The EQualities Award 

"Underpinned by its strong pastoral practice and reflective inclusive culture, the school has established its identity as a caring, versatile and safe educational establishment, serving the local community the best that the school can achieve in such a diverse residential community." IQM Flagship Assessor: November 2022 

Although we currently hold the EQualities Award which recognises the academy’s commitment to treating everyone equally, we are currently working towards achieving the new Equality Quality Mark, awarded by EqualiTeach. This award provides us with support and guidance so that we can effectively promote equality, diversity and inclusion within Highcrest, and provides us with an opportunity to showcase our commitment to equality. As a richly diverse academy, we have always worked hard to meet our statutory duties, but we would like to go further and really ensure that our students receive the very best education in this important area.

The Award has been designed by a team of equality and education experts to allow the development of best practice around four main themes: Leadership and Management, Behaviour and Welfare, Teaching and Learning and Personal Development of Pupils. There are three levels of award: bronze, silver and gold. We are working towards the silver level, and we expect it will take approximately 12 months to achieve this award.

To support us on our work towards this prestigious award, we have begun to work on a programme to reduce identity-based bullying called Equally Safe. This programme is funded by the Department for Education and will help schools develop best practice in preventing and tackling identity-based bullying, and in developing tailored, whole-school approaches.

Equality Objectives