End of Term Letter - October 2026

Thursday, 22^nd October 2026

Dear Parent/Carer,

End of Term Letter

We have enjoyed a great start to this academic year and have been very impressed by how well all the students have embraced the new timings of the day and settled back into the school routine.  We are so proud of how fantastically students have engaged with their learning, extra-curricular clubs, tutor team and belonging sessions.  The noticeable improvement in our whole school attendance is commendable and shows our students’ commitment to their education. We are delighted that our students continue to embody “The Grace Way” and work tirelessly to maximise their Limitless Potential.

Whole School Update

Year 6 Open Evening was a phenomenal success. We had more parents and potential Year 6 students than ever before and are really looking forward to welcoming them into the Grace family. The school had a fantastic buzz and our student ambassadors really demonstrated “The Grace Way”, eloquently speaking to prospective parents and students about what they love about life at Grace.

Personal Development and Ethos

We will be interviewing the Year 12 candidates for Head Student positions after the half term break and are looking forward to announcing our new school leaders. Form and year group elections are now complete, with our Leadership Team made up of two Student Council members per year group and two Form Reps for every tutor group. Our main student leadership body will soon be taking part in training around peer leadership, and we are really looking forward to hearing their ideas and watching them make a real difference in the year ahead.

A big thank you to everyone who has attended our parent events led by our Ethos team this half term. This includes our weekly free Grace Food Market (Thursdays, 9.00am–9.30am) and our rotating weekly coffee, cooking, and craft mornings. We also held a session on 'A Parent's Guide to Managing Anxiety' and hope those who came found it helpful. It was fantastic to run our Family Cinema Evening for prospective Year 7 parents, as well as our Macmillan parent coffee afternoon.

We took 14 students to the headquarters of Samaritan's Purse for the launch of the new 'Impact Innovators' programme led by the Grace Foundation. Working alongside students from other schools, they took part in social action projects with Operation Christmas Child and Feed the Hungry, packaging over 12,000 parcels to be sent across the world. Our students will continue working with Ethos throughout the year before pitching their own ideas to a selection of business partners on how to bring about positive change and give back to our local community.

Year 7 students recently took part in a performance by the Loudmouth Theatre Company called 'My Mate Fancies You', which explored how change affects us and how to navigate the transition into secondary school. They also took part in a workshop led by Rites of Passage Productions, taking an in-depth look at one of our core school values, 'Genuine Integrity', and what that means in everyday life.

As a school, we are deeply committed to ensuring our students understand and celebrate Black History Month. Students have engaged in tutor time activities and explored displays across the school highlighting inspirational men and women. Year 9 took part in dedicated Black History Month workshops run by Rites of Passage Productions and the whole school had the opportunity to join in with a movie night, food tasting, and a hair and beauty masterclass.

We always use the Harvest Festival as a chance to support our local food bank, who do so much for our families throughout the year. To make sure we provide a wide variety of what they actually need, each year group was tasked with collecting a specific item. Thank you so much to those of you who have already sent items in—we will be delivering all donations to the food bank immediately after half term.

These are the items that each year group has been collecting:

Year 7: Pasta
Year 8: Tinned Soup
Year 9: Teabags
Year 10: Tinned Vegetables
Year 11 & Post-16: Biscuits

Alongside our Harvest collection, our staff also held a cake sale to raise funds for Macmillan Cancer Support.

Year 7

I am so pleased with how Year 7 have settled into their new life at Grace Academy. The level of maturity and commitment has been amazing. It has been so lovely to see and hear the excitement during our Friday Celebration slots and to see them getting involved with clubs and enrichment opportunities at lunchtimes and afterschool. A massive well done to the Year 7 Boys’ football team for winning their first ever match at Grace and displaying their Intentional Excellence and Limitless Potential.

Year 8

I have been delighted with how well the Year 8 students have returned to Grace after the summer break. They have conducted themselves brilliantly in lessons and it has been lovely to celebrate with them each Friday in our Celebration slot. We are looking forward to seeing all our parents and carers at the Year 8 Parents’ Evening on Thursday 12th November from 4pm.

Year 9

It has been great to welcome back our Year 9 students this academic year, with so many of them already thinking about what this year entails for them and already having conversations with staff around option choices for later on in the year. It is also wonderful to see so many of the Year 9 students signing up for extra-curricular clubs and taking part in the afterschool events hosted by our Ethos team.

Year 10

It has been lovely to see how well our Year 10 students have settled into the beginning of their GCSE journey. There has been lots of excitement from the students around starting their options subjects, which has been echoed in how fantastically they have conducted themselves in lesson time. It has also been lovely to celebrate with them all during our Celebration slot each Friday and I look forward to this celebration continuing when we return from the half-term break.

