Teacher of Chemistry

Cardinal Griffin Catholic College is an 11-19 Voluntary Aided Catholic Secondary school in Cannock, Staffordshire. The College was originally established in 1960, and has grown in size (with the associated additional building work) considerably since then. Sixth Form numbers have risen significantly in the last 12 months following a concerted effort to increase the numbers by the College Leadership. The College currently has 877 students on roll, of whom, 126 are in the Sixth Form.

The College has 5 Catholic feeder primary schools, whose students make up 45% of the student body. The rest of the students tend to be more local to the College and come from a variety of local schools. The Sixth Form predominantly recruits students from our own Year 11, but we have a handful of external applications each year, which we welcome. Sixth form provision also benefits from both a partnership with Cannock Chase High School with whom we share some courses and a partnership with a local hair salon who support the delivery of Levels 2 and 3 hairdressing qualifications. The College operates its own subsidised transport to bring in students from our Catholic feeder schools and wider catchment area.

The College has strong collaborative partnerships with local Catholic schools, a local Anglican school, as well other schools including the wider network of Jesuit schools throughout the UK and Internationally. Jesuit principles have become an integral part of the College in particular our experience of Magis - a Jesuit term referring to the philosophy of doing more for Christ, and therefore doing more for others. This challenges to always think about how we can ‘go the extra mile’ for our pupils, which is encapsulated in our school prayer, ‘Lord, teach me to be generous.”

The College’s last OfSTED in 2018 rated the College “Good” overall and “Good” in all areas. The latest Section 48 also rated the College as “Good”. Interim monitoring reports from Staffordshire Local Authority indicate that the College remains on track to retain its “Good” rating at the next inspection and results have risen considerably since a dip in 2019 with very positive results in summer 2022.

The College has worked hard to recruit and retain high quality staff. The team of teaching and support staff is stable, friendly and committed to the aims of the College and its Catholic mission. The College has become a hub for training Early Career Teachers this year with 9 joining us in September 2021. We have embraced the Government’s wellbeing charter and have a collaborative and distributed leadership approach.

The College has an Astroturf pitch which operates outside College hours to generate income, providing facilities for community teams. The College is also fortunate to have significant school grounds which facilitate a range of sports taking place and provide good socialisation space for pupils during breaktimes. The building itself is predominantly 1960s, but has been well maintained.

As part of the Archdiocesan academisation strategy, the College is in the early stages of considering becoming part of a Multi-Academy Trust.

View Cardinal Griffin Catholic High School’s latest Ofsted report