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?
Improve students’ attendance at lessons so that it is good across all areas of the college, through the rigorous and consistent implementation of the college’s existing strategies; ensure that teachers routinely challenge all students who are not on time for their classes.
Teachers should ensure that all students routinely benefit from sharply focused and detailed feedback that enables them to understand clearly how to improve their work and make the progress of which they are capable.
Ensure that leaders and managers have access to timely, robust and accurate management information in order to:
improve their understanding of the extent to which all apprentices are making secure progress and are on track to achieve within the planned timescale; also, implement swift and effective action for those apprentices who are falling behind in their studies
improve the number of apprentices who progress on to a higher level of learning after they complete their programme
identify to a greater degree of precision the destinations of students who leave the college.
Improve the quality of education for apprentices by:
identifying the starting points of apprentices more accurately, so that skills trainers can plan and teach programmes that enable apprentices to develop substantial new knowledge, skills and behaviours
developing more effective links with employers so that they are fully involved in the planning of on-the-job training
ensuring that managers provide more rigorous scrutiny of the progress that apprentices make in the development of their knowledge, skills and behaviours
providing all apprentices with the opportunity to receive careers advice.
Ensure that all teachers and learning support assistants have secure knowledge in the subjects they teach and in which they provide support.
Increase the attendance of learners at English and mathematics lessons.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Ensure that governors, leaders and managers maintain their strong focus on developing teachers’ skills to ensure that the quality of provision is consistently high across all subjects.
Increase the proportion of AS-level learners who achieve and exceed their target grades by ensuring that:
more teachers use activities in lessons that are tailored to meet the different ability levels of learners
teachers check more carefully what learners have learned in lessons and help them fill any gaps in their understanding.
Increase the proportion of learners who achieve a grade C or above in GCSEs in English and mathematics at the first attempt by:
improving learners’ awareness of the importance of developing their skills in these subjects and raising their attendance at lessons
providing learners with work that is sufficiently demanding, especially those who are most-able, so that a higher proportion make progress relative to their prior attainment.
Develop further the study programmes for level 3 vocational and academic learners who do not apply for university so that they have a greater range of guidance and experiences, including work placements, to prepare them for employment.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Improve learners’ attendance rates across the college by rigorously evaluating the impact of new initiatives aimed at raising attendance rates.
Ensure that governors, leaders and managers work more effectively with wider staff teams within the college to form and implement clear plans to sustain improvements to learners’ progress.
Ensure that all assessors use the information from apprentices’ starting points to help apprentices rapidly develop new skills and knowledge and complete their qualifications within planned timescales.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Improve the quality of teaching and learning in GCSE English and mathematics lessons, to ensure that lecturers engage learners in these lessons, and provide them with the knowledge and skills they need to achieve a grade 4 or higher in their examinations.
Reinforce to learners on study programmes the importance of frequent attendance and good punctuality. Ensure a consistent approach from all staff to address poor attendance and punctuality.
Increase the number of clients available during practical lessons, so that all learners can develop their skills on a wide range of clients, and so that learners do not have to act as models for their peers so often.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Assessors should accelerate apprentices’ progress by recognising prior achievement in their planning and developing a broader range of appropriate strategies for assessment.
All tutors need to promote and teach English and mathematics better and develop these skills more consistently in their lessons so that learners recognise their value.
Tutors should ensure that the targets they set are specific to the individual learner and achieved on time.
Managers should use the quality improvement plan to build on areas that are already good, and to develop strategies that focus on improving learning further.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Increase the proportion of apprentices, particularly those on plumbing and electrotechnical apprenticeships, who achieve their qualifications in the planned timescale, by ensuring that:
apprentices receive frequent workplace visits and assessments that enable them to make rapid progress
assessors plan on- and off-the-job training effectively.
Increase the proportion of learners aged 16 to 19 who achieve their mathematics and English qualifications or improve their GCSE grade, by ensuring that:
learners attend their lessons in these subjects
teachers plan and teach sessions that take account of each learner’s prior skills and knowledge and therefore meet their individual needs.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Improve rapidly the quality of teaching, learning and assessment on level 3 mathematics courses in order for students to make good progress and achieve to the best of their abilities.
Further improve the quality of teaching, learning and assessment in the few subject areas where performance is not yet at a sufficiently high standard by ensuring that:
leaders and managers improve the performance of the minority of teachers who do not enable students to achieve the high grades of which they are capable
teachers plan a broad range of tasks and activities that meet the different needs of students and that challenge them effectively to realise their potential.
