What does the provider need to do to improve?
- Ensure that all teachers are aware of students’ starting points in order for them to be clear about the skills, knowledge and behaviours that students need to develop to make the progress of which they are capable and for their next steps.
- Increase the opportunities for all students to experience the world of work through meaningful work placements which complement their studies in the construction sector.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
- Be more critical in self-assessment and use the findings more effectively to improve the quality of provision by:
- ensuring that teachers accurately evaluate the effectiveness of their courses
- accurately evaluating the college’s strengths and weaknesses
- taking rapid and effective action to improve weaker areas
- ensuring that governors hold leaders and managers to account for meeting key performance targets.
- Ensure that 16 to 19 study programmes fully meet the needs of students by:
- enabling a high proportion of students to progress to construction-related training or apprenticeships
- giving all students access to good work experience opportunities
- reinforcing students’ understanding of diversity, safeguarding, radicalisation and extremism throughout their programmes.
- Increase the proportion of level 1 students who progress to a higher level by:
- providing clear and expected progression pathways for students to higher levels
- providing careers guidance that enables students to make informed choices about their future careers
- monitoring accurately the destinations of students who complete their courses so that managers are better informed about improvements that they need to make.
- Provide high-quality support for students from disadvantaged backgrounds on study programmes so that they achieve at least at the level of their peers.
- Train teachers to take account of students’ starting points more effectively so that students make more rapid progress in developing their understanding of theoretical content.
- Increase the proportion of students on study programmes and apprentices who achieve their English and mathematics qualifications by:
- ensuring that staff deliver English and mathematics lessons which challenge and engage students and apprentices and prepare them effectively for their examinations
- improving the attendance of students in English and mathematics lessons so that it is at least at the college’s average.
- Ensure that teachers on study programmes develop students’ personal, social, employability and written English skills by:
- reinforcing the importance of punctuality to students in all sessions
- making sure that students arrive to lessons ready to learn and with the required equipment and attitude
- enforcing the college’s attendance policy so that attendance targets are met
- training all staff so that they develop students’ written English skills effectively.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
- Secure further improvements in students’ success rates on college-based courses by ensuring that the curriculum is well planned to meet all students’ individual needs and circumstances. Continually review, strengthening where necessary, strategies and actions to improve and sustain high levels of retention.
- Improve the quality of discrete English lessons so that they meet the varied needs of all students and relate well to their vocational learning and experiences.
- Increase the proportion of good and outstanding teaching by improving the rigour of the lesson observation process so that it identifies areas for improvement in teaching more effectively. Ensure managers use the information and findings from the lesson observation process with greater consistency to inform teachers’ appraisals, quality improvement plans and professional development.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
- Increase success rates across all levels by:
- maintaining and accelerating the focus on improving retention
- ensuring the frequent monitoring of retention
- ensuring that targets for learners’ attendance are specific to each course, that frequent monitoring takes place to check they are being met and that prompt action is taken where this is not the case.
- Raise the profile of functional skills in English and create frequent and better opportunities for all learners to improve their literacy skills. Ensure that errors in spelling and grammar are regularly corrected.
- Further improve the quality of teaching and learning in theory lessons so that learners of all ability levels are motivated and engaged to make good progress. Make sure that activities are planned to meet all learners’ needs and that targets set are sufficiently specific and challenging.
- Ensure that action planning arising from course reviews has specific targets for improvement with clear timescales and milestones to measure progress at regular intervals.
- Integrate more effectively equality and diversity into the curriculum. Ensure that opportunities to develop learners’ understanding of equality and diversity are taken.
- Improve the arrangements to manage and assess the performance of staff. Make sure that staff appraisals have clear and measureable targets for improvement.
What does Leeds College of Building need to do to improve further?
- Continue to rigorously monitor the college’s retention improvement plan and closely monitor attendance and punctuality to ensure that more learners remain and succeed on their programme.
- Revise the observation of teaching policy to include standardised procedures to ensure that areas for improvement identified during the process are effectively monitored and evaluated so that the quality of teaching continues to improve. Ensure that moderation and standardisation activities that form judgements on the quality of teaching and learning are realistic and accurate.
- Strengthen methods to gather and analyse the views of students, particularly students from sites other than the main site. Further encourage student contributions to focus groups and liaison committees and ensure more effective completion, analysis and use of questionnaires.
- Extend the promotion of equality and diversity through teaching and learning to ensure more contextualisation in lessons so that all curriculum areas promote equality and diversity more effectively.
Areas for improvement
The college should address:
- declining retention rates
- target-setting for learners
- structure and promotion of enrichment
- inconsistency in divisional performance
- promotion of equal opportunities
- insufficient use of information for management at all levels
n/a
What should be improved
- some weak teaching of theory lessons
- unsatisfactory pass rates for adults at National Vocational Qualification (NVQ) level 1
- quality assurance of assessment and work-based learning
- procedures for initial assessment
- strategies for widening participation
- access to computerised management information systems for staff
- enrichment activities.
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