Leamington secondary school is set to re-open and relaunch its sixth form after closure

Trinity Catholic School in Leamington is set to re-open and relaunch its sixth form in September.

In 2018 the sixth form was suspended for a period of one year to allow the Interim Executive Board (IEB) and the Senior Leadership Team an opportunity to address both curriculum and financial pressures that faced the school.

But the school's head of the sixth form and Trinity's senior assistant principalMatthew Alton has said that more than half of the school's 100 Year 11 pupils have now applied to stay on for further education there.

He said: "It's fantastic news because we want to be in a situation where students have the opportunity to continue their education at Trinity because we believe it is the best place for them.

"We have a good history of sending our students to top level universities and want to allow students to continue with a Catholic education from year 7 to 13.

"That's something we are really passionate about."

Mr Alton said that while sixth forms are expensive to run it is also important to parents of perspective pupils that the school offers their child an education past the age of 16 and GCSE level.

He said: "If they see we have a sixth form it makes us more appealing to them.

"Our Intake {of year 12 students] is quite small at the moment but that gives us an opportunity to really tailor and personalise the education we offer for those individual students.

"Our year 11 students are keen to stay on and many of them have applied.

"We don't want our students going elsewhere.

"We feel we can offer them the best possible route through.

"We have some incredibly talented students at the school but recently we have missed the opportunity to guide them on a path."

Mr Alton admitted that reopening and 'rebuilding' the sixth form was a daunting and challenging task but one he is relishing.

He said: "What's helping is that we are collaborating with two other schools - St Augustine's Catholic School in Redditch and St Benedict's Catholic School in Alcester - and our students have come together with theirs online to do some activities and it's important that we are coming together with them.

"The staff themselves are also really pleased - for a teacher teaching to A level standard is really nice to be doing - and the parents are delighted as well."