Weston Favell Academy Ofsted Report

Full report

In accordance with section 13(4) of the Education Act 2005, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector is of the opinion that the school no longer requires special measures.

What does the school need to do to improve further?

• Improve the impact of leadership and management by ensuring that:
  • senior leaders’ checks on the quality of teaching secure consistently good teaching across the whole school, including the sixth form
  • the skills of all subject leaders in checking on the quality of teaching, learning and assessment are secure
  • senior leaders make sure that all teachers apply the school’s behaviour policy consistently
  • senior leaders’ and governors’ checks on the effectiveness with which they use additional government funding, including the pupil premium and the Year 7 literacy and numeracy catch-up funding, are sharp enough to secure the rapid progress of all eligible pupils
  • information that parents receive makes them aware of the effective work that leaders at all levels are undertaking to bring about improvements to the quality of the school’s provision.
• Improve the quality of teaching to raise pupils’ achievement further, particularly that of the most able, by ensuring that all teachers:
  • use information about pupils’ prior learning and attainment to set suitably challenging work to secure good progress
  • make sure that pupils who lose concentration on their work quickly re-engage with their learning.
• Improve pupils’ personal development, behaviour and welfare by ensuring that:
  • all pupils develop positive attitudes to learning and consistently engage with their learning to enable them to make good progress
  • the proportion of disadvantaged pupils who are regularly absent from school reduces, to be in line with the national average for all pupils.
• Ensure that teaching in the sixth form is of a consistently high enough quality to enable more students to continue with their studies into Year 13, make good progress in both academic and work-related qualifications, and prepare them well for their next steps.

Inspection judgements

Effectiveness of leadership and management Requires improvement

• Senior leaders have yet to ensure that the improvement in the quality of teaching is leading to consistently good teaching across the school. Current pupils’ achievement is improving because the quality of teaching has improved. However, not all pupils, particularly the most able, make the progress they should because of variability in the quality of teaching across different subjects.
• Senior leaders have taken effective action to improve pupils’ behaviour, leading to a significant reduction in incidents of poor behaviour. Leaders have yet to ensure that all staff are consistent in their application of the school’s behaviour policy.
• Senior leaders have ensured that teachers’ assessment of pupils’ progress is accurate. However, they have not made sure that all teachers use this information effectively to plan work that is sufficiently challenging for all pupils, including the most able.
• Senior leaders have rightly given subject leaders greater responsibility to check on the quality of teaching and pupils’ achievement. However, not all subject leaders are effective in ensuring that the quality of teaching in their subject area is of a consistently high enough quality to enable pupils to make good progress.
• Until recently, senior leaders’ checks on the effectiveness of the use of the pupil premium funding to support the progress of disadvantaged pupils has not been sufficiently precise. While disadvantaged pupils’ achievement is improving, senior leaders have not ensured that the rate of improvement is consistent across the different year groups.
• Senior leaders’ oversight of their use of the Year 7 literacy and numeracy catch-up funding has not been sufficiently sharp to ensure that pupils catch up rapidly enough in their communication skills. This has led to some pupils in Year 8 not making as much progress as they should, particularly in English.
• Work to engage with parents has yet to ensure that all parents understand the effective action that leaders have taken to improve the quality of the school’s provision, including the improvement in pupils’ behaviour and attendance.
• The principal and senior leaders have a precise understanding of the quality of the school’s provision. They have taken effective action to ensure that the quality of the school’s provision across all areas has seen rapid improvement. They understand what further action they must take to ensure that teaching is consistently good and all groups of pupils make good progress.
• The principal has raised expectations for the quality of teaching, pupils’ behaviour and achievement. She has created an inclusive culture, identifying that ‘pupils belong in the school’. Pupils receive effective support to help them to attend regularly and to manage their behaviour more effectively. Consequently, a greater proportion of pupils are now present at the school on a regular basis to benefit from the improved teaching.
• Leaders responsible for overseeing the progress and welfare of pupils who have special educational needs (SEN) and/or disabilities and pupils who speak English as an additional language provide effective support. The progress of these groups of pupils is now improving across all year groups. Pupils who speak English as an additional language make particularly strong progress.
• Staff have engaged well with external support to improve their leadership skills and classroom practice. The school receives well-targeted support from trust leaders and from professionals from a local school. This support has been effective in securing the improvements in the quality of leadership, teaching and achievement.
• Senior leaders have carefully designed a broad and balanced curriculum, which appeals to pupils’ interests. There is now a much stronger focus on providing creative and technical subjects, as well as work-related subjects. This has led to an improvement in pupils’ achievement and in their preparation for their next steps.
• A wide range of extra-curricular activities enable pupils to explore their learning beyond the classroom. Numerous, popular educational visits, coupled with many school clubs and societies, enable pupils to explore their wider interests.
• Pupils become secure in their spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. Pupils in Year 7, for example, learn about different religions, while there are many displays around the school that promote the acceptance of people’s differences. Pupils understand spiritual and cultural differences, and the need to respect all people.

