I am delighted to welcome you to St. James’s Catholic Primary School.

Our school motto is ‘Put out into the deep’ and this is evident in everything we do. We are highly ambitious and strive to be the best. St James's has an established reputation for providing an exceptional education, based on the values of living life through Christ.

The quality and dedication of the teaching team who work at the school is an essential factor in the excellent standards maintained.

We want our pupils to learn, achieve and excel inspired by Gospel values, so that they can reflect God's love in their everyday lives. We focus on building self-esteem and confidence so that success can be achieved spiritually, morally and academically. We are committed to high attainment for all learners.

We are a vibrant community, serving four parishes and our curriculum provision is rich and diverse. We believe that academic rigor is not the enemy of creativity. At our school, children master an ambitious curriculum in a systematic way while flourishing in a creative environment.

The wider curriculum is as valued as the core. We have specialist teachers for French, Art, Music and Sport which means our children have access to practitioners who are experts in these areas.

Our school is equipped with first-rate facilities and resources; we have a large library, an outdoor classroom, extensive playing fields, a computing suite and a classroom dedicated to Science and D&T learning.

Our relentless focus on effective teaching and learning, informed by cognitive science, is reflected in our strong academic outcomes. Our performance in national tests is consistently above average and our pupils excel academically in comparison to other pupils locally and nationally.

As a Rights Respecting School, we nurture and develop children who hold the highest expectations of themselves and others.

At St James’s, children learn to contribute to the life of the school and those wider communities to which we all belong. We aim to provide our young people with a wide range of skills and knowledge necessary to become high achievers and leaders in an uncertain and dynamic global society.

We strive to develop open, co-operative and positive relationships between home and school, with parents and carers becoming active partners in their children’s education. Where such relationships exist, then the best foundations for a true education have been laid.

We recognise that a child is deeply influenced by their parents and a Catholic school can only build upon what a parent is doing at home.

I look forward to meeting you in person soon.

Yours sincerely,

Mr. C. Beatty
Headteacher

St James's is a Catholic school in which each individual grows in the knowledge and love of Christ. In partnership with parents and the whole community, our purpose is to provide a high standard of education, giving the maximum opportunity to realise each person’s potential.

We believe that to make this vision a reality, we must:

• Stand firm in our faith and follow the example of Christ: help our children, families and each other to know of God’s love for us all and to learn about the message of Christ through the Gospels. In doing so, we nurture all individuals to develop confidence and have high self-esteem.
• Cast our net wide: provide a high quality, inclusive education for all where creativity and personality are allowed to blossom and thrive, and where independence, motivation and perseverance become life-long skills. We foster in the children, respect for themselves and all human-beings, respect for the environment and society in which they live so that they grow into kind and caring young people who respect others regardless of their faith or cultural backgrounds.
• Unite as a community: recognise and realise the immense potential of working in partnership with the children’s families, the Parish and wider community in order to fulfill our wider ambitions for the children in our school.

• The quality of education: Outstanding
• Behaviour and attitudes: Outstanding
• Personal development: Outstanding
• Leadership and management: Outstanding
• Early years provision: Outstanding

The Inspectors' report stated:

"The school has a relentless focus on providing the highest possible quality of education."

"Pupils consistently demonstrate excellent attitudes to their learning. They are extremely focused and engaged during lessons. Children in the early years are highly motivated. They share and cooperate well and show respect for each other."

"The school has developed an extremely ambitious curriculum for all pupils. They make sure that pupils build knowledge over time progressively. Staff have identified precisely what pupils need to learn at each stage of the curriculum. This helps pupils to learn and remember new concepts quickly."

"The school have developed a thoughtful and well-planned personal development programme. This is rooted in the values of the school. Pupils develop a thorough understanding of how to stay safe and healthy. Pupils all have access to a rich set of wider opportunities."