Blairgowrie High School - School of Ambition
Our Transformational Story (March 2009)
1. Introduction
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Context of bid
Blairgowrie High School is a non-denominational secondary school which serves the towns of Blairgowrie, Rattray, Alyth, Coupar Angus and the surrounding areas. The school has a very mixed catchment in socio-economic terms.
Blairgowrie High School was a very different place back in 2005 when the school was successful in achieving School of Ambition status. The school had experienced frequent visits from HMIE in the years running up to 2003 when, after finally being ‘signed off’, the school was the subject of national media attention relating to issues of bullying. As a result the HMIE once again announced a full inspection for 2004. In that year a third rector in the same number of years took up post.
It is fair to say, then, that the school had experienced a high degree of volatility in the years leading up to 2005, which had had an impact on both staff morale and the reputation of the school within the wider community. In this respect, the School of Ambition development could not have come at a better time: the school was in need of transformation and the programme seemed to offer the opportunity to make this so. A transformational plan (APPENDIX 1) was therefore written and despatched to the government. At this point, the plan focussed largely on the vocational aspect, but – as will be discussed later – the plan evolved in such a way that it can now be encompassed under the headings of the ‘what’, ‘how’ and ‘why’ of learning.
This report seeks to examine in detail the first of these two strands, as well as providing a more basic commentary on developments on the third, which are at a far earlier stage.
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Looking at the ‘what’ of learning – vocational curriculum
Whilst the issue of bullying had been grossly exaggerated in the national press, there were nevertheless serious issues of pupil behaviour that the school considered a priority to address. In doing so, inevitably we looked at the issue of appropriateness of curriculum. This was vital in terms of ensuring the highest level possible of pupil engagement with school and also in terms of re-engaging the local community by redefining the central relevance of the school to the community it served. These priorities were reflected in the aims and objectives section of the original transformational plan, and summarised under the heading ‘more choice, more chance’:
To closely link the curriculum with our local industry needs, thereby creating additional opportunities for pupils who may, in a variety of ways, choose to go on to contribute to the sustainability of the area after leaving secondary school.
To expose pupils, S3-S6, to a wider variety of real-life learning and training opportunities in which they can develop and succeed either at a personal or career level.
To enable the community to be involved in shaping its own skill needs and in preparing pupils who wish to pursue these.
The document went on to define ‘scope and impact’:
Pupils at different stages are presented with the chance of being involved in locally relevant learning opportunities.
Closer linkage between academic and vocational awards is forged where vocational awards are integrated and valued alongside other qualifications.
Improved opportunities for lifelong learning. Pupils are able to make best use of what is ‘on their doorstep’ in terms of their learning.
The school plays an integral part in the regeneration proposals for Eastern Perthshire
The clear direction of travel arising from these points was the idea of enhancing our vocational curriculum. By providing opportunities of a more obviously relevant nature, we hoped to engage some of the pupils with whom we had been having behavioural difficulties. To this end, we made a temporary internal appointment to a ‘project manager’ post, the remit of which would be to develop a sustainable vocational programme. The project manager was made a full member of the senior management team in order to provide status to the role of vocational co-ordinator. For the larger part of our School of Ambition project this was the only additional staffing that we deployed to the project.
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Our vocational developments also tied in with the steer that the school had been given by the inspectorate. The report of HMIE on the 2004 inspection gave seven action points, one of which was the need to improve relationships with the community and communication with parents. In introducing vocational education we used the opportunity which working with local employers gave to improve the image of the school. We wanted to demonstrate that we were reacting to the employment needs of the local community in working with employers to deliver both the national Rural Skills and Skills for Work courses. We also communicated with parents the value of these courses to pupils and the impact they could have on enhancing the potential for employability. The positive publicity which was generated by this project was also capitalised upon for the enhancement of the school’s reputation within the community.
Another area for development identified by HMIE was the need to improve attainment, particularly with the lowest attaining 20%. The introduction of a Skills for Work course in S3 was targeted at such pupils, who had the potential to become disaffected with education. They were the potential so-called ‘NEET’ group of the future, who would enter neither employment nor training on leaving school. We felt that we had to act to offer these pupils the opportunity to engage in a different form of learning which was valued as much as a more academic form. It was also vital that it was valued by staff and parents, and it was given such credibility by virtue of being an Intermediate 1 qualification with progression to the Scottish Progression Award in Rural Skills in S5 or S6.
The vocational development also had a pedagogical underpinning in that it was predicated upon a recognition that not all pupils respond to the same learning style and some can benefit from the opportunity for ‘learning by doing’ and acquiring skills ‘on the job’ that these courses offered. Hopkins et al in Preedy et al (2003 p 95), state that school improvement is about raising student achievement through focusing on the teaching - learning process and the conditions which support it. This project aimed to deliver new teaching and learning experiences to pupils through practical, hands-on experiences to develop skills in the work place.
This change was also one that had to come about on a cultural level. There was a real challenge in getting staff to recognise that this style of learning had value, and that increased motivation in pupils as a result could stimulate greater interest in their more academic subjects.
These courses were to be introduced into the curriculum as full subject choices in competition with existing subjects and would have an effect on some subject numbers, particularly if the uptake to these increased, as expected, over future years. This decision was about providing a parity of standing within the school for the new qualifications.
Stoll and Fink in Preedy et al (2003) define school improvement as a series of processes in which a school builds the capacity to take charge of change. This implies taking ownership of the change so that it becomes something that we want to do, not something imposed from the outside. It was important, therefore, to work to ensure that staff felt they had ownership of the changes envisaged in the project by outlining the rationale for the project to staff at an early stage and, as importantly, communicating progress with the change regularly to all during whole staff and principal teacher meetings.
