At Ashford School we seek to provide our students with an entrepreneurial skill set that we hope will enable them either to be creative and innovative employees, or run their own business in the future.
A Level
The Business A Level course provides a solid foundation in the four crucial functional areas of business: finance, marketing, human resource management and logistics. In addition, students study the effects of external factors such as the state of the economy, government policy, technology, ethics, and environmental concerns upon business performance, giving the students a moral as well as a profit-driven focus.
All of the business theory that we study is applied to actual businesses of varying size and scale, so that the students’ experience of the subject is as real as possible. To this end we visit local businesses such as the Shepherd Neame brewery in Faversham, where the pupils can experience first-hand the marketing and production ideas that they learn in the classroom. Students also attend conferences where they can share their business knowledge with peers from other schools.
Running alongside the A Level and CTEC Business courses we offer the students the chance to participate in the Young Enterprise style programme, which offers Sixth Formers the chance to set up and run their own business, choosing their very own product and manufacturing and marketing it themselves. This is an excellent opportunity for Business students (as well as those from other subject disciplines) to put their business theory into practice, and Ashford School companies have regularly been successful in Kent inter-school competitions.
We are delighted that so many of our students go on to pursue Business-related degree courses at university.
CTEC
From September 2026 we are introducing a new Applied Business course that students can opt for in the Sixth Form as an alternative to the traditional Business A Level.
CTEC Business Extended Certificate offers key business knowledge and skills that are assessed through a combination of re-takeable exams and coursework throughout Years 12 and 13.
Like the A Level students will learn about the key functional areas of a business such as Logistics and Human Resource Management, as well as the economic, legal and ethical environment in which a firm operates. In addition, however, there is a focus on vocational business skills such as meeting customers expectations and business project management.
GCSE
Students in Year 9 can opt to take the Edexcel/Pearsons GCSE Business qualification.
This course is designed to give young people the knowledge and skills that they need to start their own business, which is covered in Year 10, and then grow a successful business, which is covered in Year 11.
To bring this subject to life, we use real business examples, and the students own business ideas.
This GCSE represents a useful pathway into studying Business or Economics A Level in the Sixth Form, or provide our budding entrepreneurs with an invaluable business toolkit.