What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Ensure that learners on level 3 programmes:
routinely receive insightful and informative feedback from teachers so that they understand clearly how to improve their work, accelerate their learning and achieve high grades
have precise targets to guide their development and progress.
Improve learners’ attendance at lessons so that it is good in all curriculum areas and across the college by following up methodically on non-attendance, rigorously applying the college’s existing attendance strategy and evolving a zero-tolerance culture towards unauthorised absences.
Improve the quality of teaching, learning and assessment in functional skills English and mathematics at level 2 and in GCSE mathematics by:
developing the skills of teachers to ensure that they support learners to develop and apply their English and mathematics skills well in their vocational and academic work
ensuring that teachers of English and mathematics use the findings of regular assessment to identify learners’ skills gaps and ensure that these learners are supported well to quickly gain the required techniques and approaches essential for good progress in their learning
ensuring that managers provide training and development to support improvement in the teaching of mathematics and English essential skills.
Leaders and managers should plan their apprenticeship courses to ensure that all apprentices benefit from well taught and frequent lessons to help them build their skills and knowledge and complete their programmes.
Leaders and managers should ensure that staff assess apprentices’ prior knowledge carefully, use this information to plan learning and provide apprentices with clear feedback to enable them to make progress.
Leaders should provide governors with more information about the quality of their apprenticeship courses to enable them to judge the progress of improvements.
Leaders should improve their tracking of students’ external work experience and their analysis of students’ destinations to enable them to more fully measure the impact of their learning.
Leaders and managers should quicken the pace of improvements so that students’ achievements are consistently high and more achieve the grades of which they are capable.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Increase the proportion of students achieving merit and distinction grades, particularly on extended diploma courses in art and design and music, by:
ensuring all teachers are skilled in providing sufficiently challenging activities and are adept in using probing questions to elicit thoughtful responses from students and to deepen their understanding of key topics
sharing the existing good practice in teaching and assessment across all teachers in the college to increase the proportion of outstanding teaching, learning and assessment.
Collate a more comprehensive analysis of students’ destinations, particularly in following up outcomes for those progressing to employment and those taking a gap year.
Maintain the strength of focus on actions for quality improvement to embed the culture and staff collective responsibility for continuous quality improvement throughout the college.
Leaders should improve the quality of provision for learners with high needs so that they are taught the skills they need to progress rapidly to the next stage of their education or training.
Leaders should ensure that all learners and apprentices have a secure understanding of the risks associated with radicalisation and extremism in the sector areas in which learners and apprentices work and in their wider lives.
Leaders and managers should ensure that all learners and apprentices, including learners with EHC plans, receive unbiased and high-quality careers education, information, advice and guidance so that they know well the full range of next steps available to them.
Leaders should ensure that teachers improve the information they gain on what learners know and can do at the beginning of adult learners programmes, especially in ESOL, and for learners who have high needs. Teachers must use this information to plan learning carefully so that learners make the rapid progress of which they are capable.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Managers should develop further the knowledge and skills of teachers and individual learning support staff, so that they are more able to support routinely and proactively the progress and achievement of learners.
Ensure that teachers give due attention to the needs of the most able learners, so that they progress at the pace that they are capable of and achieve their potential.
Leaders and managers need to ensure that teachers on part-time adult provision plan the curriculum and use learners’ starting points effectively. They need to ensure that adult learners make good progress towards achieving their long-term education and training goals.
Leaders and managers need to ensure that adult learners receive effective ongoing careers education and guidance to help them succeed in their next steps into higher education and work.
Leaders and managers need to swiftly improve the attendance of young learners in English and mathematics lessons to help them gain the essential employment skills necessary for their future career choices.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Improve teaching, learning and assessment so that students, in particular those on vocational programmes, achieve their qualifications at the grades expected of them.
Improve retention rates in subject areas where students drop out before the end of the course.
What does Hopwood Hall College need to do to improve further?
