Broad Oak Sports College Ofsted Report

Full report

In accordance with section 44(1) of the Education Act 2005, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector is of the opinion that this school requires special measures because it is failing to give its pupils an acceptable standard of education and the persons responsible for leading, managing or governing the school are not demonstrating the capacity to secure the necessary improvement in the school.

What does the school need to do to improve further?

• Provide teaching across the school of consistent high quality so that outcomes for all pupils and, in particular, the most able and disadvantaged pupils rapidly increase, by ensuring that:
  • teaching focuses on providing fully effective learning rather than on the more narrow requirements of external examinations
  • the most effective teaching practice in the school is shared and extended
  • recent improvements to teachers’ training are built upon to ensure that they have greater impact on improving the quality of teaching
  • assessment of pupils in subjects beyond English, mathematics and science in key stage 3 provides accurate and useful information for leaders and teachers as they plan how to ensure that pupils learn effectively
  • leaders and teachers use information from assessment to match closely teaching and learning to pupils’ needs.
• Ensure that consistently high expectations of behaviour are set by leaders, applied by teachers, supported by parents and followed by pupils.
• Ensure that the curriculum provides a suitably challenging framework for pupils across the school.
• Rapidly improve attendance by analysing and responding to patterns in the attendance and punctuality of individuals and groups.
• Ensure that leaders at all levels have much greater impact by:
  • further developing the role of middle leaders
  • sharpening the focus and accuracy of the school’s self-evaluation and improvement planning
  • ensuring that staff and pupils fully understand their own accountability for the quality of their work
  • ensuring that teachers have a better understanding of pupils’ starting points, including those provided at the end of primary school
  • carefully considering the school’s effectiveness in comparison to local and national examples of highly successful schools in similar contexts.
• Further building governors’ support and challenge to the headteacher and other leaders. An external review of governance should be undertaken to see how this aspect of leadership and management can be improved. An external review of the school’s use of the pupil premium should be undertaken to see how this aspect of leadership and management can be improved.

Inspection judgements

Effectiveness of leadership and management Inadequate

• After the previous inspection, senior leaders and governors were unable to prevent a period of rapidly falling school effectiveness. During this period, pupils’ outcomes fell swiftly and other aspects of the school, including the standards of pupils’ behaviour and staff morale, became concerns. A one-year period of leadership by an acting headteacher finished at the start of the summer term 2018. Over this time, a number of aspects of the school were successfully stabilised. However, leaders were unable to prevent the most pressing concern of reversing pupils’ falling achievement, and Year 11 results fell further in 2017. Nor did they ensure that pupils’ attendance was high enough. In addition, leaders did not make sure that teaching was strong enough for pupils’ progress across the school to speed up to allow pupils to make up the lost ground needed to achieve acceptable standards.
• The very recently appointed headteacher demonstrates a clear vision for the school. He understands its challenges and shows determination to rapidly address its weaknesses. He has already galvanised other leaders and extended the school’s already growing culture of openness and honesty about the issues it faces. However, many of the positive changes already implemented are at a very early stage and others are still being planned. Working with others, the headteacher has started to refine the school’s self-evaluation record and school improvement planning. While these documents accurately identify the matters which the school needs to work on, they lack the precision needed to ensure the fastest-possible improvement. In addition, leaders’ judgements about the school’s effectiveness and the quality of teaching are overgenerous.
• Leaders are committed to sharing responsibility across the senior leadership team and among middle leaders. Leaders have started to ensure that members of the school community, from the headteacher to the youngest pupil, understand what is expected of them and are made accountable for their work in the school. Middle leaders are enthusiastic in fulfilling their responsibilities and ensuring that their faculties successfully support subject learning and achievement. However, they recognise that they are still developing their approach and that many of their strategies for improving teaching in their areas are in their infancy. In addition, leaders of subjects other than English, mathematics and science have not ensured that assessment of pupils in key stage 3 is accurate.
• Over the past year, leaders have ensured that they provide training to help teachers to improve their skills. To support this, teachers have visited their colleagues to see each other’s work and look at pupils’ written work in different subjects. Leaders have extended this further, with groups of four teachers from across the school being required to work together to consider how they can learn from each other. This is a good example of how the pockets of effective teaching practice in the school can be shared and have a broad impact. In the past, such opportunities had not been taken systematically.
• While the curriculum includes a broad range of subjects, these are not organised in a way that ensures that pupils learn as well as possible. Leaders have not ensured that teachers have a clear enough understanding of the work covered by pupils in their primary schools. This means that pupils are not always challenged and are sometimes asked to redo work that they have already completed in primary school. This results in time that is available for new learning being wasted.
• Leaders support pupils as they prepare for their role in society, now and in the future. Aspects such as tolerance and respect for each other are seen in the way pupils get along together whatever their background or heritage. The curriculum and the school’s wider expectations mean that pupils have opportunities to develop their spiritual, moral, social and cultural understanding. However, where the school’s provision has not been as consistently strong, some pupils demonstrate less self-awareness and confidence in these aspects. For example, sometimes pupils let themselves down by behaving less well in some lessons.
• Leaders, including the headteacher, are receiving an appropriate level of support from effective local schools. This has started to give them a wider view of the school’s effectiveness. In the past, Broad Oak Sports College was inward-looking and so leaders and teachers missed opportunities to learn from comparing the detail of the school’s approaches to the best in other schools, including those with similarly challenging communities.
• The need for leaders to focus on ensuring that there are rapid improvements means that the school may not appoint newly qualified teachers.

