Provide tutors with teaching knowledge and skills training and monitor how well they implement the new learning and its impact on what learners know and can do.
Ensure that all learners receive developmental feedback. Provide governors with the information they need to assess the quality of teaching, learning and assessment.
Ensure that learners aged 16 to 18 receive a broader understanding of the options they have when finishing their programmes.
Ensure that learners with high needs are supported to develop the specific skills identified in their educational and health care plans, so that they develop the skills they need when they complete their studies.
Ensure that all learners are supported to achieve the level of which they are capable.
Continue to develop the use of learners starting points when planning learning so that all learners make sustained progress.
Ensure all learners receive detailed careers, education, information, advice and guidance about the range of progression opportunities available to them including apprenticeships and employment.
Leaders and managers must ensure that young people studying on the traineeship programmes and apprentices take part in discussions with employers so that they are prepared fully for their work placements.
Leaders and managers must ensure that staff plan and teach mathematics lessons that include sufficient content to challenge learners so that they know and remember more and leads to improved levels of qualification achievement.
Leaders and managers must involve employers more in the planning and implementation of the traineeship programmes and apprenticeships so that employers know how to support learners and apprentices to increase their knowledge and improve their skills at work.
Leaders and managers must monitor closely the quality of education provided for adults so that they identify swiftly areas for improvement and take robust remedial actions to improve the quality of the provision.
Rapidly improve the quality of education for learners on education programmes for young people, particularly those aged 14 to 16.
Make sure learners with high needs receive appropriate targets that focus on the development of essential learning. Ensure the targets are robustly monitored to make certain learners with high needs are making the progress they are capable of.
Make sure that leaders of the high needs courses have sufficient oversight of the progress learners are making.
Ensure that attendance to lessons is routinely high.
Make sure that teachers use the information from learners’ starting points to plan learning.
Ensure that all learners on education programmes for young people and learners with high needs receive access to meaningful work experience that prepares them for employment.
Increase the number of learners and apprentices who successfully achieve their qualifications.
Ensure that learners and apprentices achieve the grades they are capable of.
Support apprentices to make expected progress and achieve their apprenticeship standards.
Fully implement planned actions to improve attendance in subjects where it is too low.
Improve the uptake of personal development activities.
Implement planned actions to improve the number of learners who achieve their information technology qualifications and who achieve grade 4 or better in English and mathematics GCSEs.
Develop the skills and confidence of staff teaching apprentices and students aged 16 to 18 to teach the challenging and difficult subjects in the personal development curriculum, such as sexual harassment and healthy relationships.
Ensure that students aged 16 to 18, but only those for whom it is appropriate, have the opportunity to participate in meaningful and worthwhile external work experience placements.
Improve the teaching of GCSE mathematics so that students improve their confidence with this subject and the proportion that achieve at least a grade 4 in their examinations increases.
Improve the specificity of apprentices’ development targets and the quality of feedback on their written and practical work.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Managers should identify areas for improvement swiftly and accurately to arrest the decline in learners’ achievement of qualifications.
Teachers should set learners specific, measurable and increasingly challenging targets, and monitor their progress towards achieving these rigorously, to ensure sustained improvements in learners’ achievements over time.
Teachers should make sure that activities enable learners of all abilities to achieve the highest grades of which they are capable, especially in provision for 14- to 16-year-old learners and vocational study programmes.
Teachers should ensure that learners understand the importance of English and mathematics as part of their programme and they should support learners to attend lessons and achieve qualifications in these subjects.
Managers and teachers should ensure that apprentices complete and achieve their functional skills qualifications more quickly. Across the whole of their apprenticeship programme, teachers should set targets for the skills and knowledge apprentices need to develop and closely monitor apprentices’ progress in completing these.
Ensure that students benefit from high-quality English and mathematics teaching so that they can pass their GCSE examinations.
Ensure that apprentices develop a good understanding of personal development topics beyond the vocational curriculum.
Ensure that students on supported internships know what they need to do to further develop their skills and knowledge.
Ensure that students understand the benefits and participate in an enrichment curriculum that supports the development of their wider skills and interests.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Ensure the continued improvement of teaching, learning and assessment, so that most is outstanding, and little requires improvement. Do this by building on the existing best practice of teachers, especially in outstanding areas of performance, in meeting the needs of all learners in lessons, and paying particular attention to providing sufficient challenge for more able learners. Help teachers to become fully accomplished in the use of information technology, to support learning as well as possible in lessons.
Ensure college-wide improvement in teaching, learning and assessment in foundation English and mathematics, and increase learners’ successful completion of qualifications in these subjects, by providing all teachers with the necessary skills and confidence to help learners improve. In particular, make sure that teachers improve learners’ understanding of the relevance of English and mathematical skills by integrating them into vocational studies, and by emphasising their importance in achieving qualifications, employment and places in higher education. Further ensure that teachers fully exploit naturally occurring opportunities in lessons to reinforce the relevance of English and mathematics, and that they always provide constructive feedback to learners on these aspects of their written work.
Ensure the continued and consistent improvement of learners’ successful completion by rigorous application of existing detailed quality improvement plans, both for level 2 courses for adults and for those AS-level subjects where success rates are low. In particular, build on the college’s best practice, in relation to initial advice and guidance for learners, and to personalised action plans for learners, after their probationary period.
Although the College’s student population has an overall gender balance that is 50:50 male-female, courses in specific subjects such as Hairdressing, Beauty, Construction and Care do not all reflect this balance. Further action is required to address this and make progress towards meeting national targets.