In a larger context, our vocational developments chimed with a change of emphasis that was taking place at a national level. Ambitious, Excellent Schools (SEED 2004a) and A Curriculum for Excellence (SEED 2004c) set out to give greater choice and opportunity for pupils by developing new courses to develop important knowledge and skills for employment through practical experiences linked to particular careers.
The project manager collaborated successfully with local authority staff to secure a two year pilot, starting in session ’06 – ’07, to introduce Skills for Work in Rural Skills. As a school serving a rural community, there was a demand for employees in rural industries which eased our challenge in finding partners to work with to deliver these courses. Two such working partnerships were with Perth College and Forestry Enterprise to offer Horticulture and Forestry as the vehicles for delivery of Skills for Work.
In addition to the work done by the project manager, the vocational agenda was also pursued with enthusiasm by the Home Economics Department whose innovative work has been developing the school as a centre of excellence for hospitality. The principal teacher in particular has worked tirelessly to develop links with business partners in the hospitality industry, in particular with local hotels. These developments have very much addressed the initial aim of allowing the local business community to be partners in the process of shaping the skills needs of our pupils.
Skills for Work Hospitality courses began in session 07-08 for S3 pupils and in session 08-09 this cohort has followed through to S4 with the addition of a new S3 cohort. Senior courses have also been offered this session in Intermediate 2 and the desire to be one of the few schools to be able to offer Higher Hospitality has led to the biggest single investment of the School of Ambition project: the training kitchen and restaurant. It is hoped that this development will further enhance the school’s growing reputation in the community and across the country as a centre of innovation in this area.
It is also hoped that the restaurant and kitchen – which represent a clear physical transformation for the school – will allow for further engagement with business partners who we believe will want to make use of this first rate facility for their own staff training requirements. We hope that such a demand will lay the foundation for a mutually beneficial partnership with business partners that will stand the test of time.
The Home Economics Department has also done much to develop the idea of broader achievement in this area, with pupils having considerable successes in regional and national cooking competitions. Such success has also laid the path for professional success for some ex-pupils in this, their chosen career. There is also no question that the positive press and general ‘feel-good factor’ resulting from such events has gone some way to enhancing the reputation of the school in the local community and of developing a positive ‘can-do’ ethos within the school community itself.
Despite this practical assessment as our role as provider to local industry, we nevertheless did not want to lose sight of the pedagogical underpinning of what we were doing. Bowring-Carr in Davies et al (2005) states nine aspirations needed for deep learning to occur:
Learning programmes need to be individual. We all learn differently, at different speeds, in different rhythms and for different reasons.
This aspiration is one which was central to this project in offering learning in a working environment and learning by doing. We were exposing pupils to a different, more relevant form of learning which would hopefully keep them engaged with education.
This training kitchen development also illustrates an interesting lesson for the School of Ambition programme, which is that three years can be a very short time in the life of a school. At this time of writing (March 2009), this development has yet to take place, let alone being subject to evaluation. However, after many false starts and a multitude of lengthy negotiations, the training kitchen and restaurant are finally near completion and should be ready for the change of timetable in June 2009. Evaluation will, of course, have to wait to a later date.
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Looking at the ‘how’ of learning
As well as the development of vocational training, the school was also keen to engage with advancements in technologies, which were impacting on the way in which learning and teaching took place. The initial energising vision was one of the ‘virtual classroom’. Although this began as a specific project involving classes being taught ‘virtually’ over the internet, the term ‘virtual’ underwent a process of semantic widening, so much so that by the end it had come to mean almost anything related to ICT.
The original vision of the virtual classroom had fitted in well with the broad project aims of providing pupils with greater opportunities to engage. The virtual classroom could have widened the scope of teaching that could take place within the school, allowing, for example, for vocational skills to be taught from a remote location. In addition, this concept allowed for the prospect of teaching pupils who for reasons of behaviour were not always able to attend school in person. Although the numbers of such pupils were very small indeed - perhaps three a year – such developments would allow us a greater chance of meeting the local authority’s statutory obligation to provide an education to all enrolled pupils, whether on or off-site.
The ‘virtual’ strand of this development illustrates well the organic nature of the School of Ambition project in the way in which it changed with time and circumstance. It also illustrates the aspect of the programme described in the 2007 School of Ambition research report as ‘approved risk-taking’. With time, ‘virtual’ became synonymous with ‘new’ and School of Ambition became an important source of ‘pump-priming’ for all sorts of innovative projects which would never have got off the ground without funding and the general impetus for change provided by the School of Ambition programme.
Unsurprisingly, where there were members of staff with a particular interest, developments were most likely to gather momentum. Conversely, where there was no obvious member of staff to lead on a project, these became much harder to get off the ground, as was the case with the virtual classroom development which eventually petered out. Such an ambitious project would perhaps have had a greater chance of success if we had seconded someone to take charge of it, or allocated it to one of our subject departments where there would have been a structure and personnel to take it forward.
The School of Ambition programme, therefore, became at times a sort of charter for innovation – sometimes providing an initial impetus, other times, providing a further push for projects already underway. And this, too, illustrates an important aspect of how the School of Ambition programme operated: the start of the programme was not some sort of ‘year zero’, and therefore some of what the project did was to build on existing developments.
The ICT strand of School of Ambition offered a variety of models for innovation within schools. For example, the rector at the time saw the potential applications of podcasting and paid for a professional media expert to work with pupils for an afternoon a week organising and recording ‘podcasts’ on a variety of subjects. This was a means of providing expertise as well as technology, but clearly as a model there were likely to be issues of sustainability.
Another model was to use School of Ambition funding to support projects within the school that were already taking shape. One such example of this was the Art Department and Modern Languages Departments’ Animation project, in which S2 pupils were helped to make a short animation film in a foreign language.
A further model was to provide short term contract for existing staff in recognition of additional hours spent on a development. This was so in the case of the website development where a member of staff was paid to develop and maintain the school website over the period of the programme.
The most common way, however, of disbursing funding was using existing departmental structures through a bidding system. This was a mechanism for encouraging innovation within subjects departments – sometimes bastions of conservatism within secondary schools – and of rewarding good practice, by directly linking resourcing to developments. This bidding system (APPENDIX 2) was also an effective mechanism for raising consciousness about the aims of the project across the staff, as departments were asked to address their bids to one or more of four bulletpoints into which we had distilled the essence of the School of Ambition plan. Staff at the time were also informed that all resources allocated would be subject to an evaluation one year later, which encouraged them from the outset to think about what they might set out to demonstrate.
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Looking at the ‘why’ of learning
Although the third strand of the original plan was entitled ‘inclusion’, over time this was not pursued as a separate strand but rather one that was cross-cutting. This was largely due the fact that, like the ICT strand, the central driving concept of the strand - in this case, an offsite provision for disengaged pupils – proved not to be possible. Unsurprisingly, this was the aspect of the original plan which was met with greatest enthusiasm by staff, some of whom may have seen it as a place to which the school could simply dispatch its disengaged pupils. Although the original idea had been more sophisticated than this, as leaders we might have done more to place this development within the larger context of inclusion, with which it was in danger of appearing in contradiction.
As the off-site provision began to recede as a possibility, another strand - which was being pushed in particular by one of the deputes - began to evolve in its place: the concept of values education. The idea of looking with pupils at the profound question of ‘why’ as a school we were there seemed in time to fit well with the review of ‘what’ we were doing encapsulated by the vocational agenda, and ‘how’ we were doing it, illustrated by our ICT-based innovation.
It also very clearly resonated with the educational zeitgeist reflected in Curriculum for Excellence.
And so, rather like the old axe that over time has both its handle and head replaced, the School of Ambition plan underwent dramatic change in terms of what it was addressing, whilst remaining in essence the same.
Though the development of values and vocational education seemed to represent two ends of the educational spectrum - one seeming rarified and philosophical, the other grounded in the practicalities of addressing the needs of the employment market - they were in fact quite compatible. In looking at values education, we were also looking in the broadest sense at the requirements of our community in terms of the pupils that we turned out.
2. Evidence/Impacts and Outcomes
2.1 Research Questions
Our focus for this evaluation is encapsulated in the following two research questions:
What has been the impact of offering vocational curriculum alternatives to pupils?
To what extent has investment in ICT led to improvements in learning and teaching?
2.2 Evidence and Methodology
2.2.1 Evidence Summary
| Research Strand | Evidence |
| 1. Development of curriculum alternatives | Semi-structured interviews with pupils Semi-structured interviews with parents Semi- structured interviews with employers Analysis of three focus group Pupil destinations Attainment data for vocational courses Pupil take-up of vocational courses LHTL questionnaires for staff
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| 2. ICT for Learning and Teaching | Principal teacher evaluations Staff ICT surveys Pupil ICT surveys Semi –structured interviews with pupils Quantitative data for website use Quantitative date for LMS use Quantitative data for podcasts audience LHTL questionnaires for staff
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2.2.2 Semi –Structured Interviews
Data were collected through interviews by the Project Manager with parents and pupils. Interviews had an approximate duration of fifty minutes and when it was agreed by interviewees, the interviews were taped. Additional written notes were taken in all cases. These interviews produced rich qualitative data.
(APPENDIX 3)
2.2.3 Pupil Focus Groups
Pupil focus groups were used as part of the evaluation of vocational courses. Pupils were interviewed in three focus groups in session 06/07 and again in session 07/08. The same pupils were interviewed in each case, and comparisons between responses allowed us to gauge ‘distance travelled’.
Pupil focus groups were also used to ‘drill down’ into ICT survey responses.
2.2.4. Telephone Surveys
Telephone surveys of partners supporting the provision of vocational courses were carried out in session 06/07 and again in session 07/08. These surveys were designed to gauge the impact that vocational opportunities had had on both pupils’ personal development and their employability. There is no permanent record of these surveys.
