Year 10 students who have successfully completed their bronze Duke of Edinburgh Award were awarded their certificates in today's assembly.

The Duke of Edinburgh Award is a fantastic opportunity for students to extend their skill base, and gain confidence and independence at the same time. These students have worked really hard over the past 6 months learning new skills, taking part in physical activities, volunteering and taking part in a two night expedition.

The expedition and the training section was a definite highlight for the students and an adventure of two halves, for the training aspect students had to endure torrential rain with one student even trying their hand at bog swimming! In stark contrast the main event happened to take place on the hottest weekend of the year! Despite all extreme weather conditions students showed true resilience and enthusiasm, cooking up an amazing cooked breakfast with freshly prepared hash brown and as the sun set enjoying jumbo toasted marshmallows around the campfire. They even got to watch the England world cup game through the foresight of taking a power pack with them.

Equal credit must also be given to the other sections, for skills, students took on journalistic roles, looking at the effects of cancer research, performed regularly in a band improving their skill level of playing a musical instrument and developing their art skills which resulted in a student producing a range of facial portraits in different medium.

For the Volunteering section of the award, as part of caring for an elderly neighbour, lots of dogs got taken out for walks, Mums and relatives were given a reprieve when chores were completed at home for free and students helped support their local primary school children when they came to the academy for science enrichment activity.

On top of all of that students were expected to take part in a physical activity which shows improvement in their chosen activity. One student used her love of boxing to demonstrate how much she has progressed and improved whilst another took up cycling which improved his fitness levels, gave him more independence and taught him the skills of bike maintenance!