Character Education

Character education is our deliberate intention to teach students important ethical behaviours that equip them for positive citizenship in adult life, in a way which brings benefit to them and to the communities they will be part of.

Fostering aspiration from an early age is important to help students identify and pursue appropriate ambitions, academically and personally. Life invariably provides a range of challenges for us all, and resilience is necessary in dealing with them. We want our students to feel confident rising to those challenges with equanimity, accepting that things go wrong sometimes. We also want them to learn the benefits of being kind to themselves, to others and to their environment.

Our school culture means that students are constantly exposed to these attitudes through the actions of our staff and student leaders. The range of opportunities students have outside the classroom through our co-curricular programme gives them the chance to seek out experiences that will develop their character in different ways. In class they are taught, implicitly and explicitly, how to develop the traits of good character. This includes forming and sustaining positive relationships, working collaboratively and persevering. If we work to develop values and character we are enabling students to thrive in as wide a range of circumstances as possible. This includes high stakes situations such as public exams, but also includes the day to day experiences that so much of life is made up of. Overall we want Challoner’s alumni to leave us knowing how to flourish healthily as individuals, and to recognise the good they can do by making a positive impact with their education. Many of our alumni provide positive role models of this through their involvement in school life.

For many years we have focussed on combining academic excellence with the explicit development of good character in our students. We firmly believe these go hand in hand. Our motto, Excellence with Integrity, provides a firm base for this purpose. We want our students to develop so that they can flourish in adulthood, both personally and professionally, and make a positive contribution to their community and our society. After all, Challoner’s students will play a significant role in the leadership of our society in the future.

Our core values of Aspiration, Kindness & Resilience form the foundation of our ethos. We help our students develop their own personal understanding of these values through the learning they do in school, and they are rewarded for behaviour which demonstrates these positive attitudes. This development is a journey which parents have a key role in as well and we enjoy working with parents on this.   

Our work in this area has been recognised by the Association for Character Education with their Quality Mark, awarded to schools that deliver Character Education in a planned, explicit and reflective manner. We are proud to have received this recognition twice, and continue to develop our programme in line with the principles of the Assocation.