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Learning Away Champion Schools

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Lumen Learning students getting muddy

Walsall Academy students on expedition

Pokesdown Primary School on tour

We want to recognise schools that are striving for their residentials to fulfil the Brilliant Residentials criteria and to share their good practice. We are looking for Champion Schools to help us campaign for brilliant life changing experiences for young people, by displaying the Champion School logo and working with us to share their knowledge and practices.

We will be forever indebted to the Learning Away coordinators and participating staff at all the partner schools who engaged in the first phase of the Learning Away action research. Their continued commitment to extending and developing their residential offers, engaging with the evaluation, and sharing what they learned through a period of significant national change was inspiring and we are delighted so many of these schools continue to champion ‘Brilliant Residentials’. We know there are many more schools providing high-quality residential experiences and we want to officially recognise them too.

What does it mean to be a Learning Away Champion School?

Becoming a Champion School means that you strive for all your residentials to be high-quality Brilliant Residentials.  Through the Learning Away programme a clear picture of what makes a high-quality residential learning experience has been developed, and Learning Away have coined the phrase ‘Brilliant Residentials’ to describe these experiences. Brilliant Residentials are school trips with at least one overnight stay, which are:

  • Led by teachers (and, where appropriate, students)
  • Co-designed with students
  • Fully integrated with the school curriculum and ethos
  • Inclusive and affordable for all students
  • Deliberately planned to meet students’ specific learning needs
  • Part of a progressive programme of experiences
  • Designed to include a wide range of new and memorable experiences
  • Designed to allow space for students to develop collaborative relationships with both peers and staff
  • Evaluated rigorously
  • Planned so that learning is embedded and reinforced back in school
  • Supported by senior leadership.

What does being a Learning Away Champion School involve?

A Learning Away Champion School will help to share their knowledge and experience in order to spread the Brilliant Residential message.  It also means that your school will continue to strive to enhance your own residentials. Initially this will involve taking part in a case study for the Learning Away website, as well as pledging your support for Brilliant Residentials here.

In return you will be able to display the Brilliant Residentials ‘champion’ logo on relevant school material to show that you are an advocate for residentials and your school will be listed on our website.

There will also be the opportunity for champion schools to share news and photographs of your residentials with Learning Away to use in news articles and publicity material, and potentially speaking about your experiences at workshops and conferences to encourage other schools to offer more and higher quality residentials.

How does a school become a Learning Away Champion School?

If you are interested in becoming a Champion School you will need to complete the Learning-Away-Champion-Schools-Case-Study-template.

When Learning Away receives your completed case study, we will use it to reflect on the practice in your school and to better understand your approach to residentials. As we need our new Learning Away champion schools to be following (or at least striving towards) the Brilliant Residential criteria, we will then be able to consider whether your approach meets the standards for being a champion school.

Who are our Champion Schools?

We are delighted to have the following Champion schools:

Are you a champion school? Get in touch

Email learningaway@lotc.org.uk or call 07545 696 881.