Turves Green Boys’ School are celebrating an excellent set of GCSE results again. Despite numerous challenges faced, our 2025 cohort have achieved some fantastic results that they should be proud of. These results have enabled our pupils to secure exciting and fulfilling post-16 pathways.

Head of School, Mr. Walker, said “We are incredibly proud of the achievements of our pupils this year.  The hard work and commitment of our pupils throughout Year 11 has resulted in them achieving some excellent results that they truly deserve. It was wonderful to celebrate with our pupils this morning and we are excited for what they will achieve in the future."

Special mentions to our top performers: K Fisher who achieved 4 Grade 9s, 4 Grade 8s and a Level 2 Distinction, S Cham who achieved 3 Grade 8s, 2 Grade 7s and 3 Grade 6s and C Bosley who achieved a Grade 8, 3 Grade 7s and a Level 2 Distinction.

We will be holding a few open events this year to give all prospective Year 7 parents and pupils the chance to come and visit us. These events will give you a little insight into what is means to be a pupil at Turves Green Boys' School and give you the chance to ask any questions you may have.

Year 6 Opening Evening: Tuesday, 16th September 2024, 4:30pm to 7:30pm

Headteacher Presentation Times: 4:45pm, 5:45pm, and 6:45pm

Year 6 Open Mornings: Monday 22nd September – Friday 26th September 2024, 9:15am to 10:15am

Year 7 and Year 8 would like to say a massive thank you to Dr Chris Hamlett (@hamlettcae) and all the team at Discovery Materials (@discovmaterials) for allowing us to borrow their impact tester. The pupils had been consolidating their learning about ceramics, polymers and composites by making mudbricks with different additional materials and quantities of water. They had to choose between just mud, mud and paper discs, mud and sawdust, mud and cloth or mud and hay. These were then left to air dry before subjecting them to the “guillotine style” action of the impact tester. The pupils loved it and competed fiercely against each other to make the strongest brick. Once they discovered hay was the better material, they were able to liken this to the rationale behind putting rebar in cement and could even discuss the differences between compressive stress and tensile strength. A fantastic time was had by all which would not have been possible if we did not have the very generous loan of the impact tester from Discovery Materials. Thank you again!

A huge well done to our Year 10 Geography students for their fantastic efforts on their recent fieldwork trips to Longbridge and Carding Mill Valley! Whether investigating urban regeneration or exploring river processes, you approached both the Human and Physical fieldwork with real focus, curiosity, and maturity. It was brilliant to see you working so thoughtfully in the field—and even better to see you enjoying the sunshine while doing it! Your positive attitude and teamwork made both days a great success. Well done!

The eco committee joined leagues with some excellent DT pupils to visit the MAC for a very eye opening display called “Waste Age” which showed us the many uses for things we throw away every day! Plastic bottles, clothes, and all the damage caused to the environment from our throw away culture. It gave us inspiration to continue to try and invent a plastic bottle greenhouse when we got home!

The eco committee have been working their socks off this year making sure that we continued to strive to make Turves Greener! Paper recycling has continued ticking away nicely, with pupils taking charge to make sure that they get emptied on a regular basis and this year they have reported less and less non-paper waste in those particular bins! I call that a win.

In regards to our global citizenship initiative, we have finally produced a working plastic bottle greenhouse! We have also saved old light covers from the bin! So with the plastic bottles they have been used for 3 different purposes. Firstly, you chop the bottom off and then can use it to shield saplings as they are growing to protect them from the wind and other elements. Secondly, we used them to build the plastic bottle greenhouse which has a hinge lid made out of old twine. You cut the bottoms off the bottles and then stack them together tightly so that they do not fall over and use old cane to get them into place while you string them together. Thirdly, we made some bird feeders by making holes and pushing a lolly pop stick through a slot underneath for the birds to perch on and again used some left over string to make the top of the holder. These are available in reception Thursday and Friday this week on a first come, first served basis. Our trip to the Waste Age exhibition at the MAC definitely inspired some innovation here! Oh and you’ll never guess how useful the old light fixtures are! So the school decided to place our old energy inefficient lighting with much more energy saving fixtures but the big old plastic covers were destined for the bin but we saved them! For now they are using used to weigh down some membrane to kill off the last of the horsehair before the autumn planting and will then be used alongside our plastic bottles as a form of insulation (like a polytunnel) for our saplings!

