This week, students and staff across our Junior and Senior Schools have been deeply engaged in celebrating Quaker Week, centring our learning, reflections, and community spirit around the core Quaker value of 'peace'. More than just a week of classroom discussions, our exploration of peace served as a powerful thread connecting daily lessons, creative student enterprise, and a magnificent final celebration that brought our wider community together.
Quaker Week in the Junior School
Quaker Week began with a truly exciting and inspiring day as children from Reception to J6 took part in a carousel of activities exploring this year’s theme of Peace. Throughout the day, pupils reflected on what peace means to them, expressed their ideas creatively and worked together in thoughtful and imaginative ways. Activities included:
Clay Peace Pendants - After learning how people throughout history have used symbols, jewellery and badges to communicate their beliefs and values, each child designed and created a unique clay peace pendant. The pendants reflected the pupil's own interpretations of peace and the values that matter most to them.
The Starfish Story - Inspired by the famous story of the starfish, children explored how even the smallest acts of kindness and peaceful choices can make a meaningful difference, even if it's for just one person. Through discussion and reflection, they considered how their actions can positively impact others' lives.
Peace Flags - Children designed and created colourful peace flags, using symbols, images and messages that represented harmony, friendship and hope. The finished flags formed a vibrant display, blowing and spreading the children's peace messages across the world.
Peace Stones - The children decorated pebbles with thoughtful words, symbols and designs, transforming simple stones into lasting reminders of kindness, compassion and peace. These beautiful, meaningful stones are now displayed in our Peace Garden for others to find and reflect on.
Peace Boats - Inspired by our emblem, the Sidcot Ship, pupils created their own Peace Boats. As they decorated and personalised their boats, they considered how the values we nurture at Sidcot travel with us beyond the school gates. Pupils recognised that they can carry and share kindness, respect, integrity, and peace wherever their journeys may take them, spreading the Sidcot values into the world.
Collaborative Playground Build - One of the day's highlights was the opportunity for the entire school to work alongside Woodland Tribe to create a unique play structure. Through teamwork, creativity and plenty of enthusiastic discussion (and noise!), the children collaborated to design and build a wonderful playground feature that formed a key part of the Festival celebrations. It powerfully demonstrated what can be achieved when individuals work together with a shared purpose.
Quaker Week In The Senior School
Within the Senior School, Quaker Week brought a powerful focus on peace into lessons, with learning reframed to explore the impacts of conflict and harmony across a wide range of subjects. Highlights included:
In Year 7 History, students re-evaluated all they had learned about the Battle of Hastings, this time considering the human cost of 11th-century warfare on the people and communities involved. Offering genuinely insightful comments, the class deeply empathised with the motivations and struggles of Saxon communities ravaged by the Norman invasion. Year 7 then pivoted to a more celebratory approach to peace within their French lessons, creating colourful bookmarks and 'Paix' signs that showcased the importance of friendship, respect, and harmony. Adding to this community spirit, Year 7 also stepped in to complete the Woodland Tribe playground, making this a truly cross-school project.
Years 8 and 9 were equally excited to get involved with activities, taking part in vibrant DJ workshops with DJ Elley Phunk ahead of the Festival of Peace. They learned what it takes to make great music, how to hear and follow the beat, and how to work collaboratively and listen to audiences. Meanwhile, Quaker Elders from across the school created signs to display at the festival, focusing on artificial intelligence and its ethics, particularly questions about how technology affects peace and the natural world. These thought-provoking questions were posed to everyone who attended the Festival of Peace through the signage, prompting fascinating conversations around our shared role in protecting peace.
Older students also engaged deeply with the theme through both academic study and practical leadership. Year 12 A Level Business students enjoyed a lesson analysing how global violence and war affect businesses and economic growth, exploring how conflict disrupts supply chains, drives up costs, shakes consumer confidence, and impacts GDP. By working through logical chains of analysis, they evaluated the underlying long-term impact of war and gained a greater understanding of why peace is so vital.
Our Year 13 BTEC students were also heavily involved in organising the Festival of Peace throughout the week. One standout contributor, Charlene, created outstanding signage that was key to the festival running smoothly, clearly showing details such as where visitors could find health assistance. She poured creativity, care, and attention to detail into her designs, helping give the festival a vibrant, welcoming feel while bringing its message of peace and community to life. Additionally, our BTEC class took the initiative to run a face-painting stall at the festival, giving students a chance to put their creativity and practical skills into action while helping make the event fun and memorable for everyone attending.
The Festival of Peace | Bringing Community Together
On Thursday evening, Quaker Week reached an exciting climax as the School campus transformed into a vibrant celebration of creativity, community and peace, welcoming over 700 visitors, including local state schools and fellow Quaker School Ackworth, to the biennial Festival of Peace, held ahead of World Quaker Day on Sunday 4 October.
The free community event showcased a diverse programme of activities, workshops and performances reflecting the School's Quaker ethos and commitment to bringing people together through shared experiences. Visitors of all ages enjoyed an evening of music, art and hands-on activities, including DJ sets from DJ Elley Phunk, welding workshops, lino printing, student performances, and more.
One highlight of the festival was a spectacular large-scale wooden climbing structure, designed and built by students from across the School during their Quaker Week activities in partnership with Woodland Tribe; a not-for-profit organisation that champions child-led adventure play and hands-on construction using real tools. Children from the School and beyond greatly enjoyed the playground during the evening, and students were highly praised for their imagination and collaboration in putting such an impressive piece together!
Another standout attraction from the evening was the presence of Arcadia Reach's Bug Stage, a striking mobile performance venue that had recently returned from supporting The Prodigy on their latest tour. The Bug Stage was brought to Sidcot by school alumnus and Arcadia co-founder, Pip Rush Jansen, whose work continues to be influenced by the values he encountered during his time at the School. The Bug Stage, for example, is constructed from repurposed military scrap metal; it transforms materials once associated with conflict into a vibrant space for creativity, celebration and community. It demonstrates how something linked to division can be reimagined for a positive purpose and serves as a powerful symbol of transformation, hope and connection.
The festival also coincided with the installation of the Planets Project in the School’s Peace Fields, a striking installation of sculptural planets created through a collaboration between students from Sidcot School and Weston College, alongside the Sidcot Art Department and Arcadia Reach CIC. Crafted from recycled and repurposed metal, the artwork highlighted themes of sustainability, creativity and transformation that ran throughout the evening's programme.
Reflecting on the success of the event, James Jones, Head of Sidcot School, said:
"The Festival of Peace was a wonderful celebration of the values that sit at the heart of our School community. It was inspiring to see our students share their talents through music, performance and creative expression, while welcoming members of the wider community to join us in reflecting on the importance of peace in today's world."
"As a Quaker school, we believe in fostering understanding, respect and compassion, and this festival provided a meaningful opportunity to bring people together in that spirit. We are incredibly proud of everyone who helped make the event such a memorable and uplifting occasion, and grateful to the Sir James Reckitt Charity and George Cadbury Trust for their support, which made the event possible."
A particular thank you to the Facilities, Maintenance, and Operations teams who worked tirelessly to ensure this event was a huge success for our students, families, and the wider community to enjoy.
A Peaceful End to Quaker Week
Quaker Week ended thoughtfully and memorably on Friday with a special assembly in the Junior School, where pupils reflected on everything they had learned and experienced throughout the week. Following the assembly, the whole Junior School gathered outside for the ringing of the Peace Bell. Together, we paused to reflect on what peace means to us as individuals, as a community, and in the world. It was a powerful moment of shared reflection and a fitting end to a truly fantastic week of learning, discussion and celebration.