Although attainment rates are very high across all student categories and subjects, well above regional targets and generally at or above 70% across the various groups, there is further potential to improve outcomes to maintain consistently very high attainment rates across all groups and subjects.
The College should monitor the effectiveness and impact of its new approaches for Learning Support and Extended learning support. In line with national policy, the College should monitor the effectiveness and impact of the new British Sign Language Plan.
Although outcomes for students are already very high across diverse groups of students, the College would benefit from drawing on best practice from the wider UK college sector to further enhance outcomes.
Increase attendance to English and mathematics lessons to ensure learners can make rapid and sustained progress through their qualifications.
Ensure all adult learners and apprentices have access to careers education, information, advice and guidance and fully understand, where appropriate, the professional institute memberships that their qualifications will bring.
Ensure younger learners are sufficiently challenged during lessons to build on their knowledge and skills and make the progress of which they are capable.
Ensure teachers of learners with high needs plan their teaching and adapt their learning resources to meet the needs of individual learners.
Ensure all learners and apprentices understand the risks associated with radicalisation and extremism – including localised risk.
Involve employers in the design and implementation of the apprenticeship curriculum, including reviews of the progress that apprentices make, to make sure apprentices achieve their qualifications in a timely manner.
Improve the quality of teaching, learning and assessment on a small number of courses, including engineering and multi-skills construction, to ensure all learners and apprentices receive a consistently good-quality learning experience.
Provide high-quality feedback to learners and apprentices on their work so that they know what they have done well and how to improve their work and achieve highly.
Maintain the momentum of rapid improvements to continue increasing attendance and improving achievement.
Ensure that learners with high needs, particularly those on supported internships, have meaningful work experience which is related to their individual career aspirations.
What does South West College need to do to improve further?
The College needs to:
continue to implement the strategy to enhance the quality of teaching, training and learning and to provide the lecturers, including part-time lecturers, with appropriate professional support to develop further their pedagogic skills.
What does the Southern Regional College need to do to improve further?
The College needs to:
take a more strategic approach to the longer term planning for the curriculum, to ensure that it continues to fully meet the needs of learners, industry and the wider community;
improve the use of technology to support and enhance the quality of teaching, training and learning across the College;
further improve the quality of teaching and learning in the provision for the essential skills; and
address the satisfactory quality of the provision in transportation operations and maintenance (motor vehicle).
Set clear and measurable actions to improve the quality of education for apprentices.
Ensure that staff are aware of apprentices’ and adult learners’ knowledge and skills prior to starting their course or apprenticeship, so that they can plan challenging curriculums for all.
Swiftly improve attendance for learners and apprentices.
Increase the proportion of learners who achieve the highest grades of which they are capable.
Reduce the level of disruption experienced by learners and apprentices arising from turnover in college staffing.
Provide an improved offer of careers advice and teaching of wider personal development topics for apprentices and adult learners.
Provide learners on vocational programmes with high-quality and relevant work experience on those courses where this is not yet in place.
Identify and implement actions to increase the proportion of learners who complete their courses at West Lancashire and on A-level courses at Newcastle Sixth Form College.
Ensure that staff take full account of EHC plan outcomes to identify the best way to support learners with high needs on vocational courses.
Provide effective support for apprentices on all programmes to develop their use and knowledge of English and mathematics.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Ensure students are set specific and measurable targets to enable them to make excellent progress and achieve higher grades, especially adult male students.
Improve the quality and consistency of feedback on marked written work so that students know what they need to do to improve.
Provide a broad range of challenging activities in lessons to meet the differing needs and abilities of students and help them to achieve their full potential.
Ensure teachers’ action plans following lesson observations contain specific and timely interventions to promote rapid improvement in teaching, learning and assessment practice.
Ensure all students aged 16 to 18 with the appropriate prior attainment have the opportunity to take GCSE English and mathematics in order to improve their employment prospects.
Ensure all teachers routinely promote diversity in lessons to enable students to understand wider cultural values.
Leaders and managers must ensure that staff accurately assess the starting points of apprentices. Staff must use this information to plan appropriate courses so that apprentices remain in learning, make good progress and achieve their course in a timely manner.
Leaders and managers must ensure that staff work effectively with employers to plan and review the on- and off-the-job training so that apprentices have good opportunities to put their learning into practice in the workplace.
Leaders and managers must ensure that staff track and monitor the progress that apprentices make on their courses. Staff must assess and return apprentices’ work promptly. Staff must provide frequent and useful developmental feedback on the quality of apprentices’ work, enabling apprentices to understand what they do effectively and what more they can do to improve their work further.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Improve further the quality of teaching, learning and assessment to ensure that teachers inspire and motivate learners to achieve their very best, enabling a higher proportion of them to achieve their qualifications, particularly younger learners at levels 1 and 2.
Ensure that teachers help learners to develop their skills in English and mathematics by providing them with strategies to improve the specific skills in which they are not yet proficient.
Improve further learners’ attendance and punctuality at lessons by setting high expectations for attendance, intervening swiftly when learners do not attend and supporting learners to attend most of their lessons.
Ensure that all apprenticeship teachers have the necessary skills and knowledge to teach high-quality theory lessons.
Ensure teachers use effective strategies to consistently check and consolidate students’ and apprentices’ knowledge before moving onto more complex topics.
Ensure leaders have access to detailed information on the progress apprentices make, enabling them to set precise and targeted actions for improvement.
