This project application follows a successful first Erasmus+ project between the partner schools. This previous project solidified the links between QKA, AMG and EDC and has built close bonds between the staff and students, which has had a strong impact on all students, particularly at QKA, where without this funding students would not have been able to participate due to economic restraints. This application focuses on developing knowledge about the schools' identities and local history, deepening the links between the schools by understanding their values, both shared and individual. Additionally, at QKA, many students are new or fairly new arrivals to the UK, therefore this project aims to aid integration into the school and UK society by teaching the students about the school and local area. Furthermore, QKA has recently changed its name to Queen Katharine Academy, therefore, this project will help to raise the profile and promote pride in the academy, whilst embedding its new identity and that of its partners. The project will focus on 'Local Heroes'. At each school, staff will identify two heroes who are intrinsically linked to the school - each school is named after a person who will be one of the heroes. In addition to the heroes identified by staff, students will research local figures and identify 3 other heroes that they would like to learn more about - historical figures or living legends. During each movement, students will create a museum exhibition about their heroes, including three different elements: Museum Exhibits (traditional or innovative), Guided Tours of the exhibition and a Tourist Exhibition Brochure (in three languages). At the end of the project, the permanent exhibits will be copied and distributed to each school to raise the profile of the partnerships. QKA is statistically the most deprived secondary school in Peterborough, compounding this is the fact that the majority of students are EAL and new or fairly new arrivals in country, leading to a lack of knowledge of the local area. This project aims to increase pride in the local and wider environment to aid integration and belonging, whilst at the same time promoting links with our European partners. Furthermore, the name 'Queen Katharine Academy' was introduced to the Academy in September 2017, therefore, this project will encourage both staff, the student body and wider stakeholders to develop their understanding of the school and its ethos and aims. The project will also develop academic knowledge, research and presentation skills and promote an inherent interest in History and academia. Links during the project with local museums and universities will raise students' aspirations to study subjects such as Languages and History at further and higher education (a key priority at QKA). Furthermore, the students will be encouraged to use their creativity to develop exhibits using skills from the Arts subjects such as Media, Design and Technology and Performing Arts (amongst others), to promote a love of learning and develop skills. In addition to the permanent exhibition, the information booklet and audio/visual exhibits will be used across all partner schools within the MFL and History curricular as well as being embedded into QKA’s Accelerated Curriculum, which is an alternative curriculum for students with low levels of English to help them to accelerate their English language acquisition and integrate quicker into the school and British society. Using the Local Hero resources as an integrated part of curricular learning would help them to learn about the local area and about Queen Katharine of Aragon and the school's ethos. Furthermore, it would also help the staff body to bond with the school's new identity in a positive way. A range of skills will be developed including: Research and investigation skills in identifying local heroes and developing exhibits giving information about each person; Presentation skills - information will need to be clearly presented in a range of different ways, e.g. orally during tours, written in the information booklets and creatively in the actual exhibits themselves; Teamwork - Students will need to work together in international groups, allocate roles and work to deadlines. QKA is very keen to raise the aspiration of students through its international work and focus on education as a way to escape poverty. This project will raise the profile of the school and education in general, by developing students' knowledge of local and European heritage. The results of the project will be recording in the permanent exhibitions which will be used in school, not only to compliment the curricula in Languages, History and Accelerated Curriculum, but also to support primary transition to secondary to teach primary students about the identity and ethos of their school. Digital resources will also be recorded and disseminated using e-Twinning and a blog-site for open access.

The project, Eco-Leaders, addresses the pressing issue of the environment and the future of our planet. Young people across our nations, communities and schools have sent a clear message: environmental sustainability is one of their biggest priorities and action must be taken. Eco-Leaders builds on an existing and successful Erasmus+ link between the UK, Spain and Germany. The participating organisations mutually recognise the importance of empowering young people to become positive role models within society. Our shared experience of Erasmus+ projects has equally demonstrated the huge potential among our young people to energise others and drive change through innovation and fresh perspective. In consideration of these global priorities and the unique dynamism of our young people, our project seeks to achieve the following objectives:• To establish a student leadership body across each of the three participating schools, which is responsible for promoting our nations’ common goals towards a more environmentally sustainable future.• To provide a platform for students to voice their opinions on environmental sustainability and provide opportunities for them to work together with fellow students, staff and the local community, with the aim of developing common eco-friendly practices throughout our school settings.• To further motivate students to engage with changing global priorities and how these can be addressed through international cooperation, negotiation and collaboration. • To promote cross curricular learning and to provide students with a broader skillset.The project will run over a two-year period and will include a week-long movement to each participating country, involving 30 visiting participants and 30 host participants. Each of the project weeks will be centred around one of the 3 R's of environmental action (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle) with the following desired results: • Each school will establish an environmental student-led committee, referred to as Eco-Leaders. Under the supervision of staff involved in the project, students will meet on a regular basis to discuss their concerns and priorities, both locally and globally. They will also share their visions for initiatives to be carried out during the project weeks and democratically cast votes on their chosen actions. In addition, there will be a series of video conferences between each of the Eco-Leader committees across the three schools to introduce themselves to their partners, as well as to exchange their objectives and intended outcomes.