What is Cultural Capital?

Cultural capital is the accumulation of knowledge, behaviours, and skills that a student can draw upon and which demonstrates their cultural awareness, knowledge and competence;  it is one of the key ingredients a student will draw upon to be successful in society, their career and the world of work.

Cultural capital promotes social mobility and success in our stratified society.

Cultural capital gives a student power. It helps them achieve goals, become successful, and rise up the social ladder without necessarily having wealth or financial capital.

Cultural capital is having assets that give students the desire to aspire and achieve social mobility whatever their starting point.

Rationale:

At Manor, we recognise that for students to aspire and be successful academically and in the wider areas of their lives, they need to be given rich and sustained opportunities to develop their cultural capital.

The school recognises that there are six key areas of development that are interrelated and cumulatively contribute to the sum of a student’s cultural capital:

• Personal Development
• Social Development, including political and current affairs awareness
• Physical Development
• Spiritual Development
• Moral Development
• Cultural development

Summary of the key areas of coverage for each area of Cultural Capital Development:

Personal development:

• Christian values underpinning all school activity
• Careers and Information, advice and guidance provision;
• Personal Finance Education;
• Employability skills, including some work experience opportunities;
• Personal, Social and Health Education provision including Relationships and Sex Education;
• The school’s wider pastoral framework;
• Resilience development strategies;
• Transition support;
• Activities focused on building self-esteem;
• Mental Health & well-being provision.

Social Development:

• Personal, Social and Health Education provision;
• Student volunteering and charitable works such as all student engagement with the Archbishop ofYork Young Leaders Award
• Student Voice – Year Group and School Council;
• Access to The Hub as required;
• In school and wider community engagement programmes;
• Access to counselling.
• Collective worship and year group assemblies
• Peer mentoring

Physical Development:

• The Physical Education curriculum;
• Anti-bullying and safeguarding policies and strategies including the Speak Up email;
• The Health Education dimension of the PSHE programme, including strands on drugs, smoking and alcohol;
• The extra-curricular programme related to sports and well-being;
• The celebration of sporting achievement including personal fitness and competitive sport;
• Activities available for unstructured time, including lunch and break times;
• Activity-based residentials;
• The curricular programme related to healthy eating in food preparation and nutrition;
• Advice & Guidance to parents on all aspects of student lifestyle;
• The promotion of walking or cycling to school.

Spiritual Development:

• The Religious Education Curriculum;
• Our collective acts of worship and reflection;
• Support for the expression of individual faiths;
• Inter-faith and faith-specific activities and speakers;
• Visits to religious buildings and centres and retreats to Taize;
• Classes and seminars with speakers focusing on spiritual issues;
• School-linking activities – locally, nationally and internationally;
• The Assembly programme.
• Termly Eucharist services
• Chaplaincy provision including clubs

Moral Development:

• The Religious Education Curriculum;
• Daily Collective Worship
• The behaviour and justice framework underpinning the school’s Behaviour Management policies;
• Contributions to local, national and international charitable projects including our two partner charities Mbedza in Malawi and Cry in the Dark in Romania

Cultural Development:

• Citizenship Education through the PSHE plan;
• Access to the Arts including extensive musical opportunities and regular theatre trips;
• Access to the languages and cultures of other countries through the curriculum and trips and visits including regular trips to European destinations;
• Promotion of racial equality and community cohesion through the school’s ethos, informing all policy and practice.