King Ethelbert School in Birchington has been awarded ‘The Wellbeing Award for Schools’ for supporting the wellbeing and mental health of its school community.
The Wellbeing Award for Schools, which has been developed by the National Children’s Bureau and Optimus Education, recognises the outstanding work being done in schools to promote wellbeing and mental health within school communities across England.
King Ethelbert School embarked on the award process in 2021 and have since developed various ways in the school to help support both wellbeing and mental health in the school. This has included creating an action plan which then fed into a whole school strategy for improving the wellbeing of its students, staff and parents/carers, the introduction of ‘Student Wellbeing Ambassadors’ across the year groups in the school, and the creation of Wellbeing Hubs which are inclusive of staff, students and parents. Following a rigorous verification process culminating in a one day inspection the school received the well deserved news that they had been successful in achieving this award.
The Department for Education and Ofsted have supported this approach, stressing that promoting good mental health is the responsibility of all the people who make up a school community; its staff and governors, parents and students, and partner organisations beyond the school gates.
The Wellbeing Award in-school Coordinator Charlie Barber said “We are absolutely delighted as we first embarked on the award process well over a year ago. The process initially involved us looking at the policies and procedures we had in place and to see if we could refine and build upon them to ensure that we are meeting the needs of our whole school community”. This included the introduction of our amazing three ‘Wellbeing Hubs’ which are run by teams of staff, students and parents/carers within the school”.
Headteacher, Tom Sellen said, ‘We are passionate about promoting the wellbeing and mental health of the students, staff and families at King Ethelbert School. The process enabled us to evaluate areas in which we were already doing this well, but also identify where we needed to improve. Gaining the award has been a rigorous but thoroughly worthwhile experience and Charlie Barber and her team have done a fantastic job.”
