Last year, the school focused on Kindness - recognising, modelling, and encouraging thoughtful and compassionate behaviours throughout the community. Kindness tokens and merits became part of daily school life, awarded to students for simple but powerful acts: opening doors, helping friends, assisting with schoolwork, and offering support. This initiative had a noticeable impact, with staff and students alike witnessing a significant increase in kind behaviours throughout the year.

This academic year, the spotlight has turned to Resilience - an essential quality for both academic success and personal growth. Staff have stepped up to lead by example through a series of resilience challenges. Head Teacher Ms Blundell and Ethics teacher Mr Swift undertook the task of learning to juggle over a single term. In weekly Monday broadcasts, they shared their journey, reflecting on the highs and lows of learning something new and difficult.

Ms Blundell shared: “Talking openly about how I found this challenge tricky and showing progress with our students helped us all remember that being challenged and finding things difficult is part of the learning process.”
Mr Swift added: “Every dropped ball was a reminder that failure isn’t the end - it’s a step on the path to growth.”

This term, the resilience challenge continues with Miss Holt and Miss Pope, who are learning all 206 world flags in preparation for a surprise quiz at the end of term. Through these staff-led challenges, Gordano is actively demonstrating that resilience isn’t about perfection, but about persistence, discomfort, and learning through the 'messy middle'.

Mrs Davies and Mrs Curme have used the analogy of mountain climbing to frame the resilience conversation - reminding students and staff that the hardest part is often halfway up, when exhaustion sets in and the summit feels distant. In a creative twist, they even performed a short drama during staff briefing to illustrate this metaphor: the journey is tough, but the view from the top makes it all worthwhile.

Meanwhile, the school’s Duke of Edinburgh team is doing incredible work, with hundreds of students participating in the programme this year. As part of the resilience initiative, a campaign titled “This is Resilience!” uses candid photos from student expeditions to prompt conversation and reflection about what perseverance truly looks like in action.

           As Gordano School continues to nurture these core values, students are not only seeing resilience and kindness in theory - they are watching it come to life in the actions of their teachers and peers. The school is creating a culture where character matters just as much as academic success.