Governance of the school

• Members of the trust board have confidence in the school’s principal. They recognise the effectiveness of her leadership in securing the improvements in the quality of teaching, pupils’ achievement, their attendance and behaviour.
• The trust board has a precise understanding of the strengths of the school’s provision and the areas that require further development. They understand, for example, that teaching and leadership across the school are not consistently good.
• The trust board receives regular reports from senior trust leaders who regularly visit the school. Trust leaders visit lessons, meet with pupils and leaders, and look at pupils’ work to arrive at their own evaluation of the quality of the school’s provision.
• Members of the trust board rightly use these reports to identify where they may provide more resources to secure further development of the school’s provision.
• Trust board members’ oversight of the school’s use of additional government funding has not been sharp enough. They have begun to take action to resolve this.
• Trust board members understand their responsibilities to keep pupils safe. They undertake regular checks on the effectiveness of the school’s safeguarding procedures.

Safeguarding

• The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.
• The leader who has primary responsibility for safeguarding provides clear and decisive leadership. She uses her knowledge and experience to provide the large team of safeguarding leaders with timely support so each is effective in their role.
• Safeguarding leaders provide timely and effective support to pupils about whose welfare they have concerns. Where appropriate, they liaise closely with parents, undertake home visits and make referrals to local agencies.
• In working with local agencies, safeguarding leaders are tenacious to ensure that pupils receive the right level of support.
• The safeguarding leaders maintain detailed records they use well to share information with each other and other agencies. Rightly, they also use these records to identify any emerging patterns of concern.
• The records demonstrate the rigour with which safeguarding leaders respond to concerns about pupils’ welfare, including concerns that pupils express about others.
• Staff receive regular, comprehensive safeguarding training. They understand their responsibility to keep pupils safe. They are keenly aware of the signs they should look for when checking on the welfare of their pupils. They know to report any concerns, however small, directly to a safeguarding leader.
• Safeguarding leaders are sensitive to issues in the local area that may affect pupils’ welfare. Leaders provide age-appropriate guidance to pupils to ensure that they know how to keep themselves safe, should these issues affect them.
• Pupils say that they are safe at the school. They say that they have staff to whom they can speak if they have a concern. They are confident that staff will take effective action to help them to resolve their concern.

Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Requires improvement

• While improving, the quality of teaching is not consistently good across the whole school.
• Not all teachers use information about pupils’ attainment and prior learning to set suitably challenging work. Because of this, pupils, particularly the most able pupils in Years 10 and 11, do not make consistently good progress.
• Where work is not suitably challenging, pupils drift off task. Not all teachers act quickly enough to ensure that these pupils re-engage with their learning.
• In some lessons, pupils do not know why they are undertaking the tasks teachers have set them, and so are not able to become secure in their understanding.
• Teachers have good subject knowledge. However, not all teachers use this well enough to plan activities to enable all pupils, but particularly the most able, from making at least the progress they should.
• Where teachers have high expectations of pupils, pupils engage well with their learning. They develop effective relationships with teachers, which help them to grow in confidence in their learning. This is not the case in all lessons.
• Where learning is more effective, teachers use information about pupils’ prior learning to set challenging tasks. Pupils engage well with the tasks and make good progress. Teachers regularly check pupils’ learning by asking carefully considered questions. Through this, teachers identify and clarify pupils’ misconceptions. They provide pupils with well-targeted support to become secure in their learning.

