Review of Strategies to Address Gender Inequalities in Scottish ...

indicated that he believed there was a strong link between the quality of the physicalenvironment and pupil attainment. At the time of the visit, the school roll sat at abouttwo-thirds of its capacity.ii. Initial impetus and fundingThe strategy has been in place for four years. The initial impetus came from theoutcomes of an inspection by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate (Education) and thedevelopment of the follow-up Action Plan, in combination with wider concern and policydevelopment relating to raising attainment. The key aim was to improve attainmentlevels of all pupils, which were below national standards. The initiative was notsupported by any targeted staff development activity.Any costs were met within the standard resources received by the school.iii. Implementation of the strategyThe strategy centres on the policy of establishing a two-class accelerated stream withinthe school. It was originally pioneered by the Head of the Learning Community and isnow embedded in the organisation of the school, and involves all staff and pupils.Sixty pupils in each year are assessed as suitable for inclusion in the scheme on the basisof their 5-14 assessments. These pupils form two classes of 30, allowing some flexibilityto work with smaller groups of the remaining pupils.Alongside streaming, the school had adopted a number of other strategies for raisingattainment. For example, a high priority was given to pastoral care, and two 15-minutesessions were used for mentoring groups of pupils each week. This time was partlydevoted to encouraging pupils to think about themselves and their ambitions.Furthermore, the depute headteacher with responsibility for the inclusion agendacoordinated a system called Alpha where more pro-active support was given to pupilsseen as being vulnerable. In addition, the pastoral care team, augmented by ClassroomAssistants, offered a range of forms of support to certain pupils, including ICTprogrammes and counselling. A number of projects allowed pupils to engage in learningbeyond the classroom. The intention was to support pupils to expand their horizons andto consider new possibilities for themselves.iv. The impactThe school uses the established systems of local and national data-gathering proceduresto monitor the impact. These indicate that the school has significantly improved itsstatistical outcomes for examinations, attendance and exclusions – outcomes that have ledto considerable interest from the national press.Three S5 pupils, all of whom had been in the accelerated stream, took part in a groupinterview. All three had very clear views of their futures in that they knew that theywanted to continue into higher education and, in two instances, were very clear and wellinformedas to how they could achieve their aims. For example:I am going to do an HND in Social Work and then I would like to do adegree in Child Psychology. (boy, S5)The school reported that parents had accepted the streaming arrangements, even whentheir child had been placed outside of the accelerated stream. One member of staffbelieved that this was because they had always managed to convince parents that theschool had their child’s best interests at heart.There is a further issue that emerged from discussions with teachers in schools which hadattempted the implementation of single gender classes – the gender imbalances inattainment-set classes. For example, in one school in particular, the ‘top’ set had beenlargely girls and the ‘bottom’ set largely boys. Prior to the use of SGCs, there had been22 girls and 4 boys in the ‘top’ set and 15 boys and 2 girls in the ‘bottom’ set. Thus there______________________________________________________________________________________Review of Strategies to 43 University of StrathclydeAddress Gender Inequalitiesand University of Glasgow