Embed and accelerate year-on-year improvement in success rates so that variability in achievement and retention on some courses is tackled. In particular, improve the use of data by some curriculum managers so that they are used more sharply and precisely to evaluate learners’ progress. Improve attendance to lessons across all courses.
Review and develop target setting and the recording of progress across all curriculum areas and in tutorial provision. Ensure that targets are sufficiently clear, time referenced and achievable so as to meet individual needs. Ensure that the recording of progress clearly states the advances made.
Develop links between curriculum areas and employers so as to improve opportunities for learners and to develop curriculum options further.
Improve the gender and ethnic balance of staff and governors to reflect more closely that of the community and learner profiles.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Lecturers should use the information from learners’ and apprentices’ starting points to plan learning that challenges:
the most able learners to make the progress of which they are capable
apprentices to develop new skills and make rapid progress.
Leaders and managers should bring about rapid improvements in the quality of the apprenticeship provision by:
improving the proportion of apprentices who achieve on health and social care, construction and electrotechnical apprenticeships
identifying and narrowing achievement gaps for apprentices, including those on advanced-level programmes, apprentices aged 16 to 23 and those with learning difficulties and/or disabilities
increasing the proportion of apprentices studying with the subcontractor, Absolute Training Solutions, who achieve their apprenticeship within the planned time.
Leaders and managers should improve learners’ and apprentices’ attendance on the courses where the rates are too low.
Ensure that leaders’ plans to improve the quality of education, particularly for learners aged 16 to 18, are effectively implemented.
Ensure that teachers plan successfully the curriculum for learners aged 16 to 18 and provide learners with high-quality, developmental feedback to ensure that learners rapidly develop significant new knowledge and skills.
Rapidly improve learners’ attendance and punctuality, particularly for 16- to 18- year-old learners and adults studying English and mathematics, to ensure that learners develop the skills and knowledge needed to achieve their qualifications.
Quickly develop teachers’ skills and knowledge to fully implement the personal development curriculum for learners aged 16 to 18.
Ensure that 16- to 18-year-old learners understand what it is like to work in their chosen industry sectors through meaningful and relevant work experience placements and work-related activities.
Ensure that apprentices receive impartial careers advice and guidance to help them understand what longer term careers options are available to them outside their current employer organisations.
Ensure that learners on courses in ESOL benefit from a well-sequenced curriculum that enables them to develop their English-speaking skills confidently before moving on to more complex reading and writing learning activities.
Ensure that all tutors fully involve employers in apprentices’ progress reviews to enable effective planning of further learning.
Leaders and managers should ensure that tutors on ESOL programmes are more consistent in checking that learners apply correctly what they have been taught during lessons, such as their formation of sentences.
Leaders and managers should ensure that ESOL, English and mathematics tutors are consistent in setting out clearly the steps learners need to take to achieve their goals and provide learners with the help they need to understand and meet their goals.
Leaders should continue to adjust the curriculum offer to meet the needs of local residents. They should consider offering more accredited courses to help learners with further job or study options. They should ensure that the visual and creative industries courses more closely meet the needs of male learners and learners from ethnic minority backgrounds.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Leaders and managers should ensure that:
the action planning following direct observation of taught sessions is both sufficiently detailed and used to improve tutors’ professional practice quickly
all tutors consistently plan and record learners’ non-accredited programme attainment targets to a high standard that promotes learners’ progress and achievement
tutors develop all younger learners’ understanding of fundamental British values and how to protect themselves from the harmful effects of extremism and radicalisation
the rate at which young learners achieve English and mathematics qualifications at GCSE is significantly improved so that their future employment opportunities are increased
strategies are introduced to raise and sustain high attendance on all community learning and study programmes sessions.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Increase the proportion of 16- to 18-year-old students who achieve their mathematics and English qualifications or improve their GCSE grade, by:
ensuring that teachers promote the benefits to students of achieving these qualifications and improve attendance in lessons
continuing to implement and review the well-planned strategies already in place to improve the teaching, learning and assessment of mathematics and English.