Personal development, behaviour and welfare Requires improvement

Personal development and welfare

• The school’s work to promote pupils’ personal development and welfare requires improvement.
• Not all pupils have consistently positive attitudes to their learning. When they receive work that lacks sufficient challenge, pupils are too quick to engage in off-task behaviour. When provided with the opportunity to choose which task to complete, some pupils opt for the easier task. On such occasions, pupils do not achieve as highly as they should.
• From Year 8, pupils receive independent careers advice and guidance. This enables them to learn about the different career opportunities available to them.
• Pupils learn how to be safe, including when online. Pupils learn how to live healthy lives. They understand the risks involved in making unhealthy choices.
• Pupils learn about different types of bullying, including physical bullying, name-calling and homophobic bullying. Pupils say that when bullying occurs, staff deal with it robustly. The school’s records confirm this to be the case.
• Pupils understand the need to respect all people and have a secure understanding of religious and cultural differences.
• Leaders undertake regular checks on the attendance, welfare and behaviour of pupils who receive their education away from the school. Leaders ensure that these pupils receive effective support so they make at least the progress they should.

Behaviour

• The behaviour of pupils requires improvement.
• Levels of absence, including regular absence, have fallen significantly, and are now in line with the national average. This is due to the well-targeted support that leaders have provided to those pupils who previously had poor attendance. However, the proportion of disadvantaged pupils who are regularly absent is too high.
• Pupils with whom inspectors met said that behaviour has improved. They attributed this to the higher expectations senior leaders have of pupils’ behaviour. Pupils appreciate the rewards they receive for demonstrating positive behaviour.
• Pupils who find it difficult to manage their own behaviour receive well-targeted support. Incidents of poor behaviour involving these pupils have reduced as a result.
• The improvement in behaviour has led to a reduction in the number of pupils who receive an exclusion from school. The proportion of excluded pupils has fallen from an unacceptably high level to one now in line with the national average.
• There has also been a significant reduction in the number of pupils who attend the isolation unit because of their poor behaviour. This includes pupils who receive this sanction more than once.
• Pupils conduct themselves well around the school site, both between lessons and during social times. Appropriate levels of supervision enable staff to deal quickly with any incidents of inappropriate behaviour.

Outcomes for pupils Requires improvement

• The most able pupils do not make consistently good progress across a range of subjects, particularly in Years 10 and 11. They receive work that lacks sufficient challenge.
• Too few pupils in Year 11 are making the progress they should in science. This is because they have received teaching that has not been of a consistently high enough quality. However, achievement in science in Year 10 and in key stage 3 is improving.
• Pupils in Year 8 are not making as much progress as they should, particularly in English. This is due to the fact that not enough Year 8 pupils are secure in their literacy skills and the quality of teaching these pupils receive is inconsistent.
• The difference between the achievement of disadvantaged pupils and other pupils nationally is now diminishing across all year groups. However, the rate of this improvement is slower in Years 8 and 10.
• Year 11 pupils’ achievement across a wide range of subjects was broadly average in 2017. This marked a significant improvement on previous GCSE achievement, which was consistently below the government’s floor standard.
• The school’s performance information indicates that the improvement in achievement at GCSE continues for pupils currently in Years 10 and 11. In a wide range of subjects, the proportion of pupils on track to make at least the progress they should is much higher than seen previously.
• Achievement in Years 7 and 9 is improving. The majority of pupils are on track to achieve their end-of-year target grade.
• Greater consistency and better-quality leadership and teaching ensure that pupils make stronger progress in mathematics, particularly at GCSE.
• The achievement of pupils who have SEN and/or disabilities is improving across all year groups. These pupils receive well-targeted support, particularly from the leader who has oversight of their welfare and progress.
• Across all year groups, pupils who speak English as an additional language make strong progress. These pupils receive well-targeted support to become secure in their communication skills. This, in turn, supports them in their learning.
• Most pupils who leave the school at the end of Year 11 successfully move into places for further education, training or employment with training.