Ensure that all students arrive on time for their lessons at the start of the college day, so that students are better prepared for their next steps and the world of work.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Ensure that all teachers plan and teach challenging lessons that inspire all students, including the most able, to make fast progress.
Analyse the reasons why a minority of students on A-level courses and White British students underperform, and act quickly to improve performance.
Improve the analysis of data, particularly on students’ participation in work experience and the destinations of students progressing into employment, and use this analysis to identify fully strengths and weaknesses in course content relating to employability, and to make improvements where needed.
Leaders should ensure that employers are routinely involved in the planning of on- and off-the-job training and reviews of their apprentices to support apprentices to make the progress of which they are capable.
Leaders should identify what apprentices already know and can do at the start of their programme and use this information to ensure they plan a challenging and individualised curriculum.
Leaders should review the curriculum for learners with high needs on the ‘choices’ programme to ensure it is challenging and prepares them for future learning or work.
Leaders should ensure that they put appropriate actions in place to ensure learners with low attendance attend college regularly.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Ensure that strategic planning for adult provision considers local needs by:
building on existing relationships with the local enterprise partnership (LEP) and local employers to identify local and regional skills gaps
focusing adult funding on learners who are disadvantaged and least likely to participate in education and training.
Improve the quality of provision for adult learners by:
ensuring that staff use accurate records of prior attainment and progress to inform planning of teaching, learning and assessment, including actions to help learners who are not making enough progress
improving the quality of teaching for adult learners, including those on any distance-learning provision.
Leaders and managers need to improve the teaching skills of assessors. Assessors need to support apprentices’ development and recall of key theoretical concepts. They need to ensure that apprentices can apply new learning to more complex workplace situations.
Leaders and managers need to ensure that apprentices benefit from the same high-quality careers advice and guidance as adults and young people.
Managers and teachers must improve the English and mathematics skills of young people, including those with high needs. Young people must attend their lessons. They must apply the same purpose to their English and mathematics learning as they do to their other studies.
Leaders and managers need to increase the proportion of supported internship and employment opportunities for students with high needs.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Review individual learning plans to check whether these set challenging targets aimed at extending learners’ knowledge and skills. Combine this with closer monitoring of the quality of written feedback to learners so they know how they can improve their work further.
Develop further the frequent and systematic monitoring of teachers’ classroom practices so that managers know where best to focus their quality assurance activities to bring about further improvements in teaching and learning.
Identify ways to gather meaningful, up-to-date and accurate data to evaluate fully the success of courses and to develop progression routes further.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Enable more students to achieve their best by leaders ensuring that:
all teaching staff record student assessments regularly, in a way which enables progress mentors to identify students who are underperforming
students on science and mathematics A-level courses achieve as well as they are capable.
Improve the development of students’ skills for employment by:
ensuring that each student has an individual plan for developing the skills that they will need for their chosen career path or vocational area of interest
increasing significantly the proportion of students who undertake a high-quality work experience placement.
Improve the quality of teaching, learning and assessment by:
providing relevant training and development for teachers to support them in designing activities to extend the learning of the most able students
sharing more widely the good practice of teachers who successfully provide students with more challenging activities
ensuring that teachers have the plans, skills and confidence to support the development of students’ mathematical skills in all courses.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Improve further the quality of teaching, learning and assessment. To do this:
take swift action to improve the attendance of learners on 16 to 19 study programmes and adult learning programmes who do not attend their lessons regularly
improve staff development for teachers, particularly those on adult learning programmes and those identified as underperforming. Offer high-quality training and enable teachers to share good practice across all areas of the college, so that they improve their teaching skills and provide consistently good teaching and learning
make good use of the information on individual learners’ starting points and progress to plan lessons and activities that constantly challenge learners, particularly the most able, and which enable them to achieve or exceed their targets.
Improve the effectiveness of self-assessment processes and quality improvement planning to ensure that leaders, managers and governors have an accurate view of the college’s strengths and weaknesses. Ensure that managers challenge their teams to analyse weaknesses accurately and regularly, and identify specific actions for improvement, rather than merely complying with procedures.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Further improve the quality of teaching, learning and assessment by:
setting clear targets for all learners and accurately measuring learners’ progress against their targets
ensuring that all tutors plan and deliver activities that provide sufficient opportunity for learners to participate fully and actively in their learning
making better use of learning technology to enhance teaching and learning
ensuring that learners receive guidance, as they complete their course, on further higher-level learning opportunities offered by other providers.
Promote the sharing of best practice across the service by identifying outstanding tutors through the observation process and enabling them to work with other tutors to improve further the quality of teaching, learning and assessment.
