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?
Leaders should ensure that adult learners and apprentices experience the same exceptionally high-quality teaching, learning and assessment enjoyed by 16–19-year-olds and those with high needs. Attendance at lessons for apprentices and adult learners should be improved.
Ensure that a higher proportion of learners who have high needs and for whom employment is an appropriate next step progress into paid work when they leave the college.
Improve the attendance of learners where it is too low.
Ensure that assessors help apprentices in health and social care to develop the new knowledge that they need to be successful at work and in their apprenticeship.
Improve assessment in the few areas where it is not good enough so that lecturers have an accurate understanding of the knowledge that learners are missing and can use it to inform future teaching activities.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Improve teaching, learning and assessment by ensuring that:
all teachers set challenging and demanding work for all learners and apprentices, paying particular attention to the needs of the most able learners, and that they monitor carefully their progress towards meeting challenging targets
teachers’ feedback enables all learners and apprentices to know exactly what they need to do to improve, achieve and excel.
Improve the achievement rate for apprentices by ensuring that:
employers are involved fully in the planning of assessments and reviews of progress in order to maximise the effectiveness of training
assessors set apprentices challenging targets for achievement that clearly define how they can improve their work
all apprentices who fall behind with their studies have the opportunity to catch up rapidly by increasing the number of assessment visits to the workplace.
Improve governors’ oversight of the quality of provision and hold leaders to account by scrutinising achievement and progress data thoroughly.
Ensure that all teachers motivate learners on study programmes to improve their mathematics skills and to problem-solve confidently.
Reinforce apprentices’ understanding of British values and the risks associated with radicalisation and extremism.
Make sure that learners from disadvantaged backgrounds receive the support they need to overcome their barriers to learning and achieve their qualifications at the same rate as other groups of learners.
Ensure that all learners on study programmes have the opportunity to participate in relevant work-related learning that helps them prepare for future employment or training.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Leaders and managers should ensure that the improved focus on developing students’ English and mathematics skills results in more students achieving well in their GCSE mathematics examinations.
Improve the quality of teaching, learning and assessment, including in mathematics, by:
using the detailed assessment information on students’ starting points and skills to target improvement on their areas of weakness in planning learning
creating more opportunities for students to receive sharply focused help to increase their pace of progress
making more effective use of the good practice available in a few areas to increase all tutors’ skills in delivering more individualised learning for students
ensuring that all teachers reinforce and consolidate learning by checking students’ understanding in lessons.
Leaders should ensure that learners and apprentices are aware of the enrichment opportunities available at the college to improve participation in these activities.
Leaders should ensure that teachers of mainstream subjects make consistent use of EHC plan outcomes to plan a bespoke curriculum for learners with high needs that enables learners to develop their independence and the skills they need for work and adult life.
In a minority of apprenticeship programmes, teachers should improve their sequencing of the curriculum to ensure apprentices develop basic knowledge before learning more-complex topics.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Leaders and managers should ensure that:
all students have good access to effective impartial careers advice and guidance, regardless of where they are intending to progress, so that they can make informed decisions about their next steps
teachers develop students’ literacy and numeracy skills across all academic and vocational areas, so that more students improve and refine these skills to a higher level
all students have a suitable range of work-related activities and work-experience placements appropriate to their career aims
all students have a comprehensive and secure understanding of the risks associated with radicalisation and extremism and are confident about how to protect themselves from these risks
they improve processes for evaluating the quality of teaching, learning and assessment, making sure that managers can more clearly articulate the precise actions teachers must take to improve.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Improve the quality of teaching, learning and assessment in mathematics classes for adults, so that a higher proportion of students achieve their functional skills qualifications.
Ensure that teachers of GCSE English and mathematics on study programmes challenge and enable their students to achieve the highest grades possible.
Ensure that all students with high needs rapidly improve their skills for independence, communication and social interaction. To do this, managers should work with staff to improve target-setting for students’ development of these skills, and the monitoring and recording of their progress.
Tackle the remaining pockets of low attendance so that all students develop good habits that will prepare them well for their futures.
Leaders and managers should continue to improve the teaching of GCSE English and mathematics for learners aged 16 to 18 and of functional skills mathematics for adults, so that a higher proportion of learners achieve. They should also ensure that apprentices develop their English and mathematical skills beyond the level of their qualifications on entry.
Leaders and managers should ensure that the number of young people who undertake high-quality external work experience improves. They have rightly encouraged students to reflect on their work placement and they should ensure that the quality of reflection is consistently high.
Leaders and managers should ensure that the quality of teaching – particularly the checking of learning and levels of challenge for all students – is consistently good across all provision.
Leaders and managers should ensure that attendance across the college consistently meets the college target.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Improve learners’ attendance by developing new strategies to tackle this problem; in particular, all teachers should reinforce the same high expectations on the importance of attendance at college.
Through staff development priorities:
work with teachers to ensure a consistent and suitable level of detail and challenge in the targets they set for learners
ensure that teachers provide suitably detailed feedback to learners so learners know what actions to take to improve their work.
Ensure that managers and teachers strengthen further their links with employers, use them to create further work experience opportunities for learners on study programmes, and ensure that learners use the work experience appropriately to develop their employability skills.
Extend the accessibility of careers guidance to apprentices more and, where appropriate, promote apprenticeships more widely as a career option for other learners.
Ensure that assessors work more closely with apprentices to raise their awareness of how to stay safe online.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Improve the attendance of learners by:
supporting smaller providers to develop strategies to improve learners’ attendance
setting ambitious targets for the attendance of learners
monitoring the effectiveness of these arrangements closely.
