News Winner of the Independent Schools of the Year 2021 Award for Outstanding Response to Covid-19 08.10.2021

We are absolutely delighted to have been awarded the Independent Schools of the Year 2021 Special Award for Outstanding Response to Covid-19. Presenting the award, the judges said, ‘schools and students across the country have risen amazingly to the challenge of supporting their local and wider communities, in many cases providing a vital life-line’, and they paid tribute to Godolphin’s ‘inspiring community outreach activities – including the sector-leading Bridge programme – which provided an astonishing level of digital learning support to state primary and senior school partners during the depths of lockdown’.

This award recognises the great generosity of spirit, energy and commitment of our students, staff, parents and alumnae and their efforts to stay connected and to support each other and the wider community during a period of unprecedented challenges and disruption. Their commitment ensured that our outreach Bridge programme continued to support the nearly 40 primary state school students who logged-on to sessions via live google meets using iPads provided by Godolphin where necessary. Our Higher Education Undiscovered Subjects event, introducing university subjects not normally taught in schools, was relaunched as a series of 30 – 40-minute on-line lectures which were well attended by students from our state partner senior schools and we  hosted online debating workshops for Year 7 and 8 pupils from local state schools. Initiatives in the wider community included a link-up with Certitude, one of London’s leading adult social care providers, to supply PPE to staff in care homes and our 1st XI Hockey Squad ran 3000km in 30 days to raise over £9000 for NHS Charities Together. Students made face masks for the local community, laundry bags for the NHS ‘Rapid Response Appeal’ and volunteered with local community groups to support vulnerable people; one student was featured on the BBC News Report, Corona Kindness. DofE students contributed 3,224 hours of voluntary service to our local community; we collected and donated food to the local Hammersmith and Fulham Foodbank, presents for the Salvation Army Christmas Appeal and raised funds for Children in Need. Students supported Ready Tech Go and Battersea Power Station and Wandsworth Council by donating used IT equipment, laptops and tablets for children who didn’t otherwise have access to the internet. Our Head Girl set up Mentor Jr and recruited fellow Sixth Formers to provide a free online mentoring and tutoring service to local primary school pupils and Lower Sixth students set up the online Pulsar Science Magazine for primary school children to support their interest in science and help with their learning.

Head, Dr Frances Ramsey, congratulated the whole school community on receiving the award saying, ‘over the last eighteen months we have striven to maintain a sense of togetherness, even when we’ve been apart, and  our students have demonstrated great imagination, energy and commitment in supporting each other and the wider community despite the trials they faced during the pandemic’.