Sir Robert McAlpine builders have made excellent progress with our new Academy over the summer holidays and are hoping to provide us with access to the new building as early as 15th December this year.

Following difficult changes to the exams system this year, we are pleased to share some outstanding results across all departments.

After impressing his manager during his Year 11 work experience placement, Cameron W has secured a part-time position at Marks and Spencers, which will fit around his studies as he enters our Sixth Form.

Students are once again celebrating after another successful year of Sixth Form study. Year 13 students have achieved particularly well and all students have gained the necessary qualifications to support them as they move into Higher Education, training or employment.

King James has been awarded the British Council's prestigious full International School Award for the second time, in recognition of our work to bring the world into the classroom. The award is a badge of honour for schools that promote international education, for example through visits, projects and links with partner schools overseas.

This Half Term, students will be able to take part in an exhilarating Zorbing taster session in conjunction with Consett and District YMCA.

This year we want to make working with primary schools one of our priorities. We will be offering a range of short courses for students in Years 5 and 6, and sharing our fantastic new facilities to enhance learning opportunities for all primary schools in our local community.

Improving literacy is high on our agenda and our students can look forward to a number of new and exciting literacy initiatives.

Each year at King James we offer a free fun-packed Summer School for all our new Year 7 pupils who will be joining us in September, culminating in a confidence-building residential visit. This year, we improved our programme even further to offer two exciting destinations - Peak Venture in South Yorkshire and Cartagena in Spain!

King James has been awarded the Young Carers' Charter following working with Glenys Newby from Family Action's The Bridge Young Carers' Project. Glenys visited the school last term to speak to students about the role of young carers, how they might be identified and about the support available to them.