The Crestwood School

The "Invictus Education Trust"[6] is the academy to which The Crestwood School,[7] Leasowes High School,[8] Ounsdale High School,[9] Ellowes Sports College [10] and Kinver High School [11] are all part of. The Sixth form is governed by Mr A S Griffiths. The Invictus Trust was created in March 2015 by the founding schools: Crestwood School, Ounsdale High School, Ellowes Sports College and Kinver High School with Leasowes joining in Autumn 2016. The word Invictus by defenition means ‘indomitable or unconquerable’. After creating the Education Trust, they then brought about the genesis of the 'Invictus Sixth Form' in which all of these schools involved are part of.

The Crestwood School is one of the more successful secondary schools in the area and is part of a project that involves both a standard Primary School and a Special Educational Needs (SEN) school, which work closesly with each other. The area known as Campus 21 has benefitted from investment including the building of The Brier School (SEN 5-19) and a new sports hall. The Drama department is one of the most successful subjects in the school and each year they perform for the National Youth Theatre.

Two systems used within the school include the Buddy system, whereby Year 10 students work with new Year 7 students in a bid to help them settle in after their school change. There is also a group of ambassadors, where Year 11 students assist teachers in the monitoring of students.

Extra qualifications and courses include "Critical Thinking" AS level, for more gifted students, hosted by King Edward VI College, and vocational opportunities at local colleges. Other activities include debates, swimming galas and historic visits.

For option choices students have the choice of: P.E, Food technology, Product design, Geography, History, R.E, I.C.T, Drama, Art or Music as their main GCSE Course, or they have the choice to go to a local college and study different courses including: Animal management, Hair And Beauty, Construction, Business Studies, Child Care and many other courses.

Crestwood has a very active SEN policy, with a higher than average proportion of SEN students than most other schools, this has been bolstered recently by the introduction of a scheme whereby Crestwood becomes the major centre for deaf or hard of hearing students throughout the Dudley Metropolitan Borough.

The House System is now fully implemented having been introduced to students in a series of assemblies in July 2009. Each house consists of at least one class from each year group. After students and staff had voted which list of names they liked best as a title for each house the system with the greatest number of votes was Famous Ship Names.

There is a member of staff who has pastoral responsibilities for each House. This management structure replaced the Head of Year system where a member of staff dealt with issues that arose from students who belonged to a particular year group.

This new method of grouping students in this vertically integrated way will have a number of benefits for students and it is envisaged that it will result in the smoother running of Crestwood.

Each house is now identified by a different colour. This colour is integrated into the school badge that is worn on a blazer. The school is very grateful to Totally Uniformed who have helped us to finance this change. The result is that current students have been given a new house badge to replace the old one that they had.

The first time the house system was incorporated into the life of Crestwood was for Sports Day on Tuesday 14 July 2009

The school badge had been changed due to The House system being introduced, with the rim of the badge being the colour of the house they are in. The colours and names for each house are:

• Invincible - Orange
• Discovery - Blue
• Endeavour - Green
• Victory - Red
• Warrior - Yellow

Crestwood is considered to be the most improved school in Dudley so far.

• Crestwood School, Eastleigh, Hampshire

• School website
• Edubase