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System leadership
The Trust cut its teeth in secondary
school improvement, working in
partnership with Nottinghamshire local
authority to help move a local secondary
school out of a category. Working in
partnership is always a delicate balancing
act; weighing the need for rapid
improvement against some stakeholder
perceptions that ‘some partners are more
equal than others’. It is about building trust
but above all about building a school-wide
intolerance of any practice that isn’t at least
‘good’.
Fresh pairs of eyes can always help
refocus institutions that, willingly or
otherwise, have become complicit in
accepting the unacceptable. However,
fresh pairs of hands, both at senior and
middle leadership levels also help really
galvanise actions. Between 2010 and 2012,
Spencer deployed three senior leaders;
two of them full-time in the second year;
as well as middle leaders alongside a new,
passionate internal interim Head to help
accelerate student progress and teaching
and learning. The art of leading by
example, but empowering the host school’s
leaders and teachers to deliver sustainable
solutions themselves, was learned here.
And the results were unequivocal.
Five A*-C GCSEs including maths and
English improved from 33% in 2010 to
52% in 2012; five A*-C including maths
and English for FSM students improved
from 0% in 2010 to 50% in 2012 and
five A*-C GCSEs improved from 65%
in 2010 to 82% in 2012. School leaders
from both institutions have now moved
on to promotions, including three into
Headship.
More recently, the trust has become
the lead sponsor for a number of local
primary schools. Taking on a primary
school in the ‘bottom 200 schools’ in
Derby city with an explicit anti-academy
stance was always a challenge. But
Spencer stuck firmly to its principles of
understanding the context it was faced
with, rather than attempting to build an
institution in its own secondary, slightly
more enabled image. And once again, the
results speak for themselves.
The transformation from Boulton
Primary School to Wyndham Primary
Academy has been something quite
special. Not only have results increased
significantly over the last two years since
Angela O’Brien became Principal, from
below floor to 83% combined L4, but
the whole atmosphere of the school
has changed. It is now a true learning
community for children, parents, staff and
the community. Children want to come to
school for the exciting curriculum, which
is centred around literature, extracurricular
activities and the use of ICT. A whole
school approach to progress ensures
everyone understands data and everyone is
focussed on increasing the rate of progress
for every child. Each Year 6 pupil has
the support of an ‘adult buddy’ from the
school to give confidence, help and support
as needed as well as working on literacy
and numeracy.
Other significant factors along the
transformational journey include:
• leadership and governance restructure
• A mini bus to round up children who
want to come to school but whose
parents are unable to do this
• The NEST for integration and
intervention programmes
• Narrowing the gap intervention
programme
• Enlisting volunteer teams of parents,
friends to re-decorate the school
• Providing an exciting outdoor play area
• Increased parental support for
learning as well as learning new skills
themselves helping their children
with the iPads.
• Membership of the Teaching School
Alliance and Challenge Partner
Hub which has enabled the school
to access annual reviews and high
quality training such as ITP OTP,
leadership development programmes
and enabled Angela and staff to lead
Teachmeets, train as Ofsted inspectors
and also support other schools
Susan Jowett is Executive
Principal of George
Spencer Academies Trust.
Fraser Mitchell is
Principal of George
Spencer Academy in
Nottinghamshire.
Summer 2014 | 29