• Prior to each movement / project week, host and visiting participants will prepare informative presentations, which they will deliver to their peers at the beginning of the project week. In these presentations they will formally outline the environmental challenges and situations (relating to their assigned 'R' of environmental action) in their countries, communities and schools. The host participants will also formally outline their chosen initiatives.• Students will be placed in multi-national groups and assigned roles and tasks by the host Eco-Leaders in order to successfully implement their chosen eco-friendly initiatives. • During the project week, all visiting and host participants will take part in the initiatives, ideally involving the whole school and wider community, as proposed by the host students. With the support of different departments across the school, they will be responsible for producing any promotional materials. • At the end of each project week, students will create a displayable mission statement for their assigned 'R' in English, Spanish and German. This mission statement, which will reinforce our schools' commitment to environmental sustainability and international unity, will be professionally printed and displayed in each school. • Students will also deliver an assembly to present their project work to the rest of the school and promote further engagement in environmental sustainability among our school communities.During the project weeks, students will engage in the following:• Multi-national team work to plan, promote and successfully execute the host Eco-Leaders' proposed eco-friendly initiatives.• External visits during these project weeks may include visits to local waste management centres, local industries or museums. The aims of these external trips are to motivate students within their roles as Eco-Leaders; to allow them to recognise their importance of their collective efforts; to inspire them to lead the way in halting climate change and protecting our future planet.• The implementation of a negotiated school mission statement on our joint commitment to reducing our waste, our attitudes to reusing materials and effective approaches to recycling.The outcomes of the project will be advertised widely across the partnership and our local communities using digital resources, E-Twinning site, school websites, press and social media.

"From Symbols to Symphonies (S2S) was a multi-lateral project based on the theme of ""Sharing Heritage"" as part of the European Cultural Heritage Year 2018. As the programme focus for the 2018 European Year was ""Society in Transition'', the project reflected the ongoing and diverse social change in Europe by studying the theme of immigration on a European, national and local level. This fitted perfectly with the profile of QKA which is very ethnically diverse with constant new arrival immigrant students, from Europe and beyond. This project allowed us to explore the reasons for this and raise awareness and the profile of diversity in a really positive way. During the project students researched the history and reasons for immigration in each of the participating countries as well as focusing on a particular strand of immigration which specifically applied to each participating school:- The Syrian refugee crisis in Germany - the town of Viersen has received a number of refugees and the school is helping to support their integration into German society. - North African immigrants in Spain - Badajoz is an inland, agricultural part of Spain with a number of North African guest-workers. - European Immigrants in the UK - QKA is a school in Peterborough with very high levels of immigrants (approx. 70%), mainly from Eastern Europe and Portugal.During the project students developed a balanced understanding of immigration and mobility patterns within Europe today as well as developing an understanding of the reasons for increased mobility. They then created and used music, poetry and dance to interpret the challenges and successes of migrants and they wrote and performed a musical theatre production depicting the plight of migrants.The project worked directly with 84 students (28 from each participating school), although the activities of the project incorporated contact and activities with a much wider group: Immigrants from within the local and wider community, teachers, students, charities and individuals with experience of immigration, the whole school through assemblies showcasing the project activities, the local community through the musical theatre performance and performance of the composed songs at other events, such as European Day of Languages assemblies, Mother Tongue Other Tongue Poetry Event, Peterborough Young Musicians Competition and the production of a CD of songs from the project which was shared with the student and staff body.In addition to this, participants carried out on-line research on the issues surrounding immigration and increased mobility in each of the participating countries and they learnt about each other's direct experiences as immigrants and the plight of certain demographic groups (such as Roma) in Britain (in Germany Syrian refugee students participated and in the UK european immigrants participated). Students created and populated an on-line project blog-site with research findings, presentations and resources created during the project and shared it through e-twinning. They met with charity organisations, refugees, migrants and people working with migrants to interview them and hear their stories to learn about the experiences and reasons for increased mobility and the support and activities that are offered. They carried out interviews with migrants about their own experiences and journeys and wrote a series of poems, choreographed dances and composed music which they then used the poems as lyrics for. These pieces, together with artwork, photography and some transcript extracts from interviews were collated together to produce a script and background for a piece of musical theatre (all written and composed by the students) which exemplified the experiences and emotions expressed by migrants in the interviews. Finally, they performed their musical drama performance as a multi-national cast to a public audience in Peterborough, promoting the idea of music and dance as a common language to break down barriers.The project raised awareness of the European Cultural Heritage Year 2018 by focusing on individual stories set within the wider context of 'Society in Transition'. It gave participants a broader understanding of the topic of immigration and to support understanding and community cohesion within the participating schools and their communities - it gave them a forum to tell their own stories as well as to learn about their peers and people living in their community. In the long-term it has provided resources and information about the topic of human mobility which have already been used in PSHE, Literacy and language lessons, and has helped to build closer links with local community organisations to promote community cohesion, mutual respect and the sharing of culture and experiences. Resources from the project have gained acclaim at the Peterborough Young People's Music Competition as well as the Mother Tongue Other Tongue poetry event in Cambridge."