The Cherwell OTSA SCITT Partnership

Key to judgements: Grade 1 is outstanding; grade 2 is good; grade 3 is requires improvement; grade 4 is inadequate

Janet Pearce, HMI, lead inspector

Wayne Stallard, OI, assistant lead inspector

Grade: 1
Key strengths of the primary and secondary partnership

1. The overall effectiveness of the Cherwell OTSA SCITT is outstanding. Leaders are completely dedicated to producing outstanding teachers for state schools locally and further afield. They are relentless in ensuring that the partnership continues to improve.
2. Leaders possess a deep and detailed understanding of the local and national education context. Trainees benefit hugely from the range of schools in the partnership and the contrasting placements they have. To be commended is the partnership’s contribution to schools that are in areas of social deprivation and those that require improvement. In these schools, trainees and NQTs have made a tangible impact on pupils’ progress in key areas. As one headteacher wisely commented, ‘I can’t take any risks with my pupils.’
3. The relationship between the SCITT and its partnership schools is excellent. For this partnership, meeting recruitment needs is not just about filling vacancies, but about ensuring that pupils benefit and make progress. Inspectors were deeply impressed with what school leaders told them about the impact trainees and NQTs were having on outcomes for pupils in secondary and primary schools.
4. The whole partnership ensures that trainees are superbly prepared for their careers in teaching. Trainees acquire a strong understanding of strategies and approaches that they draw upon in their posts as NQTs. They quickly establish themselves as respected professionals and role models for the pupils in their care. Current trainees spoke to inspectors about their pride in the teaching profession and how the training programme ‘enthralled’ them.
5. Trainees’ teaching is excellent, with most of them teaching at an outstanding level. In addition, the quality of trainees’ teaching has improved significantly since the partnership was set up.
6. Right from the start of the training programme, trainees are guided to focus on the impact their teaching makes on pupils’ progress and attainment. When trainees consider their own teaching, their reflections quickly turn to evaluating what their pupils learned, rather than just analysing the strengths and weaknesses in their own performance. Trainees and NQTs are committed to ensuring that pupils make progress.
7. Programme leaders have sensibly ensured that trainees following different routes to teaching have equal opportunities to excel. The programme begins with summer programmes specially devised to help trainees to learn quickly about the routines of school. Such programmes help to launch trainees successfully into the rigours of the course and they are less daunted by the challenge ahead.
8. Central training has also made an excellent contribution to trainees’ development as new teachers. Trainees value the opportunity to come together as a cohort and share their experiences. In their work as NQTs they frequently build on what they learned in subject-based and central training, particularly when challenged by new requirements in their employing schools.
9. Many trainees told inspectors about the powerful impact of training on their knowledge and understanding of pupils’ needs and vulnerabilities. In their first teaching posts, NQTs clearly demonstrate high expectations. They also respond sensitively and with compassion to the challenges some children experience outside of school. They deeply understand the responsibility and sense of duty that comes with being a teacher and are role models for children and young people.
10. Trainees and NQTs are skilled in assessing pupils’ progress and adapting to different school systems. Primary trainees’ teaching of systematic synthetic phonics is secure and they quickly acquire a strong understanding of progression through mathematics.
11. Trainees in the primary phase are very well prepared to teach across the broader curriculum, including physical education. Both secondary and primary trainees benefit from excellent specialist training to develop their subject knowledge.
12. Trainees benefit from inspiring training to help them support pupils who have special educational needs and/or disabilities. Challenging input about vulnerable pupils has moved trainees and helped to confirm exactly why they wanted to become teachers. It is heartening that some former trainees have taken up posts in special schools for highly vulnerable pupils and that they are doing extremely well as NQTs
13. Trainees’ confident planning to meet pupils’ needs struck inspectors during stages 1 and 2 and rightly impresses school leaders. NQTs enter their first appointment able to put together sequences of lessons with clear goals, focused on exactly what they want pupils to learn.
14. Trainees are adaptable and their willingness to learn is embedded by the time they take up their posts as NQTs. For example, inspectors met NQTs who are having to learn to teach in a new phase or teach a new subject. School leaders are extremely pleased with NQTs’ flexibility and the way they contribute to the school. These qualities say a lot about the way that the partnership has prepared trainees for the realities of working in education.
15. Trainees manage pupils’ behaviour and the routines of their classrooms extremely well. This is because of the meaningful training they have received about the reasons behind some pupils’ challenging behaviour. Trainees are able to use effective methods to prevent bullying. They are equally well equipped to minimise minor disruption, avoiding confrontation and maintaining a focus on learning.
