Though pastoral care has a simple and straightforward goal, it is particularly challenging in an international school with students from all over the world, from different cultures, with varying traditions, languages and experiences. Our Pastoral Care department centres around the idea of a continuous feedback loop whereby issues that arise in school and in the wider world inform the curriculums and content taught by teachers in PSHE, Form Time and in specialist subjects as well as the direction of the House system.
A student for example might be experiencing challenges at home or in school, finding work too challenging or perhaps missing friends and family abroad. A teacher will identify this and record their concerns using a confidential and secure concerns log. Our concerns log allows the Pastoral Care Leader to see the frequency of different types of issues, identify issue triggers, affected students and track students who need assistance.
Use of this real-time information is then used to implement restorative actions that mitigate future issues, find solutions to problems in which everyone involved can learn and grow from the experience or create management plans for ongoing issues.
The main aim of restorative action is to restore a positive sense of wellbeing to those affected while healing and developing relationships in the school community. The Student Parliament also plays an increasingly important role in ensuring student concerns, ideas and issues are heard and resolved.