Governance of the school

• Governors are keen and dedicated. Recent changes to the governing body have increased governors’ confidence and motivation. Governors have a wide range of external experiences, which they bring to bear on the school and its work. They share leaders’ current determination for the school to provide the highest-possible standard of education to all pupils.
• In the past, neither the governing body nor the local authority acted quickly enough in the interests of pupils. In particular, governors did not probe deeply enough to investigate the school’s effectiveness. For example, they did not make strong enough links between the pupil premium funding and information on the success of disadvantaged pupils to convince themselves that its use was fully effective. Governors are strongly aware that they need to monitor such aspects more closely.
• Governors are now fully aware of the school’s challenges and their responsibilities. They are prepared to take decisive action when this is needed. For example, they have indicated to the local authority that they require the admissions arrangements for hard-to-place pupils to work fairly between all local schools. Governors have put considerable effort into ensuring that additional funding for pupils who have special educational needs (SEN) and/or disabilities is made available. However, they have had less focus on considering whether it is spent as effectively as possible.

Safeguarding

• The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.
• Leaders and pastoral staff know pupils and their potential safeguarding needs very well. All staff receive suitable training about safeguarding when they start at the school and then in systematic annual follow-up sessions. This training includes matters such as reducing the risk of pupils coming into contact with extreme views and being aware of how to respond should such a circumstance arise.
• Leaders carefully follow up any additional support provided to ensure that pupils are safe, whether this is from inside the school or with external partners. This allows leaders to ensure that such support is complete and effective. Leaders are persistent in working with others to ensure that pupils are properly looked after.
• The pupils spoken to by inspectors said that they feel safe in school. Pupils are taught about potential risks, such as when they use computers or mobiles phones.

