Agenda item

(This item is to follow as the unvalidated results were not available at the time of despatching the papers)

(a)               SATs and Key Stage 1 and 2 results

(b)               GCSE National Challenge and A levels

(c)               OFSTED Inspections

(Report by Ms R Turner, Managing Director, Children, Families & Education Directorate, Mrs M Haeusler, Director of Learning and Mrs S Hohler, Cabinet Member for Children, Families & Education)

(1)         The Committee considered a report that provided a summary of the Kent Early Years Foundation Stage Assessments, KS1 and 2 SATs, GCSE and A level results for 2010 with the understanding that they were provisional results that may change slightly following formal DfE validation in October 2010. 

(2)         The Chairman agreed to take this issue one assessment stage at a time.

Foundation Stage

(3)         Mrs Haeusler introduced the report advising the Committee that the report was based on provisional unvalidated data results, there were no schools named as there were still a number of schools that were undergoing an appeal on their SATs results at Key Stage 2. Foundation results were improving with a reduction in the achievement gap by 2.5% to 28% and 60% of the children at that level were achieving the expected level.

(4)         In response to a question by Mr Jarvis, Mrs Haeusler explained that the national figures were not available for Foundation Stage at present.  There were a number of reasons why children had not reached the expected level of education.  She advised that development did not start at reception class, it was about looking at settings and what we were doing in Children’s Centres, helping with parenting skills and parents and carers to understand the importance of speaking, listening and talking to children and reading to them.

(5)         In response to a question by Mrs Rook, Mrs Haeusler stressed that under the restructuring it was part of the strategy to have early intervention prevention and to be proactive. All of the teaching and learning advisors had been realigned focusing on early years.

(6)         The Chairman referred to page 38 paragraph 1 (3) that referred to an increase of 250 more children in the cohort than in 2009 a figure that had been increasing for 4 years and suggested that figures on this trend could be forwarded to Members outside the meeting.

Key Stage 1

(7)         Mrs Haeusler said that she had focused on the attainment of boys at Key Stage 1 within the report as nationally boys reading and writing often was behind the expected level at this stage. Kent had been particularly focused on this and there had been improvement for boys on their reading and writing.

(8)         Mrs Haeusler explained that Key Stage 1 was a crucial time for providing early support where this was needed.  She suggested that it may be one of the reasons that those children were not being identified early enough which relates to the concerns of attainment at Key Stage 2.

(9)         She also highlighted the attainment of the gifted and talented children at Level 3 in reading, writing and mathematics, which was above the national average.

(10)    The Priority for Action was the move to Key Stage 1 from foundation stage and looking at the interventions that were in place in schools, which met those children’s needs.

(11)    In response to a question by Mr Critchley, Mrs Haeusler explained that individual tracking for every child was key to the outcomes. The School Improvement Team was looking at every school’s tracking programme and schools ought to be able to identify vulnerable learners from that tracking and be able to identify whether that child was on tack to achieve level 4 in year 6.  They should be able to do this at Key Stage 2.  The Chairman asked whether Mrs Haeusler could submit regular information to Members who wished to monitor the results for children at Key Stage 1 and 2 as they felt that they were unable to set priorities unless they knew what was happening.  Mrs Haeusler agreed to submit a report to the POSC on pupil tracking.

(12)    In response to a question by Mr Cubitt, Mrs Haeusler advised that the report was not meant to be an analysis but a report on the SATs and the national testing on provisional results supplied by the DFE.  Officers were now undertaking analysis looking on a school to school level to see if there were any drops in attainment and the causes and which children had this affected and if a school had improved, looking at what had made the difference in that result.  Mrs Haeusler advised that this information would form part of the Standards report.  Mrs Todd felt that this lead to a wider debate on succession planning, how we recruit, retain, ensuring that they were the right quality.

Key Stage 2

(13)    Mrs Haeusler advised that there were provisional averages for Key Stage 2.  Kent improved by 2% in Key Stage 2 2010 but was still 4% below the national average and that there seemed to be a long tradition since 2002.  The focus was to be why this was happening in Key Stage 2.

(14)    The ‘below floor’ target schools, was explained as schools with English and Mathematics combined, 55% of the children reaching a level 4.  There was a reduction in the below floor target schools with a concerted effort in looking at the 78 schools that were below floor target by looking at why they were below floor target and looking at how every individual child was travelling towards level 4.  This had lead to improvement but then other schools went below floor target. Intense support for those schools would continue.  Mrs Haeusler confirmed that 24 schools, 6%, boycotted the SATs in Kent.

(15)    In response to a question by Mrs Rook, Mrs Haeusler explained that the coalition government had put a halt on the national curriculum and was saying that the schools could develop their own curriculum.  She anticipated that schools would need support with that undertaking. There was a move in the primary schools to look at how language moved through all of the curriculum areas especially reading and writing.

(16)    In response to a question by Mr Vye, Mrs Haeusler felt that sustainability should be embedded into the schools and a need for a culture to strive for excellence which was a leadership role.  She advised that headteachers made visits to the classrooms and in doing so were aware of the teachers that needed support or where intervention was needed, it was not about more visits to the classrooms but a whole school ethos to continually raise the standards.

(17)    Mrs Whittle said that headteachers and teachers were put under a lot of stress with Ofsted inspections but it was worth exploring unannounced inspections so long as they were carried out in a constructive way.  She questioned who would carry out the inspections suggesting, the local authority SIP or one district looking at another district as a critical friend on how teaching and learning could be improved at a particular school. Mrs Haeusler advised that the Schools Improvement Partners along side the headteachers were already holding joint lesson observations followed by talking through what they had observed.  She felt that this was a powerful development tool for the headteacher.

(18)    In response to a question by Mr Wickam, Mrs Whittle explained that it was easier for a headteacher to teach in a larger school, as that school was likely to have more administration support,  than a headteacher in a small school.

GCSEs

(19)    Mrs Haeusler advised that the Kent GCSE results overall improved on 2009 performance by 5.3% bringing the 5+ A*-C results to 78% but felt that there was still a need to keep pushing for improvement.  She stated that the focus and energy in the quality of teaching was second to none and that pupils were being tracked and that where intervention was in place made the difference in the challenged schools.  The issue would be in maintaining the momentum for the secondary schools.

(20)    The Chairman suggested that work could be carried out on the standards that were being achieved on size and critical mass and the way that the local authority could federate 6 forms etc.  The local authority could then give guidance on whether a school should have a 6^th form or not.

A Levels

(21)    In response to questions by Mrs Rook, Mrs Haeusler advised that work was being undertaken on the BTEC results.  She then spoke on the impact of age, suggesting that the issue for A levels was the curriculum.  The subjects had to attract young people to stay on at school or in education and had meaning for whatever pathway they wanted to take. One of the priorities was to look at the curriculum for 14 -19 year olds.

(22)    RESOLVED that:

(a) the responses to questions and comments by Members be noted;

(b) a report be submitted to a future meeting on pupil tracking; and

(c) the unvalidated results of the recent public examinations be noted.