Collaborative Approaches to 14-19 Provision - Communities and ...

14-19 PATHFINDERS: THE SECOND YEARSHEFFIELD PATHFINDERThe local context447. Sheffield is the fourth largest city in England with a population of over half a million.From the 1970s it suffered severe economic decline with a loss of a quarter of all jobs in itstraditional metals and manufacturing base. The growth of the service sector, retail andcreative industries since the 1990s means that it now has an unemployment rate only slightlyabove the national average and an economic strategy designed to attract inward investors andto build on its strengths in a number of key areas such as Advanced Manufacturing and theCreative and Digital Industries. Thus there has been substantial regeneration in the city withfunding from the European Union, central and local government and the regionaldevelopment agency. As we show below the pathfinder is aiming to respond to theregeneration context in the city.448. Sheffield tends to be geographically polarised in terms of virtually every socioeconomicindicator between the affluent suburbs of the south and the west and those wards inthe north and the east where disadvantage remains a persistent problem. Sheffield has boththe parliamentary constituency with the highest proportion of graduates in any English citywhilst, elsewhere, one third of its population lives in wards that fall into the category of the10% most deprived in the country. The city is addressing these disparities through its‘Closing the Gap’ policy.449. These disparities are reflected in achievement levels in secondary schools. Overallperformance on the 5 A* - C GCSE/GNVQ measure was over nine points below the Englandaverage in 2003 but this masks wide disparities between schools. Unsurprisingly highperforming schools (on raw measures) are found in the south-west although the greatest rateof improvement in performance is seen in those secondary schools facing the greatestchallenges. Seven schools in the south west have sixth forms where 16-19 year olds performabove national averages but the majority of the city is catered for by 11-16 schools with post-16 progression to a large FE college, a new sixth form college and work based learning.134