Art students have worked hard to create over 500 ceramic poppies to mark the 100th Anniversary of  World War 1.  These can be seen on display in the Peace Garden.

Students of all ages across the academy have made the striking bright red poppies that were inspired by the poppies displayed at the Tower of London a few years ago.  The poppies are placed on a tree and fall down like a waterfall spreading out across the grass. Students have been excited and engaged by the project and have enjoyed trying to identify their individual poppies out of the hundreds on display.

We will remember them.

In September Year 7 were challenged to get creative and produce a poster about our St Edmund’s CARE values: Calm, Aspirational, Respectful and Engaged. We had lots of fantastic, colourful entries that explained the CARE values.

The winner was Maryam for her beautiful words:

CALM – “It means you have to be calm in line and when waiting to go into class“

ASPIRATIONAL – “You have to be committed to learning and be well behaved“

RESPECTFUL – “Always be respectful to your peers and teachers and be well mannered“

ENGAGED – “Give 100% in everything you do and join after school clubs“

Maryam received a medal and vouchers for her winning entry.

Congratulations Maryam.

Daniel Collett from GE Aviation came in to deliver some workshops with year 12.  Former Head Boy at St. Edmunds who secured a very successful apprenticeship, Daniel is now in his fourth year at GE Aviation. He gave the students an insight in the world of work and the role of an apprentice.  Daniel was accompanied by a team of new apprentices who supported him with the employability workshops.

Sophie said “I found that it was very beneficial as they spoke to us and advised us on how to write a CV and the type of things to say within an interview. They also gave us tips on how to turn small things on your CV (such as communication skills) into things you can use in a bigger way. They also showed us how apprenticeships are not just about having a job but how they also continue teach you new things, such as how to work as a team, even when you’re out of the education system”.

Abigail said, “Although not being interested in the course itself (Engineering), I found it very helpful when advising us about how to prepare for interviews and questions that we may be expecting and how to answer them correctly to impress the interviewer, and to be able to flip weaknesses I may have, into positives”.

Taran said , “The course itself was very good at showing us how to prepare ourselves for interviews, along with telling us how to impress the interviewer”.

What a success!!!   Really wet weather conditions did not deter prospective students, parents, friends and relations from attending our Open Evening on Thursday evening.  Visitors were keen to experience excellent classroom displays, listen to Mrs Hazeldine’s address, have their questions answered from staff on hand, take part in a tour of the academy,  join  a Treasure Trail based on gospel values, meet with Wolfie (who was on hand all evening) and generally soak up the atmosphere that is St Edmund’s.

Well done!!

Over the two years of A-Levels, I have supplemented this academic interest with work
experience within the financial sector. My placement on, “The Young Investment Banking
Programme” at The University Of Manchester gave me a 360-degree experience in investment banking where I was trained on how to secure a front-office position and given access to established investment bankers. During the program, I was given the opportunity to attend a one-on-one question and answer session which I found particularly beneficial. I was able to cover specific areas involving sales and trading, hedge funds and private equity, which gave me an overall boosted insight into finance as a whole. Commuting to Stoke-on-Trent (Wood Goldstraw Yorath LLP) I was given the opportunity to provide a budget for a client where I had to meet their overall set prices in completion of their house. The experience gave me a strong understanding on how to work with a variety of people and how to manage money in a more sophisticated way. I believe that studying a Banking and Finance degree will equip me with the knowledge and understanding to facilitate me forging a long and rewarding career in this area.

Arun Raj

Sixth Form

Sadly, due to poverty and injustice, this harvest will not be bright for millions of children and young people around the world who will miss out on food, clean water and even on going to school.
But your support is helping to change this! Last year, schools around England and Wales joined us to
Brighten Up and help make the world a brighter place for communities living in extreme poverty. Your fundraising has been enabling CAFOD partners to work alongside the poorest communities as they find ways to overcome their many challenges. Thank you!
St Edmund’s will ‘ Brighten Up’ on the Annual Fast Day this Friday 5 October. We will be continuing to collect loose change in our ‘Cafod Pyramid Boxes’, and on Friday we are asking students and staff to either donate the amount of something they normally treat themselves to like a chocolate bar, doughnut etc or to give up their normal lunch instead choose Leek and Potato soup with a roll for £1 cash in the canteen, which will be served by the Lay Chaplain and staff. All the money will be donated to Cafod. A special thanks go’s to our catering staff for making the soup provided.
During this week, some of our students have had assemblies, highlighting the work Cafod does and our prayer theme for the school for this week is Cafod.
The good news is that the number of hungry people in our world is falling, but with 793 million of our sisters and brothers still undernourished, we cannot give up.*
We can all be part of helping to eradicate global poverty and building a brighter world. Whatever you do to Brighten Up, thank you.
Make a difference!
£1 buys seeds for a family to grow beans
£7 buys a treated mosquito net that keeps children safe from malaria
£33 supplies one family with safe, clean water in their home
£300 buys a mobile health team for remote communities that don’t have hospitals

Starting tomorrow lunchtime, Thursday 4th October 2018.
The whole community of St Edmund’s Catholic Academy is invited to come to the Chapel in their lunchtime to take 5 minutes out of their busy day, light a candle and sit in the Chapel. Taking time to either pray for someone or themselves or just take some time to be quiet and reflect on the day, while music is playing softly in the background. This is a great thing to do not only at school but for yourselves at home, it is great for your wellbeing, helping you to keep calm and relieve the stresses of the day- why not try it.
Everyone leaves with a very small gift and a positive quote like
‘Do Small things with great Love’
‘Happiness is not something ready made, it comes from your own actions’
Or one of my personal favourites ‘A smile Costs Nothing’.

October is Rosary Month
The students and staff at St Edmunds Catholic Academy are invited to the Chapel on a Tuesday evening, after school, to look at how to say the Rosary and learn more about this great ‘tool’ for prayers and meditation. The Rosary beads are provided. Why not come along…
October 7th is the Memorial of Our Lady of the Rosary and the month of October is traditionally the month of the rosary. Why did the Blessed Mother ask us to pray the rosary at many of her approved apparitions such as at Fatima? Why should we pray at all?
We know that God is perfect and perfectly happy, so he doesn’t need our prayers or affections… but he loves us and wants us to be happy. He wants to have a loving relationship with us both now and for eternity. God is potentially the greatest source of happiness we can possibly have, as God is the greatest, the most beautiful, most loving, all-powerful and all-knowledgeable being in existence
Prayer is a way to help us get in touch with God and to develop a relationship with him. In prayer we not only talk with God, but God communicates with us. As we continue to pray, our relationship with God grows, and we are transformed more into the people we are meant to be.
So why pray the rosary?
One reason the Blessed Mother asked us to pray the rosary might be because it can benefit anyone at any stage of the spiritual life from beginners to advanced. The rosary is a vocal prayer, a meditation and can lead to contemplation as Pope John Paul II mentioned in his encyclical Rosary of the Virgin Mary.
“A path of contemplation … But the most important reason for strongly encouraging the practice of the Rosary is that it represents a most effective means of fostering among the faithful that commitment to the contemplation of the Christian mystery which I have proposed in the Apostolic Letter Novo Millenio Ineuente as a genuine ‘training in holiness’: ‘What is needed is a Christian life distinguished above all in the art of prayer’. Inasmuch as contemporary culture, even amid so many indications to the contrary, has witnessed the flowering of a new call for spirituality, due also to the influence of other religions, it is more urgent than ever that our Christian communities should become ‘genuine schools of prayer’. The Rosary belongs among the finest and most praiseworthy traditions of Christian contemplation.”