Education Scotland
Foghlam Alba
Learning community inspection
A report by Education Scotland
Inspection of the learning community
surrounding Greenwood Academy
North Ayrshire Council
29 November 2011
We inspect learning communities in order to let those who use services and the
local community know whether learning communities provide appropriate learning
opportunities and help learners in their development. We are also interested in
how community and voluntary groups are helped to contribute to making
communities better places to live and work. At the end of inspections, we agree
ways in which staff and volunteers can improve the quality of learning for young
people and adults and how the impact of community and voluntary groups can be
further developed.
At the beginning of the inspection, we ask managers and staff about the strengths
of the learning community, what needs to improve, and how they know. We use
the information they give us to help us plan what we are going to look at. During
the inspection, we join other activities which young people, adults and community
groups are involved in. We also gather the views of learners, active community
members and staff. We find their views very helpful and use them together with
the other information we have collected to arrive at our view of the quality of
provision locally.
This report tells you what we found during the inspection and the quality of
learning and development provided. We describe how well learners are doing
and how good the learning community is at helping them to learn. We comment
on how well staff, learners and groups work together and the difference they are
making in the learning community. Finally, we focus on how well the learning
community is led and how leaders help the learning community achieve its aims.
If you would like to learn more about our inspection of the learning community,
please visit www.educationscotland.gov.uk.
Contents
1.
The learning community
2.
Particular strengths of the learning community
3.
How well do participants learn and achieve?
4.
How well are communities developing and achieving?
5.
How effective are providers in improving the quality of services?
6.
Does the learning community have a clear sense of direction?
7.
What happens next?
1. The learning community
The Greenwood learning community covers the communities of parts of Irvine
New Town, Springside and Dreghorn. The population of the Greenwood learning
community is 21,642. The economic activity statistics show significant income
deprivation within the learning community, with the average person being 8%
worse off when gauged against the Scottish wide indicator. The percentage of the
working population aged 25-49 claiming key benefits is approximately 12% higher
than that for Scotland. The main employment is within the public sector.
2. Particular strengths of the learning community
•
Wide range of high quality learning opportunities for a diverse range of
community organisations, groups and individual learners provided by
Community and Cultural Services and partners.
•
Strong work to support minority ethnic groups.
•
Youth workers very effective engagement with excluded groups of young
people which impacts positively on personal and community safety.
•
Staff engagement with learners.
•
Strong and effective focus on meeting the needs of communities in Irvine,
Springside and Dreghorn.
3. How well do participants learn and achieve?
The learning community has an extensive range of very high quality learning
opportunities in youth work, adult learning and in community based organisations.
High numbers of learners from all ages participate actively across learning
provision and in community organisations. Almost all young people are achieving
positive destinations and entering further learning or gaining employment. Almost
all learning targets are achieved and exceeded. The numbers of learners who
gain accreditation is increasing. The notable numbers of young people who
successfully gain the Duke of Edinburgh Bronze award is above that of
comparator authorities. Highly effective work with excluded young people that
use sports, film, local radio and award programmes. This work provides young
people with a broad range of skills. Community organisations effectively deliver
an increasing range of services. Community and Culture staff and other
community planning partners regularly record performance information against
targets and compare their performance against the strategic objectives of the
Council. All Community and Culture staff use this information very effectively to
identify both their strengths and areas for improvement. Community and Cultural
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Services and partners are working effectively with schools to implement
Curriculum for Excellence and this work is increasing in range and depth. There
is scope for Community and Cultural Services and partners to share information
about prior learning with each other more effectively.
Young people
Almost all young people and particularly those who are significantly
disadvantaged benefit greatly from the very innovative work of Community and
Cultural Services and partner organisations, including local schools. As a result,
almost all young people, from an area of significant disadvantage, now progress
successfully to further learning opportunities and employment. Young people in
the Different Class! Programme work very effectively with Community
Development youth workers, teachers and other staff both inside and outside the
school classroom. As a result they make significant progress and gain new skills
in team working, achievement and personal and social development. Young
people in Bourtreehill are changing their previously negative behaviours,
developing teamwork, undertaking charitable activity, leading their own learning
through making radio programmes and undertaking an Environmental Analysis of
their community and re-engaging in school. Young people actively engage in very
well-judged health and community programmes that result in improved health and
personal safety. Young people move from being seen as a problem to being
involved in being part of the solution. Almost all young people engage in
volunteering activity as a result of their involvement with youth work programmes.
Some young people then go on to youth work apprenticeships. There is very
effective use of sports, film, health and awards programmes, including the Duke of
Edinburgh New Start initiative. As a result of these learning activities, which
include library homework clubs and after school support, young people are
significantly more confident and gain a broad range of new skills. Community and
Cultural Services, partner organisations such as Strathclyde Police, Strathclyde
Fire and Rescue, Active Schools and Community Wardens work in close
partnership to provide very effective support to young people.
