Mental Health and Wellbeing

Welcome to our wellbeing page, at Barclay Academy we aim to promote a whole school ethos whereby emotional wellbeing and mental health is embedded throughout our community and is accepted as the responsibility of everyone within our community. We aim to provide our students, staff and wider community with a continued and consistent approach to maintaining good emotional wellbeing and mental health through a variety of mediums, using our whole school approach, universal services or more targeted interventions utilising local support accordingly.

Working together with our students, staff and families we can ensure a holistic approach is maintained creating opportunities for successful outcomes and continuing on our journey to help end the stigma which is often attached to mental health.

We have developed opportunities within the curriculum to teach our students about wellbeing and mental health, promoting self-awareness, self-care and positive mind-sets. We understand that life can sometimes be tricky and developing the skills to respond to these times builds resilience, enabling our students to learn and grow on their own personal journeys. We believe in all of our students and we aim to provide an environment where they can thrive both personally and academically, no matter what circumstances they may be experiencing.

Our Mental Health Lead has completed extensive training which is government approved, every Head of Year is Mental Health First Aid trained and each member of the Pastoral Team are dedicated and committed to continued professional development within wellbeing and mental health.

“Mental health is a state of well-being in which every individual realises their own potential, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to their community.” (World Health Organisation) For more information, please click Children & Young Peoples Mental Health Services Directory

Emotional Mental Wellbeing in Schools Mark

We are proud to have achieved the Emotional Mental Wellbeing in Schools Mark.

MCR Pathways

Young Herts Talent is a mentoring programme from MCR Pathways designed to help young people unlock their potential.   

By providing weekly group work sessions for selected students in Year 7 and Year 8 and taking the time to carefully match students in Years 9-13 with their very own mentor based on interests and career aspirations, we help young people to realise their skills and progress onto a positive destination after leaving school.   

Mentors visit students in school once a week and commit to at least one full academic year of mentoring.  As long as both the student and the mentor are happy to do so, the mentoring relationship is able to continue until the student leaves school in Year 11, or Year 13 if staying on in the Sixth Form.  This ensures that students receive encouragement and support to succeed for the entirety of their Barclay journey.

Mrs M Charlwood & Mrs R Buttress - Mental Health Leads