect a culmination of learning over a number of years and as such I’d like to thank our schools for laying the foundations for this and to our parents and carers for the support they provide to our learners – especially during the last few months of exceptional uncertainty. Congratulations to all our students – I will never forget the class of 2020. Remember that your results don’t define your humanity – kindness and compassion are more important qualities than grades! No-one can take away from you what you have learnt, know and can do. Good luck as you navigate your varied and exciting progression routes.’

August 2020 – BHASVIC Results Day 2020

Following the college closure in March, we were delighted to be able to offer COVID-secure independent study space, an offer which was taken up by over 200 first-and-second year students on site over the months of our closure. It was a logistical

feat for the learner provision team, we were able to accommodate this thanks to our our amazing staff volunteers, and the Additional Learning Support Team. Information regarding Additional Learning Support can be found in the link on this page.

Learner On-Site Provision Offered

As our new students were unable to experience this on-site all activities moved online. Resources were added to the Student VLE (Virtual Learning Environment) and were set out in five stages with: film clips; student support surveys; learning activities; help and support with our virtual help desk plus our first #BeMoreBHASVIC Neuro Ninja webinar. This focused

on study skills advice and looking after your wellbeing. There have been weekly wellbeing updates from Andrew Wright since September, students are able to access these via the Student VLE. The next webinar for parents/carers and students is on Wednesday 9 December. See the Wellbeing website on this page for further details.

June 2020 – Moving On Week

A1 Enrolment

This is the launch of the second year (A2) tutorial journey, it enables us to tailor second year students in tutorial pathways. Normally held on one day around various locations in Brighton, this year we had

tutorial pathway teams, online events and a wealth of careers advice and resources available to students. You can still view all the information on our website, links are available on this page.

June 2020 – Progression Week

It was a delight to welcome our new students on site for the first time since their interviews. We enrolled students over four days, in four locations around the college site to ensure we were socially distanced and COVID- secure. As students left they were offered a delicious scooped ice cream from the ‘Indulgent Ice Cream’ van.

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PARENTS & CARERS NEWS

Alumni NewsBHASVIC are looking for former students who can inspire and advise current pupils. If you are a former student, please sign up to our alumni community: futurefirst.org.uk

Melanie Haagman is a poet and teacher from Brighton, and ex-pupil of BHASVIC. Meanie decided to write her way through the global pandemic and recently had her

book published entitled ‘Lexical Lockdown: Poems about Binge-Watching, Exercise Mishaps, Fridge-Surfing and Other Pandemical Pursuits.’ The book is valuable to any age group and has the potential to support pupils to make sense of the unsettling circumstances that we have and are facing.

Listen to Ben Lintott, Ex-BHASVIC student On the Creative Careers Podcast.In 2019, whilst Ben was still studying at college, Ben joined the “LOOKOUT: Are we there yet?” scheme, which matched Ben with a brilliant mentor from Big Egg Films. Through this project, Ben was able to build creative skills and learn more about the industry he is passionate about.

University Challenge for Durham - Ex-student Holly Parkinson took part in the July 2020 series, Holly is featured here with her team mates. Durham University’s team won their second match in this year’s University Challenge on 23 November. The team need to win one more match if they are to make the semi-finals.

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PLEASE ALWAYS CHECK THE BHASVIC ONLINE CALENDAR for a detailed schedule of the Academic year. Due to the

current situation we may have to amend events or calendar entries at short notice.

We offer a range of adult education courses, more information can be found here: . We will be opening new 20-week beginner courses as well as advanced conversation classes starting in January 2021. If you would like

to be added to the contact list and notified as soon as enrolment opens, please email language.centre@bhasvic.ac.uk and let us know what language you are interested in.

Adult Evening Language Courses

Brighton’s three colleges – BHASVIC, GBMET and Varndean have jointly pledged their commitment to the recently released FE Climate Roadmap with all three aiming to be ‘leading’ institutions by 2023.

BHASVIC In The CommunityClimate Roadmap Pledge

We all need some Christmas cheer, especially during these challenging times, so we are delighted to announce a virtual BHASVIC Christmas Concert available to view on our website in December, more details we follow later in the month.

Save the Date

BHASVIC Parent Quote - “Dear BHASVIC, What an incredible, sensible and sensitive thing to do just before Xmas - thank you so much for thinking of us. I'd like to take this opportunity to thank all of you at BHASVIC for making this Covid situation work. From the tutors and teachers through to the leadership team back down to the cleaners and organisers of all the logistics - you are all doing a wonderful job and I am very proud to recommend you to the various friends I have with young adults choosing their further education”

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PARENTS & CARERS NEWS

Finally from a starting point of looking out of the window and working with the title ‘Watching & Waiting’, here is a piece by some of our drama students, reflecting on lockdown.

We are delighted that six of BHASVIC’s photography students were included in an exhibition at the Pavilion Atrium on Worthing Pier as part of this year’s Photo Fringe festival. The open call was for young photographers aged 14 -18 years to submit work that responded to the theme of ‘Take a photo / make a difference’. The (COVID-safe) exhibition will be up in the physical form until the end of the year and is also part of the Photo Fringe website HERE. Please take a look at the incredible breadth of submissions received, really well done to our exhibitors; Varun Mahatme, Ava Bridgewater, Zachary Scott Paul, Emily Grace Aldridge, Jack McAllister and Olive Carr McClave. To view photos click on the image.

Open20 Young Photograper Exhibition