Activity: Enrichment trip to New York City

The students saw much of what NYC has to offer with a trip to a Q&A session at the Film Comment Selects Film Festival at The Lincoln Center where the panel discussed a recently rediscovered film from the 1960s directed by Paul Newman.

Activity: Enrichment trip to Rome

Philosophy students had the opportunity to discover Rome during this visit to Italy’s capital city. The group visited for 5 days and saw many of the famous sites such as the Trevi Fountain, Spanish Steps, The Colosseum and The Vatican City.

Activity: Trip to Athens

Classical Civilisation and Philosophy students enjoyed a trip to Athens. They visited the theatre of Dionysus and Acropolis in Athens and went to the mountains at Delphi to retrieve an oracle from Apollo… which foretold great exam results for our Classics students.

Activity: Trip to Berlin

The Bedford Sixth Form students took centre-stage during a recent trip to the 65th Berlin International Film Festival. The four-day enrichment visit was attended by 23 A-Level Film Studies and Communication & Culture students accompanied by their subject teacher, Jo Done, and Head of English, Simon Hardie.

A first for the Sixth Form, the trip included visits to The Berlin Film Museum where students were able to consolidate their studies and see the actual sets, costumes and script notes from such German Expressionist classics as ‘The Cabinet of Dr Caligari’ and ‘Metropolis’, witness the horrors of the Second World War at the Holocaust Memorial Museum, take in amazing views of the city at the top of Berlin TV Tower and experience the ‘red carpet’ treatment at the opening weekend of the 65th Berlin International Film Festival.

Jo Done, Teacher, said: “This trip was a great success for both the students and for The Bedford Sixth Form. To offer such a rich diversity of experiences for the students in just a few days is something I am sure they will treasure for a long time. I was extremely proud of how well they conducted themselves at the Film Festival, especially during the Q&A sessions with the director and cast following the screenings. As a teacher, to see your students use what they have learnt in your classroom and put that into practice by individually taking the mic in a packed 800-seat auditorium and directly question the filmmaker is quite an achievement.”

Activities: Trip to Paris; Trip to Barcelona

Students enjoyed first-hand experience of Barcelona’s artists, designers and architecture. One particular location that impressed was the Sagrada Familia; the incredible and very large Roman Catholic Church. One student said: “If this was the only place I visited here in Barcelona, I would still feel lucky to have travelled to see it for myself”. Students filled entire books with sketches and photographs during the trip and reflected their thoughts in their own journals. But it wasn’t all about the art; students sampled tapas at the many restaurants and witnessed incredible views across the city from the terraced area at the top of Park Güell.

Activity: Trip to Goldsmiths University

Our Art students met Professor Green at Goldsmiths University where they explored perceptions of identity; questioning how identity is formed through arts, science humanities and cultural settings. They attended thought provoking workshops and discussions presented by the V&A Museum, Museum of London and Poetry Society, amongst others.

Activities: Tour of Parliament in London; London Political Experience Day

As part of the day, students were given special permission to go through the security barriers at Downing Street, and enjoyed posing outside the famous door of Number 10. They also visited the House of Commons and House of Lords and took part in a Select Committee experience. The trip provided students with great insight in preparation for their end-of-year exams.

Activities: Science Museum; Natural History Museum; Sanger Institute, Cambridge (below)

The Sanger Institute in Cambridge focuses on scientific research to understand the role of genetics in health. The Institute was a leader in the Human Genome Project which sequenced all of the chromosomes of a human being. When our Biology students visited the Institute, they had a tour of the labs, were given an overview of some of the techniques used to sequence DNA and met with a scientist who works on the genome of zebra fish.

Activities: Prague Film Festival; British Film Institute in London

Film Studies students at The Bedford Sixth Form took a trip out to the British Film Institute for a study day, which included a preview screening of ‘Ghost Stories’ – a new British film – about an arch skeptic, Professor Phillip Goodman, who embarks upon a terror-filled quest when he stumbles across a long-lost file containing details of three cases of inexplicable ‘hauntings’. The students then had the opportunity to take part in a Q&A session with the writers; Jeremy Dyson and Andy Nyman.

Activities: Inspiring talks by Dr Mandy Bloomfield (lecturer in modern and contemporary literature) and Dr Nicola Darwood (expert in nineteenth century literature) from the University of Bedfordshire. There have also been visits to the V&A museum in London and to various theatres including a showing of As You Like It at The Globe.

Activities: EU Court in London; Galleries of Justice in Nottingham

Activities: Bedford Hospital Pathology Laboratory
Our Applied Science Students are visiting Bedford Hospital Pathology laboratory today.
We will look at the design and working of a professional clinical studies laboratory and how the lab receives, develops, processes, records and communicates tests on biological samples to the doctors and patients.

Activities: Cambridge Light House Cinema, Loughborough University Business Department, Westfield Stratford; London School of Economics (below)

Young economists accompanied two members of staff to the London School of Economics (LSE) last week for a public lecture on ‘Does Europe have a future?’ delivered by Professor Stephen M Walt who is a professor of International Affairs at Harvard University Kennedy School of Government. They did BSF proud by showing that age and status does not matter if you have a question to ask! We are proud to say that sitting next to PHD students and government officials did not deter our students from having their voices heard with some very well thought out questions for the Professor.

Activities: An outdoor team building adventure for Business students at the Kempston Outdoor Centre.

Activities: Graphics Gathering – in collaboration with Art on the Underground (AOTU).
Our Students attended the Graphic Gathering and had to design a poster for the London Underground that conveys the ‘language of London’. The winning poster will go on display around the tube network and will be seen by millions of people each day.

Four sport students attended the School Games Maker Conference at the University of Bedfordshire (Bedford Campus). This was run by the Local Organising Committee (LOC) for the Bedfordshire and Luton School Games. The conference was aimed students aged between 14 and 25 years old who have shown a desire to participate in leadership, volunteering and officiating within their school or community.