Quality of teaching, learning and assessment Inadequate

• Over time, teaching in the school has not been of sufficient quality to ensure that pupils succeed. This has led to ineffective learning and pupils making unacceptably slow rates of progress. While there have been some improvements over the previous year, teaching is inconsistent. Pupils’ success depends far too much on chance, for example on which teacher they have. Some pupils’ learning in some subjects continues to be very weak. This situation has been made worse by the school’s need, until recently, to rely on temporary teachers to cover staff absence and vacancies.
• Across the school, some teachers are highly effective, for example in food technology, modern foreign languages and physical education. In these classes, teachers’ expectations are high and they set challenging and interesting tasks. In return, pupils try hard, behave well and make good or better progress. However, there are too many classes where teaching does not help pupils to learn well. In these classes, teachers’ expectations of what pupils can achieve and how they should behave are too low. Consequently, pupils do not engage with their learning. Inspectors saw pupils of different ages talking while their teacher was talking, looking at their mobile phones when they should have been working and sitting in class wearing their bags. Pupils confirmed inspectors’ observation that such behaviour is more common in lower sets. Teachers do not consistently challenge pupils about such poor attitudes to learning.
• Teachers too frequently provide work that is repetitive or too easy. In a number of classes, pupils repeat work already covered in their primary school education. Inspectors saw teachers focusing on and preparing for the tests and examinations pupils would eventually take at the end of key stage 4. However, where this was without sufficient emphasis on the depth of learning needed for pupils to really understand the topics covered, this slowed, rather than accelerated, pupils’ progress.
• The most able pupils do not consistently receive work which is hard enough. For example, they are sometimes asked to repeat many straightforward calculations in mathematics. Too much time is spent on tasks which do not challenge pupils to think hard enough.
• Teachers are provided with helpful advice about how to support pupils who have SEN and/or disabilities. When they follow this, the teaching of such pupils is effective. Some teaching assistants are highly effective in ensuring that pupils with additional needs are helped to learn. However, others are not sufficiently involved in supporting pupils as they learn, for example when their roles are limited to organising equipment or monitoring behaviour.
• Information about pupils’ achievement is regularly gathered through tests and collated centrally. The arrangements to do this for foundation subjects in key stage 3 are not sufficient to provide useful and accurate data. Otherwise, the system allows leaders and teachers to know how well pupils are doing. However, they do not act on this information quickly enough to stop pupils falling behind. Teachers provide additional opportunities outside the normal school day for revision and examination preparation for Year 11 pupils. However, while pupils see the benefit of this additional work, it does not fully compensate for the less effective teaching that they have received over time.

Personal development, behaviour and welfare Inadequate

Personal development and welfare

• The school’s work to promote pupils’ personal development and welfare requires improvement.
• The school has a clear focus on caring for its pupils. Members of the pastoral team are committed to ensuring that pupils feel safe. They work hard to create the school’s harmonious environment.
• Leaders and other members of staff collect and record information about pupils’ welfare. This forms part of their good knowledge of pupils. However, leaders do not analyse this sharply enough to ensure that staff are having the greatest possible impact on helping pupils with particular needs.
• The school’s nurture room provides an effective learning environment for pupils who are at risk of exclusion. Pupils appreciate the support they receive there and, for many, this has a positive effect on their behaviour. However, a significant minority of pupils do not understand well enough how to behave properly. Rates of fixed-term and permanent exclusion remain high.
• Most pupils say that any instances of bullying are infrequent and that the school deals with these well. Pupils were keen to point out to inspectors that there is no homophobia or racism in the school; people are accepted as they are. Despite this, a small number of pupils told inspectors that they feel bullying is an issue for them.
• Some pupils in Year 11 have received reduced support in relation to the continuing development of their understanding of a range of personal and welfare issues in the period leading up to their GCSE examinations. This is because, since the end of April 2018, the time originally allocated to personal, social and health education lessons and physical education lessons, other than for examination classes, has been used for general revision sessions.

Behaviour

• The behaviour of pupils is inadequate.
• The absence of pupils is higher than the national average and increasing. The proportion of pupils who have long-term absence is also higher than the national average and increasing. Staff take action to respond to absence, for example by telephoning or texting the pupils’ families on the first day of any absence. However, these actions have not been sufficient to ensure that attendance is good enough. Staff do not understand patterns in pupils’ absence and not enough is done to encourage pupils to see the benefit of their education and therefore attend school regularly.
• Some pupils are slow to get to lessons. Registers show that a significant number of pupils are late to school and, while leaders ensure that lateness is followed up with sanctions, these are not having enough impact on ensuring that pupils are punctual.
• Over time, behaviour in the school has not been good enough. Leaders confirm that behaviour has improved over the last year. Around school, pupils generally conduct themselves well. They are friendly and respectful to visitors and keen to talk about their school. However, there are times when some pupils show less respect to staff.
• Where teaching interests and challenges pupils, they behave well in class. However, inattentive or even rude behaviour, such as talking when the teacher is speaking to the class, slows learning in too many classes. Teachers are not consistent in the way they respond to such misbehaviour.

