Twelve Secondary School Improvement Journeys

Twelve secondary school improvement journeys December 2013 The purpose of Estyn is to inspect quality and standards in education and training in Wales. Estyn is responsible for inspecting: nursery schools and settings that are maintained by, or receive funding from, local authorities; primary schools; secondary schools; special schools; pupil referral units; independent schools; further education; independent specialist colleges; adult community learning; local authority education services for children and young people; teacher education and training; Welsh for adults; work-based learning; and learning in the justice sector. Estyn also: provides advice on quality and standards in education and training in Wales to the National Assembly for Wales and others; and makes public good practice based on inspection evidence. Every possible care has been taken to ensure that the information in this document is accurate at the time of going to press. Any enquiries or comments regarding this document/publication should be addressed to: Publication Section Estyn Anchor Court Keen Road Cardiff CF24 5JW or by email to [email protected] This and other Estyn publications are available on our website: www.estyn.gov.uk © Crown Copyright 2013: This report may be re-used free of charge in any format or medium provided that it is re-used accurately and not used in a misleading context. The material must be acknowledged as Crown copyright and the title of the document/publication specified. Contents Page HMCI foreword 1 Introduction 3 Part One: Twelve case studies of how schools improve 4 Cefn Hengoed Community School, Swansea 4 Connah’s Quay High School, Flintshire 11 John Summers High School, Flintshire 18 Mary Immaculate High School, Cardiff 22 Newtown High School, Powys 30 Oakdale Comprehensive School, Caerphilly 35 Olchfa School, Swansea 42 Sandfields Comprehensive School, Neath Port Talbot 46 Ysgol Bryn Elian, Conwy 54 Ysgol Cwm Rhymni, Caerphilly 60 Ysgol Glan-y-Mor, Gwynedd 64 Ysgol Gyfun Gwyr, Swansea 70 Part Two: Summary of school improvement journeys 76 Common tasks for schools at all stages of development 76 Moving from unsatisfactory to adequate 78 Moving from adequate to good 80 Moving from good to excellent 81 Leadership in the case study schools 83 Summary diagram 85 How schools can use the report 87 Twelve secondary school improvement journeys HMCI foreword Different kinds of schools need different styles of leadership A school that is in special measures will need a different style of leadership from what is needed in a school that already has sound systems in place and where everyone is collaborating to maintain high standards. When the problems being faced are considerable and a school’s performance is weak, this is generally the time for direct leadership to offer centrally-driven and urgent action. The more successful a school is, the more it is possible to rely on a distributed leadership model because the culture of seeking continuous improvement already exists. At one extreme you need to develop direction and strategy, set up new organisational structures and create powerful teams to improve teaching and learning and streamline work processes. Even in extreme circumstances, though, success will not be sustainable if people are steamrollered to comply. Staff need to understand why change is happening and the best kind of way to manage change is to involve people in a process that means listening before decisions are taken and final plans agreed. Listening properly to the people who are involved in whatever needs to be improved and balancing their concerns and views while continuing to move forward are the marks of strong leadership. Perhaps change is more challenging in a coasting school where staff believe that the school is doing well and does not need to improve. In this situation, the challenges need to be diagnosed clearly. To do this, leaders, including teachers, need to: establish an ethos of mutual respect and confidence between leaders, including the new headteacher and staff, create a learning organisation that is not complacent about existing practices but constantly involved in exploring ways of improving; drop in on classrooms and scrutinise pupils’ work systematically (self-evaluation); identify what support is needed; and promote a new culture of innovation. In a sector-leading school, there will still be a need to monitor progress and improve practice in order to respond to new initiatives and to make sure that high standards are being maintained. But the other responsibility that comes with excellence, of course, is how to go further than just being sector-leading. Excellent leadership makes a significant contribution to individual school improvement and crucially is a key to system-wide improvement. Some secondary schools are lead practitioner schools that receive funding to share their expertise and good practice with paired ‘emergent’ practitioner schools. But even if you work in a school that is not a lead practitioner, if you have innovative and effective 1 Twelve secondary school improvement journeys practice in your school it is your job to disseminate that, maybe within your family of schools or in your local cluster of schools. It is a condition of achieving ‘sector-leading excellence’ in Estyn inspections that you should be sharing that practice with others. More and more emphasis is being put on networks of individuals or groups or clusters of schools. There are particular skills involved in making, using and retaining contacts in a network, and larger skills involved in leading across networks in order to achieve collective objectives. This includes understanding how partners and networks work and what the constraints on them are. Working collaboratively requires skills to establish mutual understanding of the outcomes you want to achieve, and understanding how to find and use those lines of influence that lead from the strategic to the operational, in order to achieve those outcomes. We need to think in a more sophisticated way about how to frame our expectations of the kind of leadership that will lead to change. It is not enough to issue guidance and set policy or to inspect compliance. Our objectives are more subtle and have to do with widening horizons, aligning initiatives, building capacity, influencing others, developing potential and facilitating learning. We need to enable everyone in the education system to learn more, learn better and apply their learning. That includes children, young people, teachers, support staff, inspectors, system leaders, policy-makers and headteachers. 2 Twelve secondary school improvement journeys Introduction Over the years, Estyn inspectors have visited schools at various stages of development. Core inspections and follow-up visits, as well as visits undertaken as part of thematic work, have enabled inspectors to identify schools that are good or excellent or that are making good or excellent progress from a low starting point. The case studies in Part One of this report describe schools that are on their own improvement journeys. The choice of case studies represents “journeys” from a range of starting points and a variety of stages of development. They are all schools that have either improved or maintained a high level of performance. In each case, the headteacher who played a key role in securing improvement is still in post. The case studies have been produced by staff from the schools themselves and capture their own narrative and style. To tell the full story, a lot of detail has been included in order to describe and explain the processes involved. The case studies are written in the school’s own voice, but they follow a similar pattern, starting with the context of the school, identifying three key factors that contributed to the work, and finally setting out those strategies and actions that have proved to be successful. Part Two of this report pulls together some general features of successful school improvement, based on the case studies in Part One. 3 Twelve secondary school improvement journeys Part One: Twelve case studies of how schools improve Case study 1 – Cefn Hengoed Community School, Swansea Cefn Hengoed Community School is an 11 to 16 mixed comprehensive school in Swansea. Around 44% of pupils receive free school meals; this is considerably higher than the national average of 17.4% and the Swansea average of 18.3%. Around 42% of pupils have special educational needs and of this 7% have statements of need; these are considerably higher than the national proportions, 18.6% and 2.6% respectively. The leadership team is made up of the headteacher and two deputy headteachers. The head has been in post since 2007, while the deputies were both internal appointments in September 2011. In September 2012 the school moved into a new school on the same site. What three factors have had the biggest impact on improving standards? Focus on improving attendance by improving curriculum provision at key stage 4 (14-19 Learning Measure), improving standards of teaching and learning to ensure appropriate learning for all pupils and giving pupils the skills to be actively involved in their own learning. Training all staff over time to use performance data to set targets and track pupil progress, to inform continuously refined intervention strategies. Distributed leadership to enable self-starting professional development (CPD), to maximise the momentum and reach of change so that raising standards are the responsibility, aim and drive for all staff e.g. through focus groups on teaching and learning, assessment, recording and reporting (ARR), literacy, numeracy. Revised and implemented by the staff to enable the staff to lead progress. All these led to improved outcomes which in turn have raised the aspirations of the whole community. How closely does the school match the stages of the improvement journey model? Why? The common characteristics represent our simple, clear vision which underpins our journey (using the present tense as we are always on the journey): Strong leadership and vision, shaping a dynamic strategy.

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