Adults
Almost all of the learning opportunities are well adapted to learners’ needs in
literacy, numeracy and employment terms. Learning goals are agreed with all
learners. Targeted work is engaging adults with learning difficulties and physical
disabilities, unemployed people and people from minority ethnic groups. Learners
are very motivated and achieve well. Their learning has a positive impact on their
everyday lives. Learners have a wide range of progression opportunities to move
into employment or further learning. Some youth literacy learners have moved
onto college courses and into employment. Formal accreditation is in place for
English for speakers of other languages, computer skills and Gaelic learners.
Community and Culture partners work very well together to ensure effective use
of available resources to provide a wide range of inclusive and accessible learning
opportunities. Adult learning, libraries, Children’s Outreach Services, the Harbour
Arts Centre and primary schools work together to provide a range of very effective
and well-judged family learning, cultural, literacy and numeracy opportunities.
Good referral networks are in place. The Community and Culture partnership
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should continue to develop. There is scope to develop further information and
guidance on the range of learning on offer which would support learner
progression.
4. How well are communities developing and achieving?
A wide and diverse range of community organisations and groups deliver services
which directly benefit their communities. These groups are active, influential and
have motivated and skilled volunteers. Innovative community projects deliver
local services in food, local media and support to minority ethnic groups. These
include Eglinton Growers, Irvine Beat FM and AMECA. Participants in the
Targeted Older Peoples Activity programme gain important benefits in terms of
their confidence and health. There are positive and evolving partnerships working
with other local authority services including leisure and housing, health services
and voluntary agencies to deliver an increasing range of services. Minority ethnic
groups in AMECA work very effectively in partnership with Community and
Culture staff. As a result, they have opened their first premises to deliver learning
programmes. There is now a broad range of work with minority ethnic groups and
there are increasing numbers of learners from these previously excluded groups.
There are regular well-programmed celebrations and events in a variety of
community settings.
5. How effective are providers in improving the quality of services?
All Community and Culture staff regularly reflect upon their work to improve their
practice. Youth work and adult learning staff make very effective use of the views
of learners to support their planning. A number of learners are now involved in
evaluation and there are regular reports to stakeholders. Staff make innovative
use of GLOW in their work with adult learners. Youth work staff and staff in some
primary and secondary schools regularly engage to plan and work together with
youth groups meeting in the local community. Primary schools and libraries work
together very effectively to ensure that a wide range of materials and events link
to topics for young people and their families to encourage learning. Joint
self-evaluation with the staff from both primary and secondary schools on learning
programmes is developing. There is further room to improve the development of
shared and mutual improvement plans between Community and Culture and
schools.
6. Does the learning community have a clear sense of direction?
Community and Culture staff and partner agencies are very clear about their role
in delivering the key priorities of the Council. All Community and Culture staff and
partners are particularly effective in working with disadvantaged learners. All
Community and Culture staff and partner organisations continually demonstrate
high levels of effective leadership of learning across all their activities. They
demonstrate this in a variety of settings, including the secondary school and
neighbourhood regeneration activities that relate to community safety. There are
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particularly strong working relationships between staff from Community and
Culture and partners and local schools which lead to positive outcomes for
learners. As a result, partnership working is of very high quality, and in many
cases, is sector leading. All partners demonstrate high levels of openness in
sharing and learning from each other.
7. What happens next?
The inspection team was able to rely on the high quality self-evaluation provided
by the learning community. Community Learning and Development providers
have a very good understanding of their strengths and areas for improvement and
communities are achieving very well. As a result we have ended the inspection
process at this stage.
We have agreed the following areas for improvement with the local authority and
its partners.
•
Continue to develop and broaden the approaches of all partners to contribute
to the delivery of Curriculum for Excellence.
Quality indicators help CLD providers and inspectors to judge what is good and
what needs to be improved in the learning community. You can find these quality
indicators in the HMIE publication “How good is our community learning and
development? 2”.
Education Scotland evaluates five important quality indicators to help monitor the
quality of learning communities across Scotland. Here are the results for the
learning community surrounding Greenwood Academy.
Improvements in performance
Impact on young people
Impact on adults
Impact of capacity building on communities
Improving services
Managing Inspector: Philip Denning
29 November 2011
4
excellent
excellent
very good
very good
very good
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
If you would like to find out more about our inspections or get an electronic copy
of this report, please go to www.hmie.gov.uk.
Please contact us if you want to know how to get the report in a different format,
for example, in a translation, or if you wish to comment about any aspect of our
inspections. You can contact us at enquiries@educationscotland.gsi.gov.uk or
write to us at BMCT, Education Scotland, Denholm House, Almondvale Business
Park, Almondvale Way, Livingston EH54 6GA.
Text phone users can contact us on 01506 600 236. This is a service for deaf
users. Please do not use this number for voice calls as the line will not connect
you to a member of staff.
You can find our complaints procedure on our website or alternatively you can
contact www.educationscotland.gov.uk to our Complaints Manager, at the
address above or by telephoning 01506 600259.
Crown Copyright 2011
Education Scotland