Penrice Academy

Welcome to Penrice Academy

Penrice is a fantastic school with a well-deserved reputation for the highest of standards. In 2023, Penrice was recognised as the top-performing Cornish state secondary school for Progress 8 and Attainment 8. But more importantly, our students are happy, they feel they belong here, they feel safe and achieve many successes in all kinds of fields - we are immensely proud of them! Staff and students nurture wonderful relationships that help students to achieve.

At Penrice, every child matters. We seek to work with students and parents to ensure that each individual achieves their full potential. We want all our students to feel challenged, but supported. Our aim is to guide all students so that they gain qualifications, life experiences and the tools to prosper beyond Penrice.

School should be about opportunities, new experiences and special memories!

Penrice Academy is a part of Cornwall Education Learning Trust and is an Ofsted Outstanding school (last assessed in 2014).

“I have never felt more at home anywhere that I’ve worked before. The support, the personal development, the passion - there’s nowhere like it”

Why Work at Penrice?

Penrice Academy is a fast-paced, driven and forward-thinking school, with a determination to give our students the best possible life chances. We have the highest expectations of our students’ behaviour, engagement and academic outcomes. Our students come to school ready and excited to learn. We offer unparalleled career development opportunities for all.

Our enthusiastic and dedicated team of teaching staff, support staff, leadership staff and our trainees come together every day of the academic year with one collective mission; to help every one of our students enjoy and thrive at their school.

Our Students

The opportunities on offer at Penrice are incredible; multiple sports teams, annual drama productions, termly music celebrations. We have superstars in catering, enterprising, media and technology. The list is endless, the results are fantastic and something we are all extremely proud of.

All students have the chance to take part, whatever their level. We also offer trips abroad to France and Spain to help the learning of a modern language, London to soak up the cosmopolitan culture or opportunities to go white water rafting, snowboarding or, closer to home, climbing, surfing and exploring our beautiful county.

We believe this balance of academic study and life experience is integral to getting the most out of school.

“Penrice Academy has opened doors for me that I never knew existed.”

Our Staff

Our teachers, support staff and governors play a huge part in our community here at Penrice. Each and every one of them helps in daily support, encouragement, teaching and development of each and every one of our students.

Our Governors

Penrice Academy has its own Local Governing Body who are responsible for:

· Setting the ethos and character of the Academy

· Interacting with students, staff and parents on Academy performance, curriculum, the conduct of students and admissions

· Holding the staff of the academy to account for standards

“It is all about the students for me - I feel totally inspired to be here every day, because of them.”

Investing in Your Career Development

Penrice Academy is committed to developing all staff and providing career opportunities and pathways. It is vital that we encourage staff to be reflective and then assist them in becoming outstanding practitioners.

Staff are encouraged to undertake internal targeted CPD, external courses focusing on Teaching and Learning such as ‘Outstanding Teaching and Coaching’, ‘Good to Outstanding’ and subject specific development. Penrice also provides extensive opportunities for non-teaching staff such as training in digital design, Human Resources, Forest School, SIMS, IT, Child Protection and many, many more. We want to be an outstanding employer.

On top of all of this, there are also regular Teach Meet workshops and the increasingly-popular Penrice CPD Podcast – Penrice Talks, which launched in November 2021.

“Constantly improving and developing myself as a teacher is really important to me. Penrice encourages this - every day.”

What do Parents say?

We always seek to be open and transparent with our whole school community. This is all part of being a successful school that strives for continuous improvement.

Every year we run a Parent Voice Survey. The full results of the 2022 Parent Voice Survey can be found here (PDF: 884kb), including all actions in response to feedback.

We Have a School Farm!

Need to wind down during a break or free lesson? - You can pet our animals on the farm!

We are very lucky here at Penrice Academy to have our own farm. The farm was opened in 2019 and has proven to be a fabulous addition to the school.

Our farm animals have all been specially chosen for their gentle temperaments and are a great way of building confidence and self-esteem in our students. Animals are a great form of therapy and our farm animals provide emotional support through calm interactions to students that need it.

The animals we have on our farm are:

2 Cats

2 Golden Guernsey goats

1 North Ronaldsay sheep

1 miniature Shetland pony

2 Kune Kune pigs

4 guinea pigs

2 rabbits

2 degus

1 hamster

1 bearded dragon

A variety of chickens, including 10 ex caged hens that we have rescued.

We also have our own visiting farm dog - Delphi.

Partnership Challenge

Leadership is the key to any organisation; identifying, nurturing and encouraging leaders to be the very best allows Penrice to be the very best.

National courses such as NPQML, NPQSL, local middle leader training, females into leadership and NPQH allow staff to go from their NQT year to leading the school. All ECT's and new leaders are provided with a mentor, to ask those daft questions that sometimes you don’t want to ask. Opportunities to progress and improve are constant and create a real buzz and drive around the school.

Cornwall Education Learning Trust (CELT)

As part of an Academy Trust, we are proud to work together with local schools, sharing teaching, learning and support resources.

The Cornwall Education Learning Trust sees professionals such as teaching, IT and Finance staff acting as support across the communities. This enables us to share good practice and ideas, challenge each other to do better and work together to further improve quality of teaching and learning.