The School Curriculum Ten Years Hence - UCET: Universities ...

As the young people become more confident, their basic skills
improve. They are also able to access vocational courses in Hair and
Beauty or in Construction that include extended work experience
opportunities. Attendance improved from 29% when in school to
89% on the project. Young people progressed to vocational courses
at a higher level in the college, and many considered that the
project had given them an aim in life. Previously they had no career
aspirations at all and several had been involved with the criminal
justice system.
My second example involves work in another comprehensive school
(Tonypandy Comprehensive, Rhondda Cynon Taff), where young
people selected for an alternative scheme remain part of their year
group for registration, the school’s pastoral programme, PSE
lessons, IT and the Youth Award Scheme. They follow examination
courses in the core subjects where they remain fully integrated with
mainstream classes. For the remainder of the time, pupils
undertake a programme of activities outside the usual curriculum.
For example, a recent photography project has resulted in work of
outstanding quality. Pupils took photographs in a range of sites to
show contrasting aspects of the local environment. They compiled
albums of the photographs and selected some for a public
exhibition. They constructed display boards, mounted the
photographs and arranged and lit them to make an attractive
gallery.
The resulting high quality exhibition in the school foyer has been
much valued by pupils, staff and visitors to the school and given the
pupils concerned a status and recognition they had not previously
enjoyed. Surely what we need is a curriculum that is flexible and
imaginatively taught to ensure that all pupils can benefit from
developing skills and knowledge of things that will capture the
imagination. The provisions in the new Education Bill for England
and Wales will provide more opportunity for such flexibilities.
Schools engaged in these kind of initiatives have been helped to
think creatively about what works in re-engaging pupils. Valuable
lessons have been learned from these projects that should have an
impact on what happens inside schools, making such projects less
and less necessary in the future. As part of the partnership, one
higher education institution has seconded a member of staff from a
socially disadvantaged partner school to provide, amongst other
things, first hand examples of the sort of projects I have just
discussed.
This sort of practice makes good use of the skills of experienced
practitioners from partner schools and provides training and