1. July 2013
Dear Parents and Carers
This letter accompanies our new style final report of the academic year. We have put a great deal
of work into providing you with more detail at this stage and we hope you find the report helpful
and accessible. We’d welcome your feedback on the report or any other matters, as ever, via
parentfeedback@osfc.ac.uk
This letter is the first to be sent out under our newly
refreshed logo. Since our previous College logo
had been the same for over 20 years we have taken
the decision to refresh the look, giving it a modern
feel which is more appropriate for use with today’s
electronic marketing materials and social media as we
look to the future. We hope you like the new logo and
are sure it will soon come to be identified as closely
with OSFC as the previous version. Please feel free
to give us your feedback on it. To coincide with its
launch, there are some adverts for the College on local
buses at the moment, so look out for our successful
former students around and about on the buses!
I’d like to correct an error in my previous letter
home, regarding the return date for current Year
12 students moving into Year 13. Lessons restart
for Year 12 progressing into Year 13 on Tuesday 3
September, not Monday 2 as I previously stated.
New students and any current student who has been
given permission to re-start Year 12 will start on the
Monday. Prior to this, AS level and BTEC results are
distributed to your sons and daughters by email
from 12 noon on Thursday 15 August and we have
a Year 13 enrolment day on Wednesday 21 August
for all current Year 12 students to confirm their
programmes of study for the next academic year.
PARENTS’ LETTER

2. Your son or daughter will have already completed a Y13 enrolment process via their tutorials, but
until results are known, this cannot be confirmed and there are occasions where students change
their minds about their programmes in light of their results, hence our introduction of a day
dedicated to this process, with all subject staff in college and available to help ensure the right
decisions are taken. Full details of this process have already been sent out to students covering both
results day and Year 13 enrolment day, including confirmation of their appointment time, room and
interviewer for 21 August and details of what to do if there is any problem with this. We are also
open on results day for students to come in and see staff about any concerns regarding results and
appointment slots will be available by phone.
Our Chair of Governors, Steve Lowe, is stepping down from the Board this
summer. Having been involved with the College since its inception, Steve
has devoted countless hours and enormous efforts to the College over the
last 21 years. Amongst many other things, he helped establish the College,
played a role in bringing Higher Education to the town, helped secure the
Science Centre and has championed the work of the College in numerous
contexts, all ultimately to the advantage of our students. We are a stronger
college as a result of Steve’s involvement with the Board. We will miss his
involvement and are enormously grateful for everything he has done to
support the College.
A new chair of Governors will be confirmed at the next Board meeting, taking place later this week,
so I will be able to confirm who has taken on this role in my first letter next term. There have been
a number of new appointments to the Board of Governors this year as other terms of office have
ended. New Governors in the last few months are Naila Akhtar, a lawyer working with Platt Halpern
solicitors in Oldham, Cllr Shoab Akhtar, Deputy Leader of Oldham Council and Great Communities
Manager at Great Places Housing Group, Peter Dunlop, Director of Development at Innovative
Technology and Mike Gibbons, Director of Student Recruitment and International Development at
the University of Manchester. We are very pleased to welcome these new Governors to the Board.
Governors play a very important role for the College, providing vital challenge and support, all on
a voluntary basis. Should you be interested in getting involved, we currently have a vacancy for a
Parent Governor. To find out more about the role, please contact the Clerk to Governors, Mrs Jan
Jones, either by telephone or email jjs@osfc.ac.uk
I’d like to publicly thank all the staff and students who have worked so hard to ensure students
went into the exam season as well-prepared as possible. There have been many additional revision
sessions within and beyond the College day, and we hope all has gone well for all concerned. In
addition to all the exam-focused hard work, there have also been a huge number of additional
events and activities taking place since my last letter, including some that are new this year.

