Shawlands Academy
Glasgow City Council
5 May 2009
This report tells you about the quality of education at the school.
We describe how young people benefit from learning there. We
explain how well they are doing and how good the school is at
helping them to learn. Then we look at the ways in which the
school does this. We describe how well the school works with
other groups in the community, including parents1 and services
which support young people. We also comment on how well staff
and young people work together and how they go about
improving the school.
Our report describes the ‘ethos’ of the school. By ‘ethos’ we
mean the relationships in the school, how well young people are
cared for and treated and how much is expected of them in all
aspects of school life. Finally, we comment on the school’s aims.
In particular, we focus on how well the aims help staff to deliver
high quality learning, and the impact of leadership on the school’s
success in achieving these aims.
If you would like to learn more about our inspection of the school,
please visit www.hmie.gov.uk. Here you can find analyses of
questionnaire returns and details about young people’s
examination performance. Where applicable, you will also be
able to find descriptions of good practice in the school and a
report on the learning community surrounding the school.
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Throughout this report, the term ‘parents’ should be taken to
include foster carers, residential care staff and carers who are
relatives or friends.
Contents
1. The school
2. Particular strengths of the school
3. Examples of good practice
4. How well do young people learn and achieve?
5. How well do staff work with others to support young people’s
learning?
6. Are staff and young people actively involved in improving their
school community?
7. Does the school have high expectations of all young people?
8. Does the school have a clear sense of direction?
9. What happens next?
1. The school
Shawlands Academy is a non-denominational school which
serves the south east of Glasgow including Newlands,
Shawlands, Strathbungo, Govanhill and the Gorbals. The roll
was 1232 when the inspection was carried out in February 2009.
Around half of the young people have English as an additional
language. A number of young people have only been in Scotland
for a short time. A number are also from transient families. This
impacts on attendance levels. Young people’s attendance was
below the national average in 2007/2008. The school has a
co-located Additional Support for Learning/English as Additional
Language (ASL/EAL) Secondary Support Service: the Bilingual
Support Unit. This is a city-wide provision for young people who
are new arrivals to the country with little or no English.
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2. Particular strengths of the school
•
The richness of cultural diversity in the school community.
•
The high-quality attainment and achievement.
•
The quality of the Secondary Support Service’s work in
supporting young people with EAL.
•
Young people’s understanding of global citizenship, equality,
sustainable education and environmental issues.
•
The promotion of health and wellbeing.
•
The headteacher’s vision and direction for the school.
3. Examples of good practice
•
International education.
•
Sustainable education.
4. How well do young people learn and achieve?
Learning and achievement
Most young people are determined to do well. They are
motivated, confident and friendly. Young people show respect for
each other and staff. Most feel safe, secure and well cared for.
Young people participate well and enthusiastically in discussions
and group activities, enjoy learning and think that the school is
making them more confident. In some lessons, they have very
good scope to become independent, active and engaged in
learning. This good practice needs to be extended. Young
people are not always sure how to improve their learning.
Teachers need to involve them more in setting targets and
reviewing their own learning.
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Young people are increasing their confidence and developing
their citizenship skills through participating in a wide range of
activities. These include international education projects which
increase their awareness of anti-racism, international cooperation,
human rights and environmental issues. They have very many
opportunities to take on leadership roles. They act as
ambassadors for the school on the many international visits which
take place. They have participated in a United Nations debate on
sustainable education, and an Inclusion and Diversity in
Education project in the European Parliament. Young people’s
team working, creative and personal skills are developing very
well in residential visits, enterprise tasks and a range of charitable
work, sports and arts activities. These and other activities also
develop their personal responsibility, confidence and health and
wellbeing. Young people’s successes are recognised through
awards including the UK Sustainable Schools Award and the
British Council’s Award for Excellence in International Education.
At S1/S2, reading and writing is improving with around half of
young people now achieving appropriate levels. The majority
achieve appropriate levels in mathematics. In other subjects, the
majority are making good progress in their classwork. The
school’s performance is variable at S3/S4. It performs very well at
S5/S6 in comparison to schools which serve young people with
similar needs and backgrounds. The small numbers of young
people who follow practical, skills-based programmes are making
good progress in the Duke of Edinburgh’s Awards and Princes
Trust XL. Young people with additional support needs are doing
well. Those who are still at the early stages of acquiring English
are making good progress in their social skills. Many young
people who receive support from the ASL/EAL Secondary Support
Service achieve very well across the curriculum as a result of this
support. The school has been very successful in helping high
numbers of young people go onto university, college, training and
employment.
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Curriculum and meeting learning needs
The school provides a very good range of courses and activities
which give young people choices and progression in many
aspects of their learning. The study of languages is given a
central place in their learning. Opportunities to develop skills in
enterprise, sustainable development, global citizenship and
employability are well developed. Courses promote academic
and more practical skills as appropriate to individuals’ needs. The
school is developing well its approaches to preparing young
people for life after school and the world of work. Staff have
developed courses to better meet the needs of young people
through extending the range of provision at Access 3 and
Intermediate 1 levels. Young people’s needs for quality physical
education are met very well in S1 to S4 but not at S5/S6.
Staff across the school know the young people and their learning
needs very well. Support for learning staff provide helpful
information about young people to enable teachers to meet their
learning needs. When teachers plan well, the tasks and activities
chosen are very well matched to learning needs, but this is not
consistent across the school. At times, particularly in S1/S2, tasks
do not challenge young people enough and do not build
effectively on their previous learning experiences. Increasingly,
the range of services from within and outwith the school works
well to support young people. The school should continue to
improve the range and types of support available for young
people.