2.2.5 Electronic Surveys
Electronic surveys were used as an economical and quick way of collating data on the impact of ICT investment within the school. All staff were invited to take part in two surveys, with an approximate uptake of about 50% in each case. A survey was also conducted on about 80 pupils in S3 in sessions 07/08, which represented just under half of that year group. The focus of the staff survey was to gauge staff perception of the impact of ICT on teaching and learning and also to identify any training needs that may have arisen. (APPENDICES 4&5) The pupil surveys were designed to gauge the perception that pupils had of the impact of ICT on their learning. (APPENDIX 6)
2.2.6 Principal Teacher ICT Evaluations
Principal teachers whose bids for ICT investment were successful in September 2007 were asked to complete evaluations addressing the original aims of the School of Ambition plan. These evaluations provided a broad brush overview of key themes that arose in terms of staff perceptions of the ICT strand. (APPENDIX 7)
2.2.7 ‘Learning how to Learn’ (LHTL) Questionnaire
This questionnaire, which covered most aspects of the school’s business, was issued to all staff in February 2007 and again in May 2008. This survey allowed researchers to chart improvements of a general nature, such as those in ethos, as well as looking in detail at certain areas such as learning and teaching. While this is a generic research tool and not one designed specifically to analyse or evaluate vocational learning at Blairgowrie High School, it is still useful in attempting to measure attitudinal change. A soft indicator such as this is very difficult to measure or evaluate with any degree of reliability. (APPENDIX 8)
2.3 Impacts and Outcomes
2.3.1 Vocational Alternatives Strand
The vocational strand was broken down in our transformational plan further into three specific objectives:
To further develop the Scottish Progression Award in Rural Skills for pupils in S5 and S6.
To introduce Skills for Work in Rural Skills with delivery to pupils in S3 in session 2006-7.
To use this aspect of the School of Ambition project to increase the
school’s capacity for change.
A clear area of progress for the School of Ambition project has been the introduction of the Scottish Progression Award (SPA) at Intermediate 2 level as a vocational course in direct competition with other subjects for the first time. One clear piece of evidence to suggest the success of this course is that all pupils have been successful in completing it, and a number have gained employment
as a direct result.
| Session | Total pupils | Successfully completed | Related jobs/apprenticeships | Related college course | Other college/university courses |
| 04/05 | 18 | 18 | 13 | 3 | 2 |
| 05/06 | 12 | 12 | 2 | 2 | 8 |
| 06/07 | 8 | 8 | 2 | 4 | 2 |
| 07/08 | 8 | 8 | 2 | 3 | 3 |
Over the course of the project, three pupils have been offered apprenticeships with participating employers and a significant number of pupils have gone on to full-time college courses in the land-based industries. These pupils would not have considered these college courses if they had not been exposed to the vocational experiences afforded them by the introduction of the SPA course in school. There can be little doubt that the SPA has had a direct and positive impact on the futures of all pupils who have been engaged in this course.
The introduction of Skills for Work courses has allowed the opportunity to target pupils who were at risk of becoming disaffected and to allow them to learn in a different environment and in a different way, with assessments which are based on their participation rather than recall of knowledge. There is some anecdotal evidence that these pupils have seen the relevance to the world of work of their other subject studies, and that there may have been an improvement in their attainment in school subjects as a result. Such anecdotal evidence is as far as we can go in terms of weighing impact as the numbers are still small and the course is only in its third year.
We have also sought to bring about an increase in positive relationships between the school and the community and we have evaluated soft indicators such as parents’ perceptions of the school and the range of experiences we offer. A small scale survey of the views of some of the parents of pupils involved in the vocational courses has shown that these courses are valued by parents. Some parents commented that it was the vocational course that had kept their son at school, or that they were impressed with the motivation which these courses had produced in their sons and daughters.
Some typical comments made in the telephone survey were:
----- has a new enthusiasm for school and has even gone to the farm during holidays and exam leave
In earlier years at school ------- was truanting but this year he has been at school all the time because of the land based course
I have never seen --------- to be so enthusiastic about any course at school before.
-------- has really matured and I am sure that this is largely due to the trust and responsibility that the employers give to him.
There has also been positive publicity about these courses with coverage in the press and a television BBC news item featuring the pupils in the Forestry course.
Monitoring or indeed evaluating changes in attitudes among staff is not easy. Staff attitudes to change - in particular to vocational learning - have been monitored by analysing the results of a staff questionnaire which was issued at the start of the project and repeated again towards the end.
One key to persuading staff of the importance of a wider view of our role as a school is by demonstrating the impact that developments have had on such pupils, as well as on other stakeholders. It is also significant, therefore, that the telephone survey of partner employers also showed a high level of satisfaction amongst employers with these vocational courses and the opportunities for learning they provided.
Despite the fact that there is clearly a long way to go, there is perhaps evidence of a general increase in the school’s capacity for change. This is of course not easy to gauge, but an increase in attitudinal change towards vocational education and alternative learning experiences is an important indicator of the school moving forward. To demonstrate this we carried out a generic survey in 2007 of the views of all staff of their attitudes to change in terms of extending the range of teaching and learning opportunities made available to pupils. This was followed up by a repeat of the same questionnaire in May 2008.
The result of this evaluation, which is included in summary in appendix 8, shows a clear increase in the scores in all sections of the questionnaire over the timescale of the School of Ambition project. There is a pleasing increase in scores in the sections evaluating Promoting Learning Autonomy, Performance Orientation, Inquiry, Critical and Responsive Learning and Valuing Learning. These show marked increases in both the current practice of staff within the school but also in the value which staff assign to these categories within the evaluation.
It would seem realistic to suggest that these results show that not only is vocational education being accepted but is being valued as a means of extending the successful learning of our young people.
Easier to monitor and evaluate has been the success in securing additional funding for the project through a successful bid for national Determined to Succeed funding over two years. We read this as a clear vote of confidence at an authority level in the work that we are doing
For this project to have been successful it must have shown positive impact on pupils learning and motivation; on staff perceptions; and the views of the school held by the local community, parents and employers. Pupils have shown a great motivation for these courses by regularly staying on to work with employers beyond the school day. They have responded positively to the trust shown in them by employers and have increased in self confidence, according to comments made by parents.
