About Beverley Schools Christian Trust

Beverley Schools Christian Trust (BSCT – pronounced ‘Biscuit’ for short ) is a charity set up by Churches in Beverley to provide schools workers to work in schools in Beverley. Initially set up in January 2001 to focus on Beverley’s three secondary schools – Beverley High School, Beverley Grammar School, and Longcroft School.

Our first worker – Sophie, spent time in each of the schools, and built up a good working relationship with the schools and staff. Sophie spent time in lunch time clubs, as well as using her artistic talents to provide lesson support in art and drama classes.

After around four years Sophie moved on from BSCT, so in Jan 2008 Andrea joined us. working three days a week – one in each school. As a qualified Youth Worker, Andrea was able to use her skills and experience to provide pastoral support to students as well as working in lessons and clubs. This opened up opportunities to provide ‘small group work’ with students needing specific support in areas such as Self Esteem, Bullying, and Anger Management.

When Andrea took maternity leave in 2009, Andrea’s husband Phil – also a qualified Youth Worker – joined the team to provide maternity cover. At the same time, Cathy also joined and the benefit of two workers with complementary skills and ideas was quickly apparent. The lunch time clubs were re-branded and re-launched as ‘Emerge’, and the pastoral support and small groups grew on the back of the work that Andrea had put in over the previous few months. In addition Phil was able to start providing support for RE lessons in the Grammar School.

When Andrea returned from Maternity leave, Churches Together in Cottingham approached BSCT looking for support, as their schools worker was about to go on maternity leave. This was a real ‘God opportunity’ – Andrea was able to fulfil the days in Cottingham as well as picking up one day a week in Longcroft. The maternity cover workers were able to continue working, Cathy in the High School, and Phil at the Grammar school. At around this time, East Riding College asked for support with faith based activities and Phil was able to work with them on both the Beverley and Bridlington campuses. Beverley Schools Christian Trust now had three workers each offering complementary skills and energy, and the number of activities continued to grow.

Up to this point, most of the work had been with secondary schools. The Trustees had a vision to see more work in primary schools, but had not had the money or resource to start this work as a BSCT project. Cathy also had a vision for primary school work, and she started a primary school lunch time club working outside of her BSCT work. Cathy then secured funding from Bud Hull to pay for a play worker to run lunch time clubs in primary schools, and asked BSCT if the work could be run as a  BSCT program.

So at the beginning of school year 2011/12 BSCT recruited Julia to provide maternity cover for Cathy at the High School, and Jill to run lunch time sessions at primary schools. We now have five part time five workers, all focussed on providing a Christian presence and support to schools and colleges in our area.

Contact Information:

Beverley Schools Christian Trust
PO Box 137
Beverley
East Yorkshire HU17 7XZ

Email: mail@bsct.org.uk