16. Being selected to become a mentor in a partnership school is a significant achievement. Mentors are enthusiastic about their role, take their responsibility seriously and feel privileged to contribute to trainees’ development. School leaders really value the contribution mentors make to the school and the overall professional development of teaching and learning.
17. Mentor provide practical guidance and rightly focus on pupils’ progress. Through mentors’ patience and empathy, together with encouraging but candid feedback, trainees are able to reflect deeply upon learning and the craft of the classroom. One NQT commented, ‘I feel that my mentor really knew how I taught’.
18. The quality of mentoring has improved still further since stage 1 of the inspection. For example, leaders have insisted upon an even sharper focus on pupils’ progress when mentors give feedback and discuss lesson observations with trainees. Mentors and tutors set trainees precise and challenging targets. Even better progress for trainees is the result.
19. . The partnership’s direct focus on tackling trainees’ well-being has strengthened trainees’ resolve to manage their workload, keep physically healthy and remain emotionally strong. As a result, they come to their first posts with a range of strategies that they can use to maintain a reasonable balance in their work life. NQTs have found themselves surprisingly relieved that they can cope with the demands of their first term as a teacher.
20. Leaders meticulously scrutinise the quality of mentors’ feedback and the depth of trainees’ reflections. There are many layers of checks to ensure that every trainee gets a first-rate experience. Leaders have made sure that trainees’ eportfolio of progress against the teachers’ standards is streamlined and easy to access. As a result, leaders have a thorough overview of trainees’ progress at any given time and at the key assessment points. In this way, concerns raised can be quickly tackled and put right.
21. The partnership’s response to the findings at stage 1 of the inspection was typically prompt, intelligent and successful. During stage 2, it was already clear that there had been improvements to the way that the mentors at both placements communicate and work together to support trainees.
22. The partnership makes sure that trainees benefit from contrasting school placements. NQTs commented that they were expected to take more responsibility in their second placements and that this helped them to feel like a ‘normal teacher’. Nevertheless, leaders carefully considered the feedback they received from trainees and school leaders about arrangements for the second placement. In response, there have been some sensible changes to the length and focus of the second placement for both trainees, on both the salaried and non-salaried routes.
23. Leaders are not complacent about just recruiting trainees to meet local needs, but are determined to look outwards. They are wisely considering how they can ensure that trainees stretch and challenge pupils of all abilities and attainment, including the most able, across the full range of curriculum subjects.
24. Recently qualified teachers who trained with the partnership are wellestablished in their roles and rate their training extremely highly. They appreciate the ongoing contact they have with the partnership. Many are already taking up leadership roles in their schools. As the SCITT grows and develops, partnership leaders are rightly planning to encourage trainees to consider pathways to school leadership in the future.
25. Leaders have ensured that all trainees are completely up to date with their understanding of their duty to keep pupils safe. They provide compelling and memorable training sessions in order to help trainees learn about the ‘Prevent’ duty, child sexual exploitation and female genital mutilation. Leaders rightly emphasise to trainees the importance of safe and appropriate use of social media and how to assure that any internet profile is appropriate for a member of the teaching profession.
26. There are strict processes and procedures for recruiting and selecting potential trainees. There are many more applicants than places on the programme and interview days are demanding. In this way, the partnership ensures that it selects the right people for teaching.
27. Proof of the effectiveness of the partnership is the high completion rates, which have improved and are above national figures. For the small number of trainees who defer, there are highly complex and personal reasons for doing so. It is not because they are not doing well or because they are unsuitable.
28. Leaders rightly strengthened the partnership provision for primary trainees by appointing a specialist in the primary phase. Her leadership and programme design has had a significant impact on the current NQTs, whose completion rates and overall attainment have improved still further.
29. Employment rates for trainees are above national figures. A very small number of NQTs this year have chosen not to gain employment as teachers immediately, for personal or geographical reasons, or because they are able to complete a higher degree. All the former trainees are eminently suitable for careers in teaching and met the teachers’ standards at a high level.
30. There is little variation in outcomes for different phases and routes. As numbers are small, differences in outcomes can stand out, so leaders wisely track the progress of trainees at an individual level. When leaders identify any variation through their quality assurance and assessment processes, they are quick to intervene and provide extra practical and theoretical support to ensure that all trainees succeed.