Thank you to those who were able to attend our Work Experience Parent Information Evening. We have now launched work experience for Year 10 students which will take place from Monday 21st June to Friday 25th June. Please note, the work experience placement form needs to be handed in by Friday 11th December. We really appreciate your time in supporting your child finding a placement. If you have any questions, please contact Miss Ellam, Miss Roberts or Mrs Williams.

Year 11

As we reach the end of term, we would like to congratulate our Year 11 students on their hard work and embodiment of Intentional Excellence during the recent Mock 1 examinations. Thank you to all parents and carers who joined us for Parents' Evening and the Sixth Form Open Evening; your continued partnership is vital to supporting our students’ success. We strongly encourage all Year 11 students to submit their applications for Grace Academy Coventry Sixth Form to secure their Post-16 pathway with us. Our Geography students participated in their second GCSE Geography field trip to Carding Mill where they had a very productive day.  Finally, we were delighted to celebrate fantastic attendance with a reward trip to Alton Towers for 130 students maintaining 97% or higher attendance—a huge well done to all those who were eligible to attend for maintaining such high standards.

Assessment Points (APs)

There are three sets of exams (assessment points) during the academic year for students in Years 7 to 10.  Your child will sit their Assessment Point 1 (AP1) assessments in November and the results will be used to generate a grade which appears on their end of term report. This will be a projected grade based upon how their assessment performance reflects when considering a potential final GCSE/A-Level grade. These assessments will be conducted in classrooms.  We will not be sending out individual or group reminders of specific dates or revision topics as this information will be given to students in class. We would like to take this opportunity to remind you that our school website contains information around the curriculum for each subject and year group; what is being studied, why, and how you can support your child in learning more and remembering more.  Please support your child in preparing to the best of their ability and in approaching these assessments with a positive attitude and “growth mindset”.  It is imperative that students attend for their assessments to ensure students and teachers can then be made aware of any gaps in students’ learning and work towards improvements.

Please see below the dates of the first assessments this year for each year group.

Year 7 AP1 Dates

Year 8 AP1 Dates

Year 9 AP1 Dates

Year 10 AP1 Dates

Sixth Form

We have enjoyed welcoming our Year 12 students into Sixth Form and they have settled in extremely well during their first half term. We have launched our highly successful Career Ready programme with Year 12 students which has seen a lot of engagement already. Students have completed applications with successful candidates having sat their interviews earlier this week. Students will find out if they have been successful in gaining a place as we return from half-term.

This year, Year 13 students have sat their Year 13 mocks earlier than usual. Students have spent a lot of time and energy on these examinations and we have seen a 100% completion rate across all subjects. Students have ended the half-term with receiving their grades and teachers have been delivering feedback to help students improve their grades. Our Year 13 students have been looking at options for the next stage of their journey; students have been concentrating on their personal statements for university and apprenticeship applications.

Our plans for next academic year have begun already with our Sixth Form Open Evening taking place. The evening saw Year 11 students collect their mock examination results and they were given an insight into what Post-16 study looks like and what each subject covers across the two years of study.  95% of our Year 11 cohort attended the evening which saw students and teachers have the opportunity to discuss subjects and next steps to help students decide on their individual pathways.

Safeguarding and Family Support

As a school, the safety and wellbeing of our pupils and members of the school community is most important to us.

As we break for the week, if you have any immediate concerns for the safety or welfare of a child, please contact MASH (Multi Agency Safeguarding Hub) on 024 7678 8555.

If you need support for yourself over the next week, please contact your local family hub: The Moat Family Hub at https://www.coventry.gov.uk/themoatfamilyhub.  Family Hub aim to reach children, young people and families when the need first emerges; and to help and support when we can have the greatest impact.

• Early Help: telephone 0800 8870545 or email earlyhelp@coventry.gov.uk
• Emergency Duty Team: telephone 024 7683 2222 between 5pm–8.30am and during weekends
• Multi-Agency Safeguarding Hub (MASH): telephone 024 7678 8555

October Half Term Family Activity

We have attached a poster for a free family activity afternoon run by the Coventry Best Start Family Hub.

General reminders

A date for your diaries is our Christmas Fayre on Friday 11th December.  This is a free event for our local community and we will have a variety of stalls including gift ideas, tombola and some fun competitions, as well as a visit from Santa!  We hope you will be able to come along with your families. 

Please do follow us on social media for more regular updates about what is happening at Grace.

Please note that the Academy office will be closed during the half-term break.

We hope all our students and families can now have a well-earned break, ready to embrace the exciting Christmas term and look forward to welcoming our students back to the Academy at the usual time of 8.40am on Monday 2^nd November. 

Yours sincerely,
Mrs E Wheller
Principal