MUSE

What school did you attend before Hurtwood?

Benenden School

What subjects and additional courses are you studying?

English Literature, Media Studies and Theatre Studies.

What do you like the most about Hurtwood House?

Everybody’s unique with their interests and it’s a very strong community between teachers and students.

How do you think it has helped you develop academically?

Being graded on both my effort and standard of work every week has helped me push myself to get better weekly grades. This means the effort I put into my work from the start of hurtwood to where I am now has increased dramatically, this has proved beneficial to my work as shown though my AS results, which I feel I never would have achieved without my academic development from the Hurtwood House team.

What do you like most about the teaching at Hurtwood?

The teaching at Hurtwood is very structured and efficient. All my teachers are very kind and helpful, treating me as an adult.

I prefer this to the usual teacher-student dynamic where, often, I used to struggle to have a lot of respect for teachers as a result of being treated younger, or with little importance as a result of being considered younger than my age by the ‘school girl’ way I was treated. But by having this respect for all my teachers and by their teaching methods it has allowed me to be very attentive in class and have a good understanding of everything they were teaching me.

What is the most exciting thing for you personally about being at Hurtwood?

The fact that Hurtwood offer songwriting lessons and lunchtime concerts is the most exciting part of Hurtwood for me I’d say.

At my previous school not a lot of people were as interested in modern music and performing as me, and usually any concerts put on revolved around jazz or classical music and in music lessons the genre of music I sang wasn’t really very modern or suited to what I wanted to sing. This I struggled with, as I was desperate to sing in my style of music and be taught how to write music. Having song writing lessons at Hurtwood has given me a hobby to do in-between work and take my mind off deadlines or any stress, as it's something I love so I’m happy there was the opportunity to do it.

Where are you planning to go on to after Hurtwood (Uni and beyond)?

I have offers from Leeds University for Digital Media Design and Oxford Brookes University for Digital Media Production.

Freddy Condon

The teaching at Hurtwood is very structured and efficient.