Black History Month
October 2021 marks Black History Month in the UK and at Nova. We realised very quickly that October half term would reduce BHM coverage by 2 weeks, so we planned ahead. We started work on our Black History Month activities in September in preparation for the exhibit launch in October.
Working with BAMEed Bristol and South West, it was clear that we at Nova were leading the way in our ideas and projects for Black History Month amongst Swindon secondary schools. Other schools took inspiration from Miss Claire Preece’s artwork idea from Freequality and did similar in their schools. The next part of our exhibit will be to highlight #ProudToBe and local Black History.
We demonstrated best practice and paved the way especially across EduTwitter and our school Instagram platforms. Our reading programme has been diversified by Mrs Anderson. Even Karyn Parsons – who played Hilary Banks in Fresh Prince of Bel Air – reshared our Instagram story on her profile as we read her book ‘How High the Moon’ that was also promoted by Bedrock.
There was a fantastic assembly by Miss Sayers, discussions in The World Around Us at tutor time, freequality club coverage of BHM, entries from all houses and year groups for the exhibit launch and a flag competition on Friday lunch time.
Different departments have collaborated and are collaborating in a shared folder for future activites and a huge thank you to Kate Griffiths and Tom Griffiths for compiling music by Black Musicians.
We will run further activities throughout the year and also mark South Asian Heritage Month as part of embracing World Diversity in Nova, Swindon, Wiltshire, UK and afar. There will be upcoming discussions in The World Around Us, further assemblies such as the impact of racist slurs by Mrs Malik, and further work in Freequality alongside other activities/competitions.
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