Governors’ Annual Report to Parents December 2019 Welsh language version available on request Governors’ Annual Report to Parents - 2019 On behalf of the Governing Body and Acting Headteacher, we would like to take this opportunity to thank you as parents, and the whole community for your support of St Julian’s School. Over this past academic year, the staff and governors have continued to work hard to develop the quality and provision of the education provided to all learners. The Governing Body has played a fundamental role in both supporting and challenging the school to ensure progress continues at St Julian’s at the appropriate pace. We hope that you have already had the opportunity to visit our evolving website and I would ask you to pay particular attention to the Governing Body web pages which can be found in ‘About Us.’ We continue to use these to ensure that the school community can access the work of the Governing Body, and the different roles we hold. We also ensure that we have parent governors available at all parents evenings so that parents can get in touch with their representatives more easily. As the report outlines we have paused to celebrate our success but also re-focused on the ongoing challenges ahead. Your role as parents / carers continues to be vital in not only supporting your children but communicating with us and providing helpful self-evaluation information on our work. The Governors, Acting Headteacher and staff are determined to ensure that the school continues to work tirelessly to develop our provision over the coming years and provide the quality of education that all our students deserve in meeting the national aspirations of becoming ambitious capable learners who are confident and able to make a successful contribution to society in Wales. Cllr Deb Davies Tracy McKim Chair of the Governing Body Vice Chair of the Governing Body 1 Governors’ Annual Report to Parents December 2019 Contents Page No. 1. Members of the Governing Body 3 ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ 2. Term Dates 3 3. Standards 4 4. Attendance 5 5. Teaching and Learning 5 6. Safeguarding and Wellbeing 6 7. School Leavers 7 8. Curriculum 7 9. The Wider Curriculum 13 10. Finance 15 11. Contact 15 2 Members of the Governing Body Community Governors Local Authority appointed governors Mrs Irene Cameron MBE Cllr Deborah Davies : Chair Rev Les Jones Ms Tracy McKim : Vice-Chair Mr Andrew Goddard Cllr Phil Hourahine Vacancy Cllr Graham Berry Mrs Jen Porter Mr Paul Jones Mrs Deborah Weston Teacher Governors Ms Louise Moore Mrs Cath Blake Ms Kat Mason Staff Governor Headteacher and Deputy Headteacher Mr Ryan Owen Mr Julian Doroszczuk Mr Mark Tidman Miss Sarah Hook Parent Governors Clerk Mrs Louise Perkin Mrs Nia Dale Mrs Leigh Holmes Mrs Clare Coff Mr Christopher Curtis Ms Clare Greenhouse Mrs Hellen Vinnicombe Vacancy Term Dates Term Start Half-term starts Half-term ends Term ends Autumn 2nd Sept 2019 28th Oct 2019 1st Nov 2019 20th Dec 2019 Spring 6th Jan 2020 17th Feb 2020 21st Feb 2020 3rd Apr 2020 Summer 20th Apr 2020 25th May 2020 29th May 2020 20th Jul 2020 St Julians School, Heather Road Newport NP19 7XU [email protected] ​ www.stjuliansschool.co.uk 3 Standards Parents will be aware Estyn undertook a monitoring visit of the school in June 2017 and as a result placed the school in the support category of ‘special measures.’ Over the past two academic years we have had six monitoring visits from Estyn which involve lesson observations, meetings with students and staff and scrutiny of all of our work. Although the focus is on the general progress we are making with regards our Post Inspection Action Plan, each visit has also concentrated on one or two of the key recommendations. A copy of our plan can be found on the school website. R1: Improve standards at KS3 and KS4 ​ R2: Improve the coordination and planning for progression in developing literacy and numeracy ​ R3: Improve the quality and consistency of teaching, marking and assessment ​ R4: Improve self-evaluation and improvement planning ​ R5: Strengthen the role of middle leaders so that they are fully accountable for standards, provision ​ and the quality assurance of the work of their departments. Each visit continues to be extremely useful with Estyn recognising the good practice we are developing alongside key areas where further progress needs to take place. It would be useful if you were able to refer to the Teaching and Learning section of this report for more specific details. KS3 Contrary to an overall improving trend in performance in previous years, 2019 saw all performance indicators at both Level 5+ and Level 6+ decline in raw data scores except for English at Level 6+. Despite this decline, progression data based on KS2 outcomes demonstrates that many pupils made at least expected progress in the three key performance indicators of English, mathematics and science with a minority