Increase the rigour in monitoring the quality and consistency of assessment of learners’ progress on courses that do not lead to qualifications.
Collect and analyse information more systematically on the destination of learners after they have completed their course, in order to assess the impact of learning on future study and employment.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Improve attendance, particularly in English and mathematics, by making sure that teachers have appropriately high expectations for students that closely reflect workplace demands.
Ensure that students who have high needs develop the personal skills they need for adult life, rather than teachers planning and delivering learning that focuses too narrowly on the requirements of qualifications.
Ensure that a much higher proportion of students studying GCSE English and mathematics achieve a grade 4 or above.
Ensure that teachers of A-level courses plan and deliver learning that is high quality so that a much higher proportion of students achieve their full potential.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Further develop the arrangements to record learners’ progression and destinations to include those seafarers completing the pre-courses in ‘maths@sea’ and ‘English@sea’, and use this information to evaluate how effectively these courses support learners to move on to higher levels of qualification and learning.
Ensure that all learners complete the necessary ‘Prevent’ duty training. Staff should support learners to understand the relevance and reasons for completing courses and how this relates to their work and everyday lives.
Ensure that managers follow up the recommendations given to tutors at the subcontractor, after they sample learners’ work and in order to confirm that actions for improvement have been implemented.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Provide training for all teachers so that they have the confidence and knowledge to integrate mathematics and ILT effectively into their lessons to develop and enhance learners’ skills. Ensure that all teachers use the results from initial and on-going assessment consistently well to help match teaching to individual learning needs.
Strengthen the priority to improve the quality of teaching, learning and assessment to outstanding by using the findings from the observation of teaching, learning and assessment to deliver relevant staff development.
Improve the rigour of trustees’ monitoring of the quality of provision, and of their challenge to managers’ to improve performance, by providing them with better management information on the quality of teaching, learning and assessment.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Ensure that all teachers enable learners on study programmes and adult learning programmes to develop their English and mathematical skills within their main qualifications.
Ensure that a much greater proportion of learners studying English and mathematics achieve high-grade passes in GCSE English and mathematics, and that a higher proportion of adult learners achieve their functional skills qualifications at levels higher than those that they already hold.
Accelerate the pace of change in tackling the weaknesses in the apprenticeship provision to improve the quality of education that apprentices receive and ensure that apprentices make quicker progress.
Ensure that teachers on A-level courses plan and use high-quality learning activities that support and challenge a much higher proportion of learners to achieve their potential.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Leaders and managers should improve the quality of apprenticeship courses by:
improving the testing of learning so that staff check in more detail how well apprentices develop their knowledge
increasing the level of challenge for those apprentices who miss deadlines or do not attend their off-the-job training
improving target-setting so that staff set challenging targets which focus on developing apprentices’ skills, knowledge and behaviours
improving the level of apprentices’ literacy and numeracy skills by ensuring that they all practise and develop these skills in both the classroom and the workplace.
Improve further teaching, learning and assessment in GCSE English and mathematics classes so that a higher proportion gain grades 4 to 9, ensuring that students complete work that challenges them and helps them improve their skills.
Ensure that attendance continues to improve in all areas of the curriculum, and particularly for students studying English and mathematics.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Leaders and managers should continue to implement their well-conceived strategies to further improve the proportion of students who achieve their qualifications.
Managers should ensure that more students and apprentices are able to improve their skills in English and mathematics and achieve their GCSE qualifications, in line with their specific targets.
Leaders and managers should further improve the quality of teaching, learning and assessment in the small minority of lessons where students make insufficiently rapid progress by ensuring that:
teachers provide sufficient challenge to the most able students, so that they make good progress and achieve or exceed their target grades
all students and apprentices are set aspirational targets, taking into account their starting points.
Managers should continue to increase opportunities for external work experience placements for vocational students, particularly for those at level 2, so that they are able to learn about and experience work in their vocational area. This should include increasing the number of supported internships for students in receipt of high-needs funding.
Managers should take effective steps to ensure that students’ attendance improves further, across all subjects, to increase their opportunities to make good progress.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Improve the quality of teaching, learning and assessment, by ensuring that:
tutors set and agree challenging targets for students, so that they know what they need to do to improve their skills and knowledge
tutors use questioning techniques that are effective in checking and extending students’ learning, so that students understand each topic before they move on to the next
students attend their lessons frequently.
Increase the proportion of students who achieve their qualifications in externally accredited courses by enrolling students onto the correct courses that meet their needs and aspirations, so that they complete all the components of their courses.
