Together we shine as one.

School Aims and Rules

If children are to do their best, they need guidance from both teachers and parents, so we aim to develop and maintain a close partnership between home and school as we share the task of educating your child.

Our aims:

To nurture Christianity and spirituality.

We see awe and wonder in all we do.

Together we shine as one.

Our Mission

Within our close Christian community, children are encouraged to fulfil their potential, to be enthusiastic, motivated and responsible learners who are challenged through an exciting and creative curriculum. By providing a safe, respectful and challenging environment, we equip them with the necessary skills to become citizens of an ever-changing world.

Cowick Church of England Primary Christian Vision
Together we shine as one

At Cowick School we start from the premise that ‘God is love’ (1 John 4:8b) and place love at the
heart of all we do. This translates into a school that expresses love of God, love of school and love of
learning.
The school is founded on a Christian vision and we seek to nurture the Christian faith and spirituality
through an understanding of Christian belief, tradition and ‘awe and wonder’ in the curriculum.

Our Christian vision is one based on:

Togetherness as part of the loving family of God
Guidance in choosing the good pathway in life
Widening of horizons upon God’s world
Care for God’s creation
The theological concept that we are all being and becoming the best we can be

Togetherness
Together we shine as one.
The Church of England’s Vision for Education presents a vision that: ‘The God of wisdom, love,
compassion and peace, in whose image we are created, is utterly relational.’1 At Cowick School our
Church is the Church of the Holy Trinity and our ethos is rooted in the faith of the trinity; of a God
who is three. Our identity as a school is rooted in the value of each individual and the fellowship of
togetherness. Both are needed for us to shine.
“It has been said beautifully and profoundly, that our God in his most inner mystery is not solitude,
but a family.”2 Our school is akin to a family. Ours is a small school, in which everybody knows
everybody and we make the most of this as a way of developing relationships across the school.
While loving his home, Jesus acknowledged that his true family included those who gathered to
follow him. At Cowick School, we nurture a family environment, based on the gospel’s invitation to
recognise that we are children of God (John 1:12)

Guidance
"Teach children the way he should go, and when they are old they will not turn from it." (Proverbs
22:6 paraphrased)
In stories such as that of the two builders, Jesus extols the wisdom of making the right choice for the
future. Cowick School aims to guide children. We affirm the wisdom of considering the
consequences of choices that Christ presented in a parable between wide and narrow gates and
their differing destinations (Matthew 7:13,14). 3 As a school we acknowledge that we are called to
offer guidance to one another and to share in the task of finding the good path.
Horizons
“Good schools open up horizons of hope and aspiration, and guide pupils into ways of fulfilling
them.”4
At Cowick School we see the love of God as an inspiration to our children to have wide horizons, to
look to the wider world and to all creation with hope and enthusiasm for life.
We want our children to experience, ‘Life in all its fullness’ (John 10:10b). By providing an
environment where independence, responsibility and respect for oneself and others, are nurtured.

At Cowick we are preparing children for life and work beyond school. We are also echoing the
Biblical Proverb: ‘The world of the generous gets larger and larger; the world of the selfish gets
smaller and smaller’5
We celebrate and develop a global and environmental dimension in all we do and we grow a sense
of courageous advocacy among our children. It is our aim that our children should be globally
minded. This includes a passion for children encountering other faith beliefs and communities. By
providing a safe, respectful and challenging environment, we equip our children with the necessary
skills to become citizens of an ever-changing world.
Caring for creation
There is a story at the beginning of our Bible in which God enjoys creating our world and celebrates
its goodness.6 We have developed an emphasis on the importance of care for the environment. The
Church of England Vision states: ‘Hope in God’s future for the world, in God’s ongoing love and
compassion for all people, and for the whole of creation, and in God’s promise of life in all its
fullness are at the root of our dedication to educating for hope and aspiration.’7

Being and Becoming
‘Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed.8
The Christian vision of people is that we are constantly being and becoming the person God wants us
to be and being the best we can be. As a school we have our ‘Bees’; the encouragements we offer to
one another to be the people God is forming us to be.
Christian faith underpins such personal becoming with the understanding of forgiveness that frees
us from the mistakes we make. This belief inspires our positive behaviour based on affection,
respect and achievement in a caring, loving and secure environment where all gifts and talents are
celebrated, in keeping with the Church of England Vision: ‘The ultimate worth of each person is
grounded in being created in the image of God and in God’s love and compassion for each.’9

1 Church of England Vision for Education p.8
2 John Paul II quoted in Boff, L. Holy Trinity, Perfect Community Orbis Books p.4
3 This text is generally applied to life and eternal direction, but also, in the context of the Sermon on the
Mount, relates as a parable to the individual choices made in life decisions
4 Church of England Vision for Education p.7

5 Proverbs 11:24 Message Bible
6 The school handles this story with the understanding of the place of myth in the Hebrew Bible and in the
context of the teaching on ‘Creation’ in our ‘Understanding Christianity’ lessons
7 Church of England Vision for Education p.10
8 1 John 3:2a
9 Church of England Vision for Education p.9