making better than expected progress. KS4 Last year saw the introduction of the new interim performance measures at key stage 4 as part of the national Curriculum Reform agenda. Consequently, comparisons to previous year’s performance in many measures is no longer possible. The new interim Capped 9 measure is where every grade obtained by a pupil is allocated a set number of points; the points gained in mathematics, English, science plus 6 other qualifications are then totalled up and averaged. The average point score for the school was 348 which demonstrates an improvement of 19 points compared to 2018 outcomes and is above the score for pupils in our family of schools and the Local Authority. Another notable improvement was in the percentage of pupils achieving a minimum of 5A*/A grades which increased by 4.6 percentage points over 2018 outcomes. Both these measures highlight strong performance of our more able and talented pupils. Analysis of the performance of pupils eligible for free school meals (FSM) in a range of measures including the Capped 9 demonstrates equally positive outcomes, with St Julian’s pupils performing above all three comparative figures for FSM pupils in our family of schools, the Local Authority and All Wales. In the discrete subjects of English Language, science, mathematics, and numeracy performance was variable with all subjects performing above the family average figure but below that of the Local Authority and All Wales figures. 4 KS5 Our L3 threshold continued its improving trend in 2019 rising by 0.3 percentage points to 93.3%. Other key measures also demonstrated improvement over 2018 outcomes for example 3A*/A and 3A*/C. It is especially pleasing to note the high percentage of our Year 13 students who have now successfully entered University. All of these students have worked so hard to achieve their grades to gain admission to University and we are very proud of them all. It is also pleasing to evidence the increase in the number of students who have gained access to Russell Group universities this year and also our first successful Cambridge undergraduate in many, many years. We know it is achievable - it is now up to others to follow! Attendance Our annual attendance figure for 2018-19 at 93.74% sees a continuation of the improving trend in attendance. The school marginally exceeded its LA target of 93.7% and demonstrated an increase of 0.2% on the previous year’s figure of 93.5%. FSM performance at 90.5% is the highest reported in the last four years. This positive trend is a result of increased rewards for good attendance alongside greater EWO involvement and the application of Fixed Penalty Notices and Attendance Panels for persistent poor attenders. We know that attendance links closely to student performance and we ask parents to continue to work with us to improve our attendance. We are concerned with the increasing numbers of students who go on holiday during term time. As governors we recognise the negative impact this has on student’s achievement. Fixed Penalty Notice (FPN) As you will be aware from the information on our website, following Welsh Government legislation, Newport City Council has adopted a Code of Conduct which allows the school to issue Fixed Penalty Notices to the parents of pupils who lose five school days or ten school sessions which are unauthorised. As a school we will always wish to cooperate with parents and carers and hope there will not be the need to issue these. We would encourage all parents to work with the school to improve attendance and raise any issues or concerns with the school if you need support with school attendance for your child. Teaching & Learning For 2019-20, every department across the school has written a Development Plan outlining exactly how they will continue to improve the quality of teaching and learning in their subject areas. These key areas for development have again come directly from our whole School Development Plan and range from increasing levels of challenge in the classroom, improving aspects of writing and oracy and increasing levels of student resilience. These areas have been identified through our quality assurance procedures and termly Estyn monitoring visits. All leaders and teachers across the school are responsible for and committed to improving standards and we will measure improvements through further monitoring of provision and standards. Our strengthened monitoring arrangements include listening to learners, work scrutiny, lesson observations and regular data analysis. In addition, each department had a quality assurance week within the Autumn Term where all aspects of provision and standards have been evaluated. 5 Marking, Feedback and Assessment We have continued to place high expectations on students and staff when it comes to the quality of work and this is one of a number of key areas we routinely monitor when looking at students’ books.