Thinking about the school grounds, we have been able to include some planters out the front of the school to encourage pollinators as well as a memory bench. The planters either side have some wildflowers and wisteria which will grow as our pupils do. It’s a calm space for pupils to sit, reflect and calm their minds whilst taking in a good dose of mother nature. We’ve also cleared up the forest school building and made a pathway between our allotment patches so pupils can safely navigate their way around. We also planted more fruit trees so next year we might be able to sample plum, cherries and pears alongside our home grown apples.

Our final target for this year was to improve biodiversity. Besides planting more trees, bushes and pollinator friendly plants, we have now installed over 20 bird boxes, 5 bug hotels, rid our garden of the horse hair which had taken over the whole of the space behind the sports hall and installed our own pond!! This has been a long work in progress and one that the pupils say is their proudest achievement. Already they are seeing wildlife in there which have come naturally. We are looking forward to the first stickleback we see in there (turns out bird poop can be very useful!).

We’re busy finishing off the final details on our green flag application which will mean we have been green 2 years running, committing ourselves to continually improving to make Turves Greener!

On the 2nd of July we welcomed back our Year 11s to celebrate their 5 years at TGBS. The long awaited Lomas Football tournament kicked off the day with teams competing for the coveted cup. Organised by Mr Woodall, all the boys either took part or spectated and cheered the thrilling final.

They then had their final favourite lunch ahead of their leaver’s assembly. They were treated to some of their best moments during their time at Turves, world events over the last 5 years and some group and solo performances of classics such as ‘Wonderwall’ and ‘Sweet Caroline.’ True karaoke kings!

Finally, the afternoon saw some of them playing football on the astro turf and more inflatable battles. It was a pleasure to host the for the day and we wish them all the best.

Our 8S1 group have been working with Mr Adams from the University of Birmingham to help adapt and develop models of the solar system and how nuclear fusion occurs within the Sun. We discussed the pros and cons of different model representations of natural phenomena and decided to have a go at making our more accurate living models. They soon discovered though that completing many rotations during a single orbit is not very easy! Their innovation and analysis of our models has really shown how they are thinking hard!

7S4  have been learning about why dual coding is so so important! We’ve been learning about fertilisation and germination (which both have LOTS of key words they need to be able to recall). So we looked at an image, turned it into a step-by-step flow process and then (to show they understood it) then attempted to recreate the image from the start of the activity without having any access to their books. As you can see they did incredibly well and managed to recall quite a few key structures. Well done!

From 1st – 5th July, pupils from all Matrix Academy Trust schools, including Elmwood School who are joining the Matrix family in September, embarked on the final International trip of the 2024–2025 academic year. The 55 children experienced an unforgettable week in the heart of Italy.

During their time in Italy, students explored some of Rome’s most iconic landmarks, including the awe-inspiring Colosseum and the Pantheon. A hands-on gladiator school experience gave everyone a taste of ancient Roman life — a highlight for many, even with the heat!

Adventurous spirits were tested on the high ropes course, followed by visits to the Spanish Steps, Trevi Fountain, and the lively Piazza Navona. Although a planned trip to the Vatican was sadly cancelled due to a metro line closure, spirits remained high. Instead, the group enjoyed a sunny afternoon on the beach at Ostia, where paddling in the sea proved the perfect way to end a packed itinerary.

The behaviour of all students was exemplary throughout the trip — a real credit to the Trust and to their schools. The final trip of this year was a resounding success, leaving everyone with memories that will last a lifetime – and a lot of enthusiasm to participate in next year’s adventures!