Improve the quality of targets set by staff for students by ensuring that:
assessors set targets to support apprentices in improving their written skills
teachers set and review clear and precise targets for all students that not only support them to achieve their qualifications, but focus on the development of their wider skills development and areas for improvement.
Leaders and managers need to improve further students’ attendance.
Leaders and managers must ensure apprentices benefit from well-planned, high-quality off-the-job training and develop their mathematics and English skills beyond the requirements of the apprenticeship.
Leaders and managers need to further increase the range of, and participation in, enrichment activities to broaden students’ personal interests and support their well-being.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Sustain and continue the strategies that have led to the improvements made in teaching and learning over the last three years so as to eradicate the remaining small proportion of weaker teaching. Ensure that:
all students are questioned more skilfully so that they are stretched and challenged in their learning
on all courses, students are given work that is sufficiently demanding both in lessons and for independent study.
Increase students’ attainment and progress in a small minority of subjects where these are still low. Ensure that maximum use of value added data is made to identify all courses where students are underperforming, and then:
review all aspects of teaching, learning and assessment on those courses to identify what is needed to improve
continue to increase the proportion of higher grades so that they exceed the national average.
Improve attendance on intermediate courses through the continued and accelerated use of present strategies.
Ensure that all managers have clarity and sharpness in understanding the root causes of underperformance so that improvement strategies have universal impact across all courses on the quality and improvement of teaching and learning and students’ outcomes.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Review the strategy for English and mathematics so that more students achieve at least a grade higher than their previous level of attainment, and success rates return to their previous high levels.
Build on the existing good and outstanding practice in teaching, learning and assessment, so that all teachers plan effectively to meet the needs of all students and apprentices, with a sharper focus on providing stretch and challenge for the most able students.
Ensure that all teachers make good use of learning technologies; deploy learning support staff well; use teaching strategies that stimulate and engage all students; and securely embed the development of skills in English and mathematics skills into all lessons.
Build on the successful use of the quality improvement plan, to intervene where performance has declined, so that the outcomes in all subjects mirror those of the outstanding provision in the college.
Ensure that all teachers can learn from the good practice in the college and have the confidence to promote equality and diversity more effectively in lessons.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Leaders should maintain a strong and relentless focus on strategies for improvement in outcomes for the small number of students taking AS and A levels in subjects such as physics, arts, and English who do not make the progress expected of them.
Ensure that the accommodation used to teach adult learners in the college’s annex mirrors the spacious and high-quality facilities provided to students aged 16 to 19.
Identify the starting points of learners aged 16 to 18 on GCSE English and mathematics courses more accurately so that tutors can plan and teach curriculum content that enables these learners to develop substantial new knowledge, skills and behaviours.
Ensure that tutors who work with learners with high needs set targets that are consistently specific and enable all these learners to progress quickly against identified areas for development.
Increase attendance in the subjects where it is too low.
Ensure that the quality of education provided for learners aged 14 to 16 on fulltime provision at the Mabgate campus continues to improve swiftly.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Leaders and managers should bring about rapid improvements in the quality of the apprenticeship provision by:
ensuring that the data reports that they receive are relevant, accurate and timely
ensuring that teachers improve the progress apprentices make by planning their lessons so that activities are sufficiently ambitious, interesting and relevant.
Teachers should ensure that they set suitably demanding work for learners. In particular, teachers should ensure that they challenge the most able learners to achieve the grades of which they are capable.
Leaders, managers and staff should continue to focus their improvement strategies on underperforming courses. They should continue to increase the proportion of learners achieving their qualifications, including in functional skills and GCSE grades A* to C in English and mathematics.
Leaders and managers should improve the number of apprentices who complete their apprenticeship in a timely manner.
Leaders and managers should ensure that tutors improve the standards of learners’ written English and increase their understanding of mathematics in their chosen course.
Tutors should ensure that they use an appropriate range of teaching and assessment strategies, providing opportunities for learners to recall topics and improve the retention of their new knowledge and its application to their learning or workplace activities.
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.
