The role

The challenge

The Northumberland Church of England Academy will serve an area that is ranked in the top 2% of the most deprived wards in the country. Recent OfSTED reports provide strong evidence that the communities and schools of the existing partnership face a number of significant challenges.

For first schools these include:

• Attainment on entry well below the average
• Low levels of literacy including poor communication skills and limited vocabulary
• Low levels of numeracy and a lack of confidence in manipulating numbers
• Low aspirations amongst both learners and the community
• Low levels of academic self-esteem leading to high dependence on teachers
• Inadequately developed social skills
• A culture of low expectations.

Though positive changes are happening at First and Middle school level, OfSTED continues to find that some learners of 13 and above who attend Hirst High School (which will be replaced by the new Academy) have:

• Low attainment on entry to high school
• Lack of basic learning skills and poor concentration
• Inadequate social skills leading on occasion to poor behaviour and engagement
• Inadequate reading, writing and communications skills
• Low aspirations.

Culture change

In addition, OfSTED report that parental engagement at high school level ‘remains an issue of pressing and significant concern’. While the underlying causes of such ‘intransigent issues are always highly complex’ inspectors believe that these are ‘rooted in the culture not only of the community but also, to a greater or lesser extent, in the culture of schools themselves.’