There is no doubt that these courses have allowed pupils to develop in ways which would not have been possible within the traditional curriculum. Exposing pupils to experiential learning in the workplace has tremendous benefits to the individual pupils. Additionally, as these pupils have often gone out of school to pursue these courses, the reputation of the school has been enhanced within the community as they have been excellent ambassadors.
2.3.2 ICT Strand
As with any other development is school, it is difficult to isolate the impact of ICT on learning and teaching when so many other variables must be taken into account. The research question posed for this report is: ‘to what extent has investment in ICT led to improvements in learning and teaching?’, and this section will examine the evidence for this.
The evidence for the ICT strand is both quantitative and qualitative in nature. We have collated quantitative data though use of surveys of pupils and staff, and breakdowns of website usage. Qualitative data been produced through principal teacher evaluations and pupil interviews.
As previously described, we invested in staffing to develop and maintain the school website, which we saw as an innovative means of extending learning and teaching beyond the traditional locus of the classroom. In developing a ‘learning management system’ we hoped that pupils and teachers would be provided with a vehicle for extending their interactions. On the same principle, we also developed the use of podcasts, which were largely broadcast by means of the website. We also hoped that the school website would be a means of advertising the many good news stories about the school that were so important to the process of building up the school’s reputation within the community.
Statistics on website use suggest that there is no question that the website is often visited by pupils, as evidenced by the fact that there were 56243 ‘hits’ on the learning management part of the website between June 2007 and June 2008. (APPENDIX 9) The survey conducted of S3 pupils also pointed to large numbers having visited the website, though fewer taking advantage of the LMS. However, the learning management system at this time was typically being used more with senior classes where there is a greater emphasis on homework and revision, so the limited usage by the sample S3 pupils is perhaps less disappointing than might at first be thought.
Statistics on visits to the podcast site, which was on a link to the main website, also suggest a good take-up. Between 1st January and 22nd February, for example, the podcast site had 1766 unique visitors. Of these, approximately 60% had come from the school’s website. (APPENDIX 10)
It is foolhardy, of course, to equate quantity of use of a resource with improvements in learning and teaching, but S3 pupils do seem to confirm such improvements in their responses to the S3 survey when asked about the use of the website, with the vast majority of them agreeing that it had improved their learning.
Interactive whiteboards featured largely as a part of the investment in ICT and it was clear that their use, at some level, was widespread across the school, with little more than 7% of pupils responding that their teachers never used whiteboards. In contrast to this, over 82% of pupils stated that staff used whiteboards either often (31.71%) or very often (51.22%).
There is also some evidence to suggest that interactive whiteboard have had an impact on learning and teaching. For example, in the first staff survey most respondents (26 out of 39) suggested that use of the interactive whiteboards had increased motivation in pupils. A significant majority of staff also pointed to better/quicker understanding and better concentration as pupil outcomes if interactive boards. These finding also chime with the interview responses of S3 pupils (APPENDIX 11) who pointed to the interactive nature of board use as being something that was likely to improve their motivation to work. This, they said, was far better that classes in which they were forced to sit in silence, as teachers taught.
However, both teachers and pupils pointed to training as an issue. In the pupils interviews, pupils pointed out the variety of experience they had with teachers using the interactive whiteboards where some ‘just used it like a blackboard’ whilst others used it in a much more sophisticated way. Several pupils interviewed stated that many teachers required additional training. (‘some teachers could do with more training’; many have a lot of problems.’) This training deficit is also apparent in the first staff ICT survey, where only 16 out of 39 staff responding stated that they required advanced training, compared to 23 who felt in need of basic or intermediate training. Furthermore, of the 35 staff who responded to the question regarding the level of training that they had already received, 28 stated that they had had either ‘no help or guidance’ or ‘basic level’ only.
3. Reflections on Interventions
3.1 Vocational Strand
The introduction of Skills for Work in third and fourth year has allowed us the opportunity to target pupils who are at risk of becoming disaffected and to allow them to learn in a different environment and in a different way. It is hoped that these pupils will also see the relevance to the world of work of their other subject studies, and that there will be an improvement in their attainment in school subjects as a result. Though it is difficult to prove a direct correlation, the schools performance in the key SQA performance measurement of ‘5@3 (five or more foundation passes) has improved in recent years and been amongst the strongest in our local authority. We believe that this is in part because we have been able to provide alternative curriculum choices to pupils who might otherwise have become disenchanted with school and left with very little to show in academic terms.
One of the most challenging objectives in a project with the scope of School of Ambition is in bringing about a fundamental shift in the school’s capacity for change. Such a growth in capacity hinges on the ability, where necessary, to change outlooks and values through engaging the hearts and minds of staff. In short, staff need to feel such change is right for us a school community, in that it enhances our ability to deliver a fuller education to more pupils.
There is much evidence of a growing acceptance among staff that the inclusion of vocational courses within the curriculum broadens the learning and teaching experiences for our pupils. For example, some departments are beginning to ask if there are opportunities for them to offer a vocational dimension in their subject. As well as the PE Department’s plan to introduce a Skills for Work course in Leisure Services in conjunction with the on-site Recreation Centre, the Business Studies Department has expressed interest in finding out more about the Skills for Work course in Financial Services as an extension to the courses which they currently offer. Perhaps more surprisingly, there is also a planned collaboration between the traditionally less vocationally-orientated subjects of English and Music in pursuit of a new SQA course in Practical Theatre Skills.
On reflection, however, it could perhaps be argued that we have still not focused sufficiently on the communication and explanation to all staff of the desired outcomes of the introduction of vocational courses. Indeed, there may still be an unhelpful perception amongst a minority that this aspect is purely a ‘bolt-on’ product of the School of Ambition project, rather than something that we should and would be doing anyway. Such staff still perhaps perceive vocational learning as something peripheral to the core business of the school. However, it is perhaps not surprising that all the narrow perceptions of the role of a school ingrained over many decades are not so easily shaken off in a few years.
In this sense, the project could only hope to be a sort of attitudinal pump-priming for what will be a very long cultural revolution. If we are truly to change perceptions of what a school does we must embark on a steady widening of the range of curriculum choices available to our young people. If this is to be achieved, there is a need to accept that education will increasingly become a partnership between teachers, college staff and employers. As Bowring-Carr in Davies et al (2005) suggests, as another aspect which is required to begin deep learning, all the people in the learning organisation are relaxed in each others’ company, open to new ideas, supportive of each other and accepting of an equality of regard. This project has seen college staff coming into school for the first time to deliver courses which are in direct competition with subject departments.
The school has developed good working relationships with a number of colleges in the delivery of vocational education. One example of this is Oatridge Agricultural College, where our SPA pupils experience a two-day residential induction course during which they are exposed to experiential learning in a college environment for the first time. Health and safety training is given along with first aid and some skills in animal handling and tractor driving. Employers value this induction as pupils come to them having had some initial training. The pupils also report it as being a very worthwhile experience and a valuable introduction to the course.
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ICT Strand
It is perhaps the greatest single mistake in educational development, as in any area, to believe that financial resource will in and of itself be an engine of change. The purchase of materials and hardware in particular is not in itself bound to bring about any change, let alone change of a transformational nature. And yet, it is clear that financial input can play its part in change, and indeed it was clearly this belief that underpinned the Government’s national plan of supporting Schools of Ambition with substantial funding.
After recovering from the initial shock of realising that we were to come into a considerable windfall over a three year period, we turned our minds to the question of how this resource might best be deployed. The first big choice was - in simple terms - between spending money on people or things. In the case of the vocational strand, we made a fairly even division in these terms by funding a project manager to lead the vocational development (as well as allowing the Principal Teacher of Home Economics time to lead on the hospitality aspect) and balanced this with major investments in vehicles to support the Land-based developments and the building of our training kitchen and restaurant. However, for the ICT strand, funding was almost exclusively deployed to allow the purchase of hardware and software. Although, on reflection, we might have created a little more balance in how spent our funding, there was an underlying logic to this which was essentially to do with structures.
When we looked at the ‘what’ of learning we were venturing out into a development landscape without a pre-existing infrastructure which was very much to do with the historical background of how comprehensive schools had developed over the years. In the case of vocational studies, such as Land-based curriculum, there were simply not the structures, either in terms of organisation or staffing to develop or sustain such curriculum change. It was for this reason that we felt the need to deploy staffing to this area to allow someone to lead in way that created sustainable structures for the advancement of this agenda.
The situation regarding the ‘how’ of learning was very different for in this strand we sought only to look at the means by which a pre-existing curriculum was imparted. We therefore had all of the structures that had developed over many years to support the teaching of these curriculum areas, most notably subject departments and subject principal teachers. We also found ourselves on the crest of a technological wave that was inexorably sweeping through schools and in this sense the School of Ambition project allowed us simply to pursue an agenda with more haste and enthusiasm than might otherwise have been possible.
It is telling that the one area of ICT development that did not take off - the virtual classroom - was the one that could not so easily be hung on pre-existing departmental structures. On reflection, this was also the development that might have proved to have been most truly transformational. Part of the problem, also, with this ambition was that we lacked a lucid conception of exactly what it would mean in real terms. It may be that the concept was simply at too early a stage of development itself for a school like our own to have tried to progress it. Alternatively, perhaps it was our failure to spend money on professional expertise which led to our initial failure to achieve a meaningful conception of how this might work in practice, and so led to us being unable to move forward with it.
In retrospect, we may also put down the way in which we eventually chose to disburse ICT funding to a similar lack of ability, at a management level, to conceptualise in whole school terms how we might use ICT to transform the school. Our choice to ask departments to bid for ICT funding with ‘good ideas’ could, on one level, be considered an abdication of management responsibility, but a more generous interpretation might see this as being about widening ownership of the whole School of Ambition project in as much as we asked departments to define for themselves what transformation, in terms of the ‘how’ of learning, might look like. In this sense, we operated on a microcosmic level in a way similar to the government in its initial invitation to schools to define for themselves what would be ‘transformational’.
As will is evident from the bidding forms, however, departments were asked to bid for funding in a broad context of doing things innovatively in a way which was in keeping with the guiding principles of the national programme.
4. Sustaining the Change
4.1 Vocational Strand
Throughout this project we have been aware that any changes must be sustainable beyond the funding of the School of Ambition project. This has led us to make capital investments, such as our two four wheel drive vehicles, so that transport of pupils for Land-based courses can be ensured in future years. We have also invested in training staff as assessors so that in future years there is not the need to buy in assessors from colleges for the vocational courses. There has also been our substantial investment in the training kitchen and restaurant to allow us the facilities required to develop our Hospitality agenda.
We now have courses being delivered by employers and Perth College at no cost to the school, and are planning further courses with the college. In the course of the current session we are developing a Skills for Work course in Uniformed Services for third and fourth year pupils, as well as a course at Intermediate 2 level for fifth and sixth year pupils in Alternative Energy. These courses will be run as a partnership between college staff and staff in departments with no additional staffing costs to the school.
We have ensured that all of the vocational courses introduced and being planned can be delivered within our present staffing so that there is no additional staffing cost. Additionally, we draw upon college staff and local employers, at no cost to the school, for both delivery and assessment of these courses. Such an approach allows viability despite the small numbers which are a prerequisite for the delivery of these very practical and experiential types of courses.
The replacement of our vehicles, however, is likely to become an issue some time in the future and we shall need to think of an innovative way of funding their eventual replacements. However, we have undertaken to perform a rigorous maintenance schedule for these vehicles which should guarantee considerable longevity.
4.2 ICT Strand
Sustainability is a major issue for any develops, such as ours in ICT, which have been founded on a substantial injection of funding. However, the sustainability issue that exists here is more a financial one that one of practice or culture, as almost all developments that took place as a result of School of Ambition funding are already very much ingrained in practice, and there seems little likelihood that teachers will abandon the changes based on technology that have been wrought in our classrooms.
Part of the reason for this was that these developments were ‘bottom up’ in as much as teachers were asked what it was that they wanted to allow them to develop their teaching. These were not, therefore, the sort of developments that required the on-going fuel of funding, or - more importantly - the on-going pressure of a development leader who planned for, evaluated and monitored staff progress. In such cases, the withdrawal of a funding stream and individual leadership can often lead to the inevitable collapse of well-meaning developments.
Additional to this was the fact that these developments, to a large extent, simply reflected the way the educational wind was blowing. We have earlier in this report spoken of a cultural revolution and we may once again draw upon Chinese history for another metaphor for change, in this case: ‘the great leap forward’.
This is to suggest that School of Ambition was used a vehicle to give the school a significant thrust in a direction in which it was already, like other schools, likely to move. The metaphor is also useful in that it provides the sense of an energising and morale-boosting development designed to create pride in the staff in the relative technological advantage that we were to gain - without, we hope, any of the more negative historical connotations.
5. Looking at the ‘why’ of learning – a brief commentary
Whilst recognising that qualifications, either traditionally academic or vocational in nature are valuable, we were also committed to developing a sense of values in our young people, some of which - such as ‘perseverance’ - would have a direct impact on their performance as employees, others of which - such as ‘service’ - would impact more broadly on their ability to contribute to society as a whole.
Over time we sought to distill the values that we felt important into a small and memorable group. What resulted was our ASPIRE acronym, which stood for the following value set:
Ambition
Service
Perseverance
Integrity
Respect
Excellence
Whilst ‘ambition’, ‘perseverance’ and ‘excellence’ chimed well with the attainment agenda, the values of ‘service’, ‘integrity’ and ‘respect’ were consciously aimed at developing our young people’s sense of ethics.
It is also worth noting that the idea of creating a value set had in part being influenced by two of the senior managers’ involvement in the Columba 1400 leadership programme, which had been funded centrally by School of Ambition.
As this whole school strand relating to values education was the latest to be develop, it is also therefore the most difficult to evaluate. Essentially, this aspect was about raising staff and pupil awareness about the importance of the larger canvas of education.
It is still too early to evaluate the impact of this particular strand, but there is some evidence to suggest that the school is undergoing a reorientation in terms of the larger perception of what we are about. Last session and this session, assemblies have been themed around the ASPIRE value set, and increasingly these assemblies are being led by pupils. For example, pupils from the charities group presented an assembly for all year groups on the theme of ‘service’ in the run-up the Children in Need fundraising event, in which they provided some background to the charities that would be supported by pupil contributions. Ex-pupils also presented under the same heading on a trip they had undertaken to Malawi to assist in the building of a school that we had twinned with. This trip had arisen from these pupils’ attendance at a ‘global citizenship’ conference which has also been funded out of the School of Ambition fund.
In fact, as more pupils and staff have seen the potential for presentations by pupils on issues related to our value set, we have had to put on additional assemblies to meet the demand. One such set of assemblies was to mark ‘Holocaust Memorial Day’ in January 2009, when pupils from S2 History classes addressed all pupils over the course of a week on the subject on the Holocaust. These assemblies were themed as ‘respect’.
The decision to schedule more assemblies generally this session arose from the recognition that they were one of the few times when as leaders we could work on the agenda of whole school values and during which we could reinforce the concept of a whole school community with shared values. As the role of the assembly hall has developed significantly as the crucible for such value-building, we decided to use School of Ambition funding to undertake an upgrade of the with a view to making it a more comfortable and pleasant environment. As well as funding the purchase of a high quality projector and large screen for pupil presentations, we also made smaller changes, such as moving our war memorial boards to more prominent positions in the hall, which also had a lasting impact. This upgrade tied in with a technical upgrade that we undertook of our lighting and sound system in preparation of the development of a cross-curricular course in Practical Theatre Skills taught jointly by Music and English.
6. Conclusions
6.1 Change takes time!
It seems like a long time since our school was fortunate enough to achieve School of Ambition status, but in the life of a school it is a mere heartbeat. Lasting change in any institution of our size takes time to come about and even longer to sustain. Sometimes this is for reasons which might be described as ‘technical’, such as the enormous difficulty we experiencing creating the initial momentum to get the training kitchen development started. This is evidenced by the fact that it appeared in our plan originally in session 04/05, but will only be completed by more than half way through session 08/09, and indeed not in the timetable until session 09/10. It is ironic, then, that what was to be a flagship development has not yet even come on stream at the time of project evaluation.
As well as the technical impediments to change, there are also those that might be described as cultural. In looking at the ‘what’ of learning, we sought to challenge some deeply held perceptions about what a school should be. For example, we challenged the issue of where education should take place by moving towards courses where pupils left the school premises to undertake their studies. We challenged, too, the idea of what a school timetable should look like by creating large blocks of time to allow our land-based pupils time to work outside the school. Of most lasting significance, perhaps, was the fact that we challenged the very idea that there is clear water between schools and colleges in that we had pupils being taught within both institutions and by both lecturers and teachers.
All of these challenges were about asking questions based on how best to meet pupils needs. In so doing we sought to have structures and opportunities be defined by the pupils’ needs, rather than simply have the pupils fit around the structures and opportunities as they had previously existed.
As we have suggested earlier, what also lies at the heart of such change is a challenge to the prejudices of staff, parents and pupils themselves. And such change does not come quickly. .However, sometimes change is about recognising that we are in for the long haul.
6.2 Nothing stays the same
Perhaps the most important conclusion to draw from our experience of the School of Ambition project is that change evolves organically as priorities -sometimes subtly - shift. This has been most apparent in terms of the ICT development where the end result looked very different to the initial conception. Such movement is inevitable and perhaps even healthy as it allows schools to adjust course according to opportunities and challenges as they arise. To their credit, the School of Ambition support staff at government level have recognised this from the outset and encouraged schools such as ours to allow for such ‘organic’ development and growth in our plans. Still, the exercise of creating a transformational plan did provide a powerful discipline for the school and provided us with an initial compass setting against which we could chart changes in direction.
6.3 The challenge of structures
It is instructive to consider the structures that exist in typical secondary schools, such as ours, and adopt an approach of ‘reverse engineering’ to track back to the evolving educational principles they were designed to serve. There are strengths to such structures, but it is important to recognise that if a school intends to move in a direction that - to some extent, at least - sets out to challenge embedded guiding principles, they may also have to consider overhauling the structures designed to underpin them. One example of this in the case of our school has been our decision to challenge that ‘what’ of learning in terms of our move towards alternative vocational models which take learning and teaching outwith the boundaries of the school buildings. Such changes are in impeded by the period allocation of typical schools and, thus, we have had to make changes by creating blocks of time which allow pupils to visit learning sites such as forestry commission land or local farms. Without such challenges to structures, we are in danger of remaining forever their slaves. It is vital, therefore, to begin with the learning outcomes we want to achieve and thereafter to bend structures - or create new structures - to support these, rather than allowing our ambitions to be forever limited by the structures that we find.
Another example of structures which can at once promote learning and delimit it is that of the subject department. In the case of our hospitality developments, we were able to use the pre-existing structures of the Home Economics Department – the staff, the Principal Teacher, the development planning and quality assurance procedures, the budget code and so on – to promote this change. However, in the case of the land-based development, there was no
pre-existing structure which could act as a vehicle for its promotion and sustainability. This was why it was vital to create the post of ‘project manager ‘ to allow for someone to lead this development. Our challenge in the future will be to sustain this structural change and, indeed, to develop it to provide all of the support mechanisms that a subject department would typically have.
This point is also clear in terms of our ICT developments where those that were driven by existing department structures thrived, and those – such as the virtual classroom – without such structural supports, withered on the vine.
In a broader sense, there are lessons for the national Curriculum for Excellence development here and we must ask to what extent it is naïve to expect schools to start doing something quite radically different without making changes to the underlying structures which have evolved over time to promote more of the same.
7. Bibliography
Bowring-Carr, C. in Davies. B, et al (2005) School Leadership in the 21st
Century, 2nd ed.,Abingdon: Routledge Falmer
Hopkins et al in Preedy, M.; Glatter, R. and Wise, C. (2003)
Strategic Leadership and Educational Improvement, London:
Paul Chapman Publishing.
SEED (2004a) Ambitious, Excellent Schools: our agenda for action. Edinburgh, Scottish Executive.
SEED (2004b) Determined to succeed: enterprise in education. Scottish Executive Response. Scottish Executive [Online]. Available at: http://www.scottishexecutive.gov.uk/library5/education/dtsr.pdf
SEED (2004c) A Curriculum for Excellence. The Curriculum Review Group. Retrieved on 28 July 2008 from http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2004/11/20178/45862
SEED (2004d) A Curriculum for Excellence. Ministerial Response. Retrieved on 28 July 2008 from http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Resource/Doc/26800/0023691.pdf
SEED (2006) Ambitious, Excellent Schools: progress report. Edinburgh, Scottish Executive.
SEED (2006) The NEET Strategy, More Choices, More Chances is an action plan to reduce the proportion of young people not in education employment or training in Scotland. June 13, 2006. [Online]. Available at: http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2006/06/13100205/0
SEED (2006) A Curriculum for Excellence: Progress and Proposals. A paper from the Curriculum Review Programme Board. Edinburgh, Scottish Executive.
Stoll, L. and Fink, D. in Preedy, M., Glatter, R. and Wise, C. (2003)
Strategic Leadership and Educational Improvement, London:
Paul Chapman Publishing
8. Appendices
Transformational Plan
ICT Bidding Form
Telephone interviews parents - vocational
Pupil interviews – vocational
Staff ICT survey 1
Staff ICT survey 2
Pupil ICT survey
Sample Dept ICT evaluation
Whole staff survey comparison
Research tool
Full spreadsheet analysis
LMS use
Podcasting
S3 pupil interviews
