Business

In Business Studies you will learn all about how a business works on the inside. You will also look at different types of business and how to set up and successfully run your own business. You will learn about all facets of business activity including management skills, organizational structure, marketing, branding and finance. Throughout the courses, you will continually develop your Enterprise Skills.

Aims:
Our aims as a Business Department are to ensure that students develop all the skills and understanding they need to be able to set up and run a successful business.

Staffing:

• Curriculum Leader; Mrs Christina Barlow
• Assistant Curriculum Leader; Mrs Dianne Dixon
• Teacher of Business; Miss Laura Fearnley
• Teacher of Business; Mr Joel Clegg
• Teacher of Business; Miss Penny Smith
• Teacher of Business; Mr Lukman Patel
• Teacher of Business; Mrs Janet Pruchniewicz (Headteacher)
• Faculty Personal Assistant; Miss Frances Burkinshaw (Also cover supervisor)

This faculty is a growing department currently offering an exciting curriculum that not only delivers option business courses but is also part of the core curriculum of personal finance, financial capability and economic understanding. We have an experienced team with varying specialism’s and a wide range of skills.

Key Stage 3
Students do not follow any specific business courses however, they study business across the curriculum and in various enterprise activities aimed at the whole school. (See below)

Key Stage 4
Course offered are:
BTEC Business Studies (Edexcel BTEC first – Level 2)
OCR National (Level 1 & 2) in Business (and ICT at level 1)
ICPF IFS – Intermediate Certificate in Personal Finance (Institute of Financial Service Level 1 & 2)
GCSE Short Course Economics (AQA)
Diploma in Business, Administration & Finance (Edexcel Level 1)
Enrichment

As a department we are continually looking to bring business alive and make it real for our students. To enable this we have had outside speakers from industry into lessons, we have taken students on various visits, staff have been on ‘industry insight days’ and we run after school activities to further develop our students. Our faculty is also responsible for enterprise education within the school and our recent provision of enterprise involved a trip to Cadbury’s World. The trip was followed up by a chocolate themed Enterprise Day where pupils designed, made, packaged and advertised their own chocolate bars as a part of their coursework.

As Business and Enterprise is one of the schools areas of specialism the faculty also implements several projects working with other schools, practitioners and community groups to develop business across the school and community. (E.g. Literacy project, team teaching, primary school projects and community classes etc.)

How do we help you achieve your potential?
The Business faculty continues to gain excellent results year on year with 100% of our BTEC candidates reaching a pass or above last year (2009). We also continue to aspire to fit students onto courses appropriate to their learning styles and abilities to enable students to achieve their targets and above. We have also had several groups of students working on extra courses in year 11 in order to increase their results with excellent success (IFS courses and Economics).

Why is it important for my child to learn Business and Enterprise?
You learn skills in business studies that are useful in many jobs. The list is endless but here are just a few;

Who should I talk to if I want more information?
Curriculum Leader; Mrs Christina Barlow