Outcomes for pupils Inadequate

• Pupils do not make fast enough progress or achieve high enough results in GCSE examinations.
• Since the previous inspection, there has been a continuing slowing of the progress pupils make over their time in the school. In 2017, Year 11 pupils’ rates of progress were in the lowest 3% of schools in the country overall, being particularly low in mathematics and science. While rates of progress in English were slightly faster, these were still in the lowest 10%. Of additional concern, these figures were all lower than those achieved by similar pupils in 2016, despite these already being in the lowest 10%. Rates of progress in modern foreign languages and humanities were somewhat higher and rose a little from 2016 to 2017. However, these were still well below the respective national averages.
• Typically, pupils achieve around one grade lower in each of their GCSE examinations than all pupils nationally with similar starting points. Disadvantaged pupils and the most able pupils do even less well. In 2017, both of these groups of Year 11 pupils were close to one and a half grades behind similar pupils across the country.
• The relatively slower progress of disadvantaged pupils means that the difference between their achievement and that of other pupils, in the school and nationally, is widening. Leaders’ use of the pupil premium funding to support disadvantaged pupils has had too little impact.
• The rates of progress of pupils currently in the school are very variable. These depend too much on pupils’ year groups, sets and subjects. The school’s own data indicates that pupils in Year 11 continue to make inadequate progress. Year 10 pupils’ progress in English is slower than in mathematics and is not sufficient to allow pupils to close the gap between their learning and the targets set for them to be successful. While leaders judge that progress in key stage 3 is more promising, there is similar inconsistency. For example, pupils in Year 7 have been making weaker progress in mathematics than English.
• Pupils who have SEN and/or disabilities make variable rates of progress, in line with other pupils in the school. However, when they receive high-quality support, they make good progress.
• This picture of variable progress matches the variability in learning seen by inspectors during observation of teaching and learning and when reviewing pupils’ books.
• In subjects other than English, mathematics and science, particularly at key stage 3, it is harder for the school to judge accurately how much progress pupils make. This is because the assessment system used by the school does not provide accurate or validated information for foundation subjects at key stage 3.
• The school has a comprehensive programme of careers education and support for pupils as they move to college. This helps them to have confidence about continuing their education. While nearly all pupils continue in their education as they leave the school, it does not prepare them as well as possible for this transition because their results are not as good as they should be.

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School details

Unique reference number Local authority Inspection number 105364 Bury 10042463 This inspection of the school was carried out under section 5 of the Education Act 2005. Type of school Secondary comprehensive School category Age range of pupils Gender of pupils Community 11 to 16 Mixed Number of pupils on the school roll 587 Appropriate authority The governing body Chair Headteacher Telephone number Website Email address Ken Kerr Paul Greenhalgh 0161 797 6543 www.broadoak.bury.sch.uk BroadOak@bury.gov.uk Date of previous inspection 26–27 June 2014

Information about this school

• The school has experienced significant staffing changes since the previous inspection, including two changes of headteacher. The current headteacher took up his post in April 2018. There have also been two changes of the chair of the governing body.
• Broad Oak Sports College is smaller than most secondary schools. The school has a largely mobile population and annually is experiencing large numbers of pupils who move out of the area and others who move in.
• The school population is highly diverse, with pupils from a wide range of minority ethnic backgrounds. Roughly one quarter do not speak English as a first language.
• The proportion of pupils eligible for the pupil premium is double that typically found nationally.
• The proportion of pupils who have SEN and/or disabilities is above the national average.
• The school does not make use of alternative provision for its pupils.
• The school does not meet the government’s current floor standard, which is the minimum expectation for pupils’ progress.
• The school meets the Department for Education’s definition of a coasting school based on key stage 4 academic performance results in 2015 to 2017.

Information about this inspection

• The inspectors observed teaching, learning and assessment, and pupils’ conduct in lessons.
• The behaviour of students was observed throughout the school day.
• Inspectors held discussions with the headteacher, senior leaders, middle leaders, a group of teachers and other members of staff, and three groups of pupils. They also had informal conversations with a large number of pupils.
• An inspector met with a group of governors, including the chair of the governing body. An inspector met with a representative of the local authority.
• There were 20 responses to Parent View, Ofsted’s online survey for parents. None of these included additional written comments. Questionnaires returned by 32 members of staff were also considered.
• Inspectors examined school policies and other documentation provided by the school. Records, including those relating to safeguarding, attendance and behaviour, were also reviewed.
• The school’s information on pupils’ progress and attainment was scrutinised.
• Inspectors examined pupils’ exercise books.

Inspection team

David Selby, lead inspector Tuesday Humby Jonathan Jones

Her Majesty’s Inspector Ofsted Inspector Her Majesty’s Inspector