16 to 19 study programmes Requires improvement

• The quality of teaching is not yet consistently good. Where it is not of a high enough quality, students do not make as much progress as they should.
• Too few students remain in the sixth form at the end of Year 12. This is because they have not achieved as highly as they should to continue their studies into Year 13.
• Students’ achievement in the academic subjects in 2017 was broadly average. Achievement in the work-related subjects was below average, because the quality of teaching in these subjects was inconsistent.
• The school’s current performance information indicates that higher proportions of students are making at least the progress they should in both academic and work-related subjects.
• The leader of the sixth form has a precise understanding of the quality of the provision in the sixth form. She knows what she must do to secure the necessary improvements to the quality of teaching and students’ achievement.
• All students undertake work experience and receive independent careers advice and guidance. Students receive effective opportunities to explore the full range of career opportunities available to them.
• Attendance is high and reflects students’ positive attitudes to their learning.
• Students’ behaviour is good. They show respect to each other and to their teachers.
• Through taking on leadership roles across the school, students act as positive role models for younger pupils.
• Students develop their literacy and numeracy skills well across the curriculum. Students who have not achieved highly enough in GCSE English and/or mathematics, receive effective support to improve their grade.
• Leaders have rightly adapted the sixth-form curriculum so it better suits students’ interests and needs. It is too early to measure the impact that this new curriculum has had on ensuring that Year 12 students attain highly enough to be able to continue with their studies into Year 13. However, the new curriculum has led to there being fewer Year 12 students who leave their courses mid-year.
• Students take advantage of a range of extra-curricular and enrichment activities to develop their learning outside the classroom, and to learn about fundamental British values. This prepares them well for life in modern British society.
• All Year 13 students who completed their studies in 2017 successfully moved on to places of higher education or to apprenticeships.

School details

Unique reference number 136948 Local authority Northamptonshire Inspection number 10038660 This inspection was carried out under section 8 of the Education Act 2005. The inspection was also deemed a section 5 inspection under the same Act. Type of school Secondary comprehensive School category Academy sponsor-led Age range of pupils 11 to 18 Gender of pupils Gender of pupils in 16 to 19 study programmes Number of pupils on the school roll Of which, number on roll in 16 to 19 study programmes Mixed Mixed 1349 131 Appropriate authority Board of trustees Chair Principal Telephone number Website Email address Mike Hamlin Lorna Leventhal 01604 402121 www.westonfavellacademy.org admin@westonfavellacademy.org Date of previous inspection 2–3 November 2016

Information about this school

• Weston Favell Academy is larger than the average-sized secondary school.
• It is part of the Greenwood Academies Trust (GAT), the trust board of which takes on the role of governance for the school.
• The proportion of pupils who are from minority ethnic groups is above average.
• The proportion of disadvantaged pupils is above average.
• The proportion of pupils who speak English as an additional language is well above average.
• The proportion of pupils who have SEN and/or disabilities is twice the national average. The proportion of pupils who have an education, health and care plan is significantly below average.
• The school uses three alternative providers for a small number of its pupils. These are: CE Academy in Northampton; Progress School in Northampton and Stablemates Therapy in Daventry.
• The school receives support from Northampton School for Boys.
• The principal took up her post in September 2017.
• In 2017, the school met the government’s current floor standards for pupils’ achievement at the end of key stage 4.

Information about this inspection

• Inspectors observed learning in 65 lessons, 18 of which they conducted with senior leaders, including the principal. Inspectors also visited eight tutor periods.
• During their visits to lessons, inspectors looked at pupils’ work and spoke with pupils.
• Inspectors looked at pupils’ books as a separate activity.
• Inspectors held a range of meetings with school leaders, including: the principal; senior leaders; the leader responsible for safeguarding; subject leaders; pastoral leaders; the leader of the sixth form; the special educational needs coordinator; the leader responsible for personal, social, health and economic education; the leader responsible for careers guidance; leaders from the trust who provide the school with support; and a selection of staff.
• The lead inspector met with members of the trust board, including the chief executive officer of GAT.
• An inspector spoke by telephone with representatives from the two alternative providers that the school uses.
• Inspectors observed pupils’ behaviour before school, between lessons, and during breaktime and lunchtime.
• Inspectors met formally and informally with pupils from across all year groups and with students from the sixth form.
• Inspectors took into account the 100 responses to Ofsted’s online survey, Parent View.
• Inspectors reviewed a range of documentation relating to the school’s provision, including: self-evaluation and improvement planning; the quality of teaching; behaviour and attendance; achievement; governance; external support for the school; and safeguarding.
• The lead inspector checked the school’s single central register and the school’s system for recruiting staff.

Inspection team

Simon Hollingsworth, lead inspector Kathryn Hobbs Dick Vasey Bernice Astling John Burridge Peter Kent Her Majesty’s Inspector Ofsted Inspector Ofsted Inspector Ofsted Inspector Ofsted Inspector Ofsted Inspector