Increase the availability of accredited English and mathematics courses to learners by utilising funding so that qualifications offered are more closely aligned with the learners’ aspirations to gain employment.
Build the capacity of tutors through training, staff development and extending the resources available to them so that they are confident in promoting British values and improving learners’ understanding of radicalisation and extremism.
Leaders and managers should ensure that teachers in plumbing, joinery and in GCSE English and mathematics identify the gaps in students’ knowledge and deliver the curriculum to build on what they already know and can do.
Ensure that teachers of learners who have high needs plan an ambitious foundation level curriculum so that learners can meet challenging goals.
Increase the attendance of adults on access to higher education, beauty therapy and theatrical and media make-up courses.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Increase the number of learners who make good progress and achieve qualifications in English by ensuring that:
all staff who teach English have both the subject skills and the teaching skills to help all learners develop their knowledge and skills quickly
vocational teachers consistently include activities in their lessons that promote the development of good writing skills
vocational staff provide clear guidance on marked work that helps learners to improve their writing, and check that learners follow this guidance on subsequent work.
Provide training for staff in underperforming subjects so that they:
take into account learners’ existing abilities and plan lessons that provide appropriate challenge for all members of the group
plan for learning that provides an increasing level of challenge over time and equips learners with the skills they need to meet this challenge.
Take firm action to improve attendance, particularly in English and mathematics lessons.
Leaders must ensure that they help staff to improve the professional behaviours of the minority of learners who do not reflect the high standards demonstrated by most learners across the college.
Leaders must ensure that managers and teachers of the minority of subjects where learning is not yet consistently good work together effectively to plan the curriculum and share good practice. This will ensure that learners are able to apply new learning to their studies fluently.
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.
Leaders must improve the quality of education across the provision. They must ensure that all programmes are sufficiently challenging for learners and that the quality of teaching and assessment is improved, so that a greater proportion of learners and apprentices stay on their programmes and go on to make good progress.
Leaders must ensure that there is a more rigorous focus on improving learners’ attendance, so that a higher proportion of learners develop this vital skill for employment.
Leaders must ensure that learners and apprentices receive high-quality feedback on work and in progress reviews that helps them to know how to improve their work.
Leaders need to expand the personal development curriculum, so that learners develop their wider knowledge, talents and interests. Within this, leaders should ensure that learners remember what they have been taught about the dangers of radicalisation and extremism. Learners should be fully informed about the opportunities available to them at the end of their programme.
Leaders need to ensure that on education programmes for young people, they have sufficient staff to teach the courses, and suitable contingency plans in place where staff are absent, so that lessons are not disrupted and learners have a more consistent and stable learning experience, so that they can make good progress.
Leaders should ensure that learners and apprentices are aware of the enrichment opportunities available at the college to improve participation in these activities.
Leaders should ensure that teachers of mainstream subjects make consistent use of EHC plan outcomes to plan a bespoke curriculum for learners with high needs that enables learners to develop their independence and the skills they need for work and adult life.
In a minority of apprenticeship programmes, teachers should improve their sequencing of the curriculum to ensure apprentices develop basic knowledge before learning more-complex topics.
While the Gender Action Plan promotes activity across all curriculum and service areas, further action is required at course level to address gender imbalance on traditionally male/female dominated courses.
There is an increased demand for support for the mental health problems faced by students, placing considerable strain on both support and curriculum staff.
The college has not yet developed, in collaboration with students, an Equally Safe strategic framework to prevent gender based violence on campus.
What does the provider need to do to improve further?
Ensure that the quality of teaching, learning and assessment for learners aged 16 to 19 consistently reaches the standard of that seen for adult learners and apprentices. In particular, teachers should be supported to:
consider the abilities and prior attainment of all learners in a group so that they plan and deliver lessons that challenge the most able and give extra help to those who need it
improve their use of a variety of formative assessment methods, including the use of questioning, so that they are able to judge the progress of all learners and adjust their teaching accordingly
consistently provide high-quality feedback on written work so that, over time, learners are able to improve the standard of their submissions
develop targets for learners that focus on the acquisition of skills and knowledge, and monitor the effectiveness of these in improving learners’ progress.
Improve the quality of teaching, learning and assessment in English and mathematics in discrete lessons for all learners; for learners aged 16 to 19, improve the extent to which teachers incorporate these subjects in their lessons, so that a higher proportion of learners make good progress and achieve their qualifications.
What does the college need to do to improve further?
Ensure that managers and teachers take effective action to improve the small minority of underperforming courses, especially in the GCE AS- and A-level provision.
Leaders and managers should ensure that students and apprentices attend English and mathematics lessons regularly so that they learn the skills and knowledge that they need to achieve on their courses.
Leaders and managers must ensure that education, health and care plan targets are broken down thoroughly so that teachers can use them to plan learning activities that develop students’ skills and knowledge, so that students achieve their planned goals.
Leaders and managers must ensure that students and apprentices receive helpful feedback on their work so that they understand what they need to do to improve, how to make improvements and to prepare themselves for future study.
Leaders and managers should ensure that all students and apprentices have a good understanding of the careers opportunities available to them when they complete their courses so that they are able to make informed decisions about, and plan for, their future careers.
Leaders should ensure that the quality of education in the small proportion of subjects where it requires improving meets the high standard of other subject areas across the college.
Managers and teachers should consistently provide learners with high-quality feedback on marked work, so that all learners know what they have done well and how to improve.
Leaders should ensure that managers and teachers on apprenticeship courses plan and teach an effective personal development curriculum, including access to suitable careers advice and guidance.Leaders and managers need to:
