School Marketing Report – Summer 2021

By Ceara Hayden (Head of Marketing and Admissions)

Well, what a year it has been! Challenging, exciting, unexpected, creative…
a whirlwind of a year.  And that’s without a pandemic. Put that on top of it all, and what do you have? One truly incredible and inspirational time upon which to reflect.

I believe in our previous update to yourselves from a Marketing and Admissions perspective here at St Bees, we outlined the huge success we were celebrating. We had grown from a student cohort of 15 to a thriving, ‘mini-population’ of 53 young people. An almost 300% increase, complete with a scintillating mix of international students from Romania, Germany, Turkey and Kazakhstan.

Admissions this year have, not to dramatise it, been slightly trickier. A lot of our events to drive recruitment involve in-house activities – note Chinese New Year, Open Days or our fantastic Science Fair of last year. International students obviously want the security of travelling abroad, which at the start of this year, seemed less certain – though fortunately more likely now. And people all over the world were feeling a sense of unease or uncertainty – education was clearly not at the forefront of their minds.

However, this past year has enabled us to embrace technology, think outside the box and adapt creatively – and that is in the true spirit of St Bees. We have all learnt, most likely similar to yourselves, how easy it is to connect via Microsoft Teams/Zoom/Skype/WhatsApp. The world has instantly become a smaller place. Here at St Bees, we are committed and dedicated to providing our students with a global mindset. Just like yourselves when you were students here, mixing, living with and learning from students from all over the world enables young people to formulate opinions and ideas in a more balanced and holistic way. Our multicultural community is vitally important and with the aid of online calls, even lockdown couldn’t stop us!

In terms of Admissions: for the international market this just meant we couldn’t travel abroad to meet new families – all was conducted online; but yet again, successfully. For the UK students, tours of the school again were conducted online until we were safe to reopen again. As such, numbers are looking healthy for September and are continuing to grow.

St Bees School is delighted to offer all relations of OSBs a huge 50% discount on tuition for the coming academic year. With places in fierce competition (and Year 8 entry already full), this is a great opportunity for your loved ones/relations to follow in your footsteps! To apply, please contact Ceara.hayden@stbeesschool.co.uk today. We look forward to hearing from you.

A huge thanks to Stuart Lancaster (FN/AC 80-88), who kindly gave us some of his precious time as we hosted a ‘Q & A’ session to approximately 100 avid fans – a mix of OSBs themselves, in addition to rugby fans.  Despite a mere technical glitch (isn’t it always the way?!), the event was a roaring success – and we truly cannot thank Stuart enough for his support for the school. In May we held a similar event with some fascinating tales from Jeremy Davey (SH 79-86) surrounding his contribution to the team involved with the World Land Speed Record. It is these events which truly show the shining spirit of being an OSB and provide inspiration to our current and future students as to what it means to carry the flame forward.

Thinking ahead, as the world reopens, we look forward to hosting more events where the OSBs and school work more closely together – and therefore, I really hope to meet you all in person one day.

Many thanks for your continued support as we all embrace this journey together.

 

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The St Beghian Society    
St Bees School,    St Bees,    Cumbria,    CA27 0DS.

         Tel: (01946) 828093      Email: osb@stbeesschool.co.uk      Web: www.st-beghian-society.co.uk