House System and Enrichment Activities

The House System

The College’s House System makes a valuable contribution to the provision of Pastoral Care and the development of the college’s ethos.  Each pupil is assigned to one of the four houses, Dunleath, McCormick, Montgomery and Nugent when they begin Year 8 and remain in this house throughout their time at the college.  As part of our family ethos, family members are usually in the same house – and this can steam back several generations.  Healthy competition between the Houses occurs across a range of activities – academic, sporting, artistic and musical.

Aims

  • Provide students with a group identity and sense of belonging
  • Promote interaction between students in different year groups to provide opportunities to learn from each other
  • To support the college ethos and provide students with opportunity to achieve,  celebrate success while having fun
  • Encourage students to become involved in extra-curricular activities
  • Provide students with opportunities to develop leadership skills and qualities
  • Encourage healthy competition and the desire to succeed

History

The four houses at Glastry College have been named after local families who settled in the area during the Ulster Plantation and these are how our 4 registration groups are name in each year. A distinctive colour represents each house;

  • Dunleath – Yellow
  • McCormick – Blue
  • Montgomery – Red
  • Nugent – Green.

3 Categories of House Points

  • Enrich
  • Empower
  • Excel

Enrich

These points will be awarded for Extra-Curricular including house competitions and school representing sport.

  • Attendance to enrichment activities
  • Participation in extra-curricular events and competitions

Empower

These points will be awarded for Character and personal responsibility.

  • Behaviour (politeness, good conduct, attendance)
  • Charity (participating in charitable activities including but not limited to raising money)
  • Responsibility (Prefect, mentoring, school council)

Excel

These points will be awarded for Academic commitment, application and achievement.

  • In class – ordinary work, tests etc
  • Trackers
  • Reports

Our Enrichment Programme

Our after school enrichment activities take place every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday with Scripture Union and ‘Homework Club. among activities that take place during lunchtime.

The school day ends at 15.45 except on Wednesday, where the last period of the day (15.00-15.45) is given over to extra-curricular activities. On Wednesday afternoon some afterschool activities run 15.00-15:45 and some run 15.00-16:30.  Students may leave the College at 15.00 on Wednesdays provided that they are either collected from the College or they can walk home safely.  Written parental consent will be required for students to leave at 15.00.

These are some of the enrichment activities that we run:

Sport & Fitness

  • Badminton
  • Football (Girls)
  • Football (boys)
  • Netball (Y9 Girls)
  • Rugby (Boys)
  • Rugby (Girls)
  • Yoga & Zumba Fitness

Musical

  • School Rock Band
  • Music
  • Choir (Girls)
  • Choir (boys)
  • Choir (mixed)

Creative and Leisure

  • Chapters – A quiet space for pupils to relax with a good book.
  • Cookery Club
  • Drama Club
  • Glastry College Newspaper
  • Horticulture Club – Developing the school garden
  • Junior Art Club
  • Senior Art Club
  • Nurture Club – chats, games, walks
  • Junior Science club
  • Technology Club – A blend of Solid Works CAD and practical projects

Teamwork, Confidence and Competition

  • App development club (Amazon AWS based completion for Y8)
  • Politics/debate club – Organised debating within Glastry with opportunities to compete between schools. (Senior School)
  • Quickstart – Business enterprise club (Junior School)

Academic Support

  • Homework Club – In a classroom
  • Homework Club – In an IT suite
  • Maths Support (Junior School)
  • Maths Support (Senior School)

Guidance

  • Careers guidance (Senior School)
  • UCAS and Careers Support Hub (Y14)