3. In terms of trips and visits, Business students
have visited Chester Zoo and the National
Mining Museum to support their studies of
Business Marketing. In the final week of term,
a group of Accounting students will attend
a masterclass at PricewaterhouseCoopers in
Manchester. Language students have seen
‘Après Mai’ in French at the Cornerhouse
cinema, in preparation for their A2 studies and
a group visited Manchester University to find
out more about the Language degrees on offer
there. From the Humanities department, History
students attended the ‘Discover History’ day at Manchester University, Archaeology students
visited Arbor Low and Stanton Moor stone circles in the Peak
District to practice the field survey techniques that they will
use as part of their individual coursework projects into a range
of sites in the region. These visits took place on 20 and 21
June, coinciding with the summer solstice, a time of major
significance to the Bronze Age builders of the monuments.
Religious Studies students have visited the local Catholic
Church, St. Patrick’s.
Possibly our most exciting new trip this half-term was the Physics
trip to CERN, Geneva, which involved 23 AS and A2 Physics &
Electronics students spending a day at CERN which houses the
largest Physics experiment in the world. They took the official
tour in the morning including a trip to the Magnet Testing
Facility and the AMS control centre (a particle-physics detector
that looks for dark matter, antimatter and missing matter
from a module attached to the
outside of the International
Space Station). They then had
a very rare opportunity to
go 100m underground to the
ATLAS experiment. ATLAS is
one of two general-purpose
detectors at the Large Hadron
Collider (LHC). It investigates a wide range of Physics, from
thesearchfortheHiggsbosontoextradimensionsandparticles
that could make up dark matter. It was only possible to go
down to this amazing machine because Ana Soldner-Rembold
(who formerly worked at CERN and now teaches Physics and
Electronics at the College) was able to organise this for us. An
unforgettable, inspiring trip for all involved.
Other Science department trips and events included Biology students’ field trips to Ainsdale
Sands, Chemistry students visiting the School for Environmental Sciences at Salford University,
GCSE Science students visiting Fiddlers Ferry, to study the generation of electricity and a taster
day visit to Lancaster University for students interested in studying STEM subjects. In addition

4. to these off-site visits, Science students have attended various lectures and masterclasses held
in the Science Centre and at other local venues, including Dr Jim Wilde from Lancaster University
who gave a lecture on the solar system, a lecture on particle physics by a leading professor in
this field from Manchester University, a lecture by Prof. Fred Loebinger on Quantum Mechanics,
hosted by Hulme Grammar School and an insight into studying Material Physics at Oxford
University which was hosted by Blue Coat School. Finally for Science, Biology students have been
engaging in an e-mentoring scheme with the University of Huddersfield.
To complete the very long list, Leisure Studies and Travel and Tourism students have visited
Blackpool Pleasure Beach to gather information for their case study assignments, Law students
have had a taster day with the Law department at Huddersfield University, Health and Social
Care students have visited Oldham Library to conduct some research and practice referencing
skills and in the final week of term Sport students will visit Trafford Watersports Centre and
Textiles students will visit Gallery Oldham to see the ‘Born to be Wild’ fashion exhibition and
collate research for their practical project in the autumn.
Cross-college events include expeditions to the Lake District
for the Duke of Edinburgh scheme students, students from
the Oxbridge Group visiting Oxford University and the girls’
football team watching
England senior women’s
football team vs. Japan
at Burton Albion FC. Our
Sports Leaders award
students hosted the very
successful Junior Super Athlete event for a fantastic 260 local
primary school pupils and our in-house ‘Olympathon’
ran just last week, involving 60 students and the PE
department staff completing 26.2 hours of sport, raising
money for Christies in the process. The students started
off the event early on Thursday 27 June and took part in
26 activities such as Goalball, Bocchia and Kabaddi and
more traditional sports of volleyball, hockey and football.
The Olympathon finished on Friday morning with a well-
deserved relaxing yoga session, followed by a ‘dance-off’
between the various teams of students as part of the
closing ceremony. Their stamina and team spirit throughout was really impressive and I know
this will be an event they remember for years to come.

5. We were delighted to be able to offer the GMP
‘Natural Born Leaders’ scheme for a second
time this year. This enabled sixteen students to
complete a week-long programme run by Greater
Manchester Police. The carefully selected group
spent the week building teamwork, leadership
and communication skills, visiting GMP training
centres and taking part in exercises designed
to test the skills and leadership capabilities of
GMP staff. The week finished with the team
presenting a ‘Dragon’s Den’ style pitch to a panel
of guests and a talk from Sir Peter Fahy, the
Chief Constable of GMP, who also presented the
students with their certificates of achievement.
Another project new to the College this year is the Bright Futures scheme, which offers innovative
‘real job’ placements to students during their second year at college. We are trialling this scheme
next year and so far have secured 15 placements
with Barclays Bank, Odeon Cinemas and MC2,
a marketing company, all of which are based in
central Manchester. Students apply for posts and
complete a selection process involving staff from
the companies and then will spend one day a week
from late September to Easter next year working
in administrative posts based with the companies
involved, alongside continuing their studies at
College. This promises to be an excellent scheme
for the selected students, providing a wide range
of employability skills that should enhance their
future prospects tremendously.
We have recently appointed our new Student Ambassadors for the next academic year and once
againhadafantasticfieldofapplicantsfromwhichtochoose. I’dliketopassonmycongratulations
and thanks to the new team, because they have already been working hard at the various school
partnership events that have taken place in the last couple of weeks. We try to involve students
as much as possible in our various events for schools and we are consistently told how valuable
having student input is and what excellent role models our student ambassadors are. The new
cohort is already living up to this strong reputation.
You may be aware of the recent industrial action by two of the main teacher unions. We were
able to keep the college open on the day of action (27 June), though there was some disruption to
lessons. We notified students about our position in advance of the day via email and reminders
through Twitter. We also notified those parents for whom we have details via our parent portal
and through a notice on our website, but I just wanted to take the opportunity to remind parents
who haven’t yet done so that you can still sign up for the parent portal. This has undergone
substantial development during this year and we hope to make even more use of it next year
so if you haven’t yet signed up, please do, either by phoning in for a registration code or by
requesting one by email, using the parentfeedback@osfc.ac.uk address. Similarly, if you use
Twitter, please follow us on OSFC_Info as this is a very handy and quick way for us to pass on key
messages.

6. Moving on to financial matters, you may recall at the time your son or daughter enrolled with us
last summer, our request for a donation to the College Fund. This is an annual request to parents
and it is made to supplement reducing Government funding in order that we can continue to
enhance each student’s learning experience and improve college resources. We are extremely
grateful to parents for their ongoing support via these donations which, in recent years have
enabled us to refurbish the learning resource centre and multigym, to the benefit of all students.
We are now able to receive payments for 2013-14 and would prefer payments where possible
to be made using our online system (ParentPay). Payments can be made any time from now to
September. Alternatively there will be a finance desk available during the Y13 enrolment day on
the 21 August if you would prefer to pay by cash or cheque. Many thanks again for your generous
support.
Students who have been in receipt of the College bursary this year will have received an email to
reapply for next year. If your circumstances have changed or you are applying for the first time
you should read the information booklet on the College website and download the application
form. This should be handed back in with a photocopy of your supporting evidence on 21 August
2013.
I hope all students (and parents!) enjoy a restful yet productive summer break. Regardless of
students’ future plans, using the break to enhance their experience and develop new skills will
be helpful when it comes to completing application forms. Whether this be volunteering, part-
time work or informal work experience with family and friends, it can all be very useful. We held
optional masterclasses for year 12 students who are keen to apply for Primary Teaching, NHS
courses, Dentistry and Medicine over a three week period this half term. Students were given
extra support for preparing to apply for these particularly competitive courses.
All Year 12 students are being encouraged to continue to research their ideas for progression after
college over the summer and those planning to apply to university can now begin their application
forms online. Full details are on the careers blog http://blog.osfc.ac.uk/careers/
Thanks to everyone involved with the College for their support and hard work this academic year.
Wearelookingforwardtosomestrongresultsin thesummerandhaveseenfurtherimprovements
in our retention (staying on) rates this year, all of which bodes very well for students’ progression
next year.
With very best wishes,
Jayne Clarke
Principal
Highly Commended 2010-2011
Principal: Jayne Clarke, BA(Hons), MA (Ed)
Oldham Sixth Form College Union Street West Oldham OL8 1XU
Tel:0161 287 8000 Fax:0161 650 1100 E-mail:principal@osfc.ac.uk Website:www.osfc.ac.uk

7. GALLERY 2012 - 2013

8. Dates for diaries
Thursday 15 August
AS results emailed at 12 noon.
Support available in college 9am-2pm.
Wednesday 21 August
Y13 enrolment day (for current Y12 students)
Appointments slots have been emailed to
students
Thursday 22 August
GCSE results day
Tuesday 3 September
Lessons start for Y13 students (current Y12)