St Ambrose College, an all-boys secondary school in Greater Manchester, has transformed its approach to peer relationships, creating a community where boys support each other's academic and personal growth. Through comprehensive transition programmes, strategic house systems, and careful culture-building, the school has created an environment where healthy competition thrives alongside genuine peer support. Peer Relationships score +1.4 above the national secondary benchmark of 6.8/10 on The Engagement Platform, with 76% of pupils advocates for the statement ‘I enjoy being in school’.  

The foundation for strong peer relationships begins before boys even start at the school. St Ambrose runs three sports camps across Saturdays in May and June, designed specifically to help incoming students form connections. Principal Dermot Rainey recalls visiting the final session:

"I said, 'right, who's met a new friend ready to come in September' and every single hand went up because the boys do come from far and wide.”

This early investment in relationships pays dividends throughout their school experience. The transition programme extends beyond sports camps to include one-to-one meetings where staff take small groups of five or six boys with their parents, using structured questions to understand individual needs and circumstances. Assistant Head Dan Sweeney explains the follow-up approach:

"We've given them a summer project to do about the ethos and the character of the school. It’s an independent learning project that they combine with other children’s work on the first day.”

The house system provides another crucial framework for building relationships across year groups. Rather than keeping students isolated within their year groups, the houses create vertical connections that strengthen the school community. Year 12s have particularly high TEP scores, indicating the impact of their positions of responsibility, among other approaches; their average Headline Engagement score is +3.0 above the national secondary benchmark of 5.6/10.

"We have the Sixth Form Heads of House and they will do assemblies going into each of the houses... and we have loads of in-house competitions again, so rather than just the boys sticking with their form... to create relationships with other people from other year groups."

Most significantly, the school has cultivated a culture where academic achievement is genuinely celebrated. Boys "bounce off each other and they push each other," with competition being positive rather than destructive. Students support struggling peers rather than boasting about superior results.

This supportive academic culture extends beyond the classroom. During Easter holidays, Dermot bumped into multiple groups of St Ambrose boys studying together in Manchester's Central Library:

"Over the three different floors of the library, there were just loads of St Ambrose Boys in their Easter holidays… they had a university mentality to them."

When Dermot mentioned this to current students, their response showed how embedded this culture has become:

"I was joking to a few of the lads this year about it, 'oh, if I go into St Peters Square library this year I hope I'll see you.' And they were all, 'oh it's where we go, that's where we go.'"

The school has deliberately fostered this environment through initiatives like the Explorer programme, an Oxbridge pathway for years seven to nine, giving students aspirational goals to work towards collectively. Success in programmes like Sutton Trust scholarships becomes something the whole community celebrates.

The result is making it "cool to want to earn" - a fundamental shift where academic effort and achievement are sources of pride rather than embarrassment, supporting the school's broader goals of developing young men who can make positive contributions to society.

Key strategies:

• Implemented comprehensive transition programme including sports camps and summer projects

• Created house system to build relationships across year groups

• Established culture where academic achievement is openly celebrated and supported

• Provided aspirational programmes that students work toward collectively

• Modelled collaborative learning through initiatives like group library study sessions