The ASL/EAL Secondary Support Service enables young people
to learn English in a supportive environment. Staff are very
committed to the young people and provide them with very good
programmes of study and support to help develop their social and
academic language. Both the ASL/EAL Secondary Support
Service and the EAL staff assess the needs of young people well.
EAL staff should continue to ensure they help teachers across the
school to develop their skills in supporting bilingual learners.
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5. How well do staff work with others to support young
people’s learning?
The Parent Teacher Council supports the school very well.
Parents feel welcomed in the school and they think that progress
reports and parents’ evenings are informative. They are informed
about school events including through the informative website and
newsletters. A few parents would like communication to be better
and to get more information on their child’s progress in learning.
The school has a very good range of effective partnerships to
enhance young people’s learning, including a joint assessment
team. Young people in S4 successfully mentor their younger
peers to help them settle into school. The very strong links with
local businesses and employers have successfully focused on
employability and enterprise activities.
6. Are staff and young people actively involved in improving
their school community?
Staff are very committed to improving the life and work of the
school. Many support the extensive range of out-of-school
activities for young people. Teachers contribute well to working
groups and lead the development of important improvement
priorities. The pupil councils and the Eco Group are active in
making school improvements. They regularly discuss aspects of
the life of the school. The school is successfully developing its
approaches to self-evaluation. Senior managers visit classes to
observe learning and staff identify and share good practice. Staff
are developing their skills in analysing attainment information.
The school regularly gathers the views of staff, parents and young
people. Evidence gathered is used to set priorities for the
improvement plan. These arrangements have led to
improvements in learning and teaching and to the curriculum.
Staff have identified the need to develop further approaches to
track young people’s progress and achievements. Staff now need
to continue to improve their approaches to self-evaluation and
apply them consistently across the school.
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7. Does the school have high expectations of all young
people?
Relationships between adults and young people are positive. The
school is developing its approaches to support individuals who
need to improve their behaviour. The school has a commendable
range of activities which promote race equality and respect for
cultural diversity very well, including through a focus on
international education. Most staff have high expectations of
young people’s learning and behaviour and use praise well to
encourage them to succeed. Staff are actively taking steps to
improve young people’s attendance. The school has effective
procedures for dealing with complaints from parents and young
people. Staff understand and implement procedures to safeguard
young people’s health and wellbeing. Young people are very
positive about the wide range of opportunities the school offers to
promote a healthy lifestyle. They have appropriate opportunities
for religious observance. The building is not fully accessible to
those with restricted mobility.
8. Does the school have a clear sense of direction?
The headteacher has a clear vision for the school. She has
developed her vision and the values and aims for the school in
consultation with staff, young people and parents. She provides
very strong leadership and direction and has successfully secured
staffs’ shared commitment to school improvement. The school is
committed to further developing positive links with the community
and other partnerships to enhance its life and work. As a team,
the depute headteachers provide strong leadership across the
school. The principal teachers are developing their leadership for
learning and should continue to develop their role in improvement
through self-evaluation. The school has a strong capacity to
improve.
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9. What happens next?
As a result of the very good quality of education provided by the
school, we will make no further visits in connection with this
inspection. The education authority will inform parents about the
school’s progress as part of the authority’s arrangements for
reporting to parents on the quality of its schools. We have agreed
the following areas for improvement with the school and education
authority.
•
Continue to improve young people’s progress, achievements
and attendance through improving monitoring and tracking.
•
Continue to improve the consistency and quality of young
people’s learning experiences through improving
self-evaluation.
Quality indicators help schools, education authorities and
inspectors to judge what is good and what needs to be improved
in the work of the school. You can find these quality indicators in
the HMIE publication How good is our school?. Following the
inspection of each school, the Scottish Government gathers
evaluations of three important quality indicators to keep track of
how well all Scottish schools are doing. Here are the evaluations
for Shawlands Academy.
Improvements in performance
Learners’ experiences
Meeting learning needs
very good
good
good
We also evaluated the following aspects of the work of the school.
The curriculum
Improvement through self-evaluation
HM Inspector: Mary Hoey
very good
good
5 May 2009
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To find out more about inspections or get an electronic copy of this
report go to www.hmie.gov.uk. Please contact the Business
Management and Communications Team (BMCT) if you wish to
enquire about our arrangements for translated or other appropriate
versions.
If you wish to comment about any of our inspections, contact us
at HMIEenquiries@hmie.gsi.gov.uk or alternatively you should write in
the first instance to BMCT, HM Inspectorate of Education, Denholm
House, Almondvale Business Park, Almondvale Way,
Livingston EH54 6GA.
Our complaints procedure is available from our website
www.hmie.gov.uk or alternatively you can write to our Complaints
Manager, at the address above or by telephoning 01506 600259.
If you are not satisfied with the action we have taken at the end of our
complaints procedure, you can raise your complaint with the Scottish
Public Services Ombudsman (SPSO). The SPSO is fully independent
and has powers to investigate complaints about Government
departments and agencies. You should write to SPSO, Freepost
EH641, Edinburgh EH3 0BR. You can also telephone 0800 377 7330,
fax 0800 377 7331 or e-mail: ask@spso.org.uk. More information
about the Ombudsman’s office can be obtained from the website
at www.spso.org.uk.
This report uses the following word scale to make clear judgements
made by inspectors.
excellent
very good
good
satisfactory
weak
unsatisfactory
outstanding, sector leading
major strengths
important strengths with some areas for
improvement
strengths just outweigh weaknesses
important weaknesses
major weaknesses
Crown Copyright 2009
HM Inspectorate of Education.
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