The River Thames outside DLD College London

From the Principal #122

17th September 21

Thomas HadcroftAfter a couple of weeks we are now fully underway into the year and it certainly is great to see the students, staff and visitors inside the college bringing the whole building back to life. It feels a long time since we have experienced the same feeling of community back under one roof. We still support a number of our students who continue online lessons, though we hope in a few weeks’ time we will all be together once more.

During our staff training week we were delighted to welcome Professor Guy Claxton, best-selling author and leading educationalist, to the college to work with our teachers developing their approaches to teaching and learning for the students.  We are excited to be collaborating with one of the leading experts in the sector and aim to continue to work on strategies to improve the learning happening inside and outside the classroom. One central aim is to support all our students to develop their independent-learning skills and develop them as lifelong learners.

From our first assembly I have made it clear to all our students of the high expectations that we have of them and the need to continue to develop their appreciation of learning to learn. I recommended that all the students purchase the book ‘Learning How to Learn’ by Barbara Oakley and Terrence Sejnowski and to develop a greater appreciation of the processes that they are continually perfecting. If they haven’t yet purchased this, please do encourage them to do so.

It has been great to see the students in lessons, taking part in experiments, presenting to their peers and connecting with each other over the past few days and it is clear that the learning process is developed from their teachers, but also from the diverse community that we have in college.

I would like to thank Dr Daniel Woodley, Head of UCAS and Careers. for his very insightful presentation to the Year 13 and International Foundation Programme students this week introducing the new University Admissions Tutors (UAT) and the university admissions process. I am delighted that each student in these year groups has been allocated their UAT and they will be supporting them over the coming weeks through the admissions process.

Finally, I would like to give my best wishes to the Year 13 students who will be undertaking their first milestone tests over the coming week, giving us an indication of their current achievement levels and how we can offer further support depending on their results.

I wish you a pleasant week ahead.

Best wishes,
Tom

Thomas Hadcroft, Senior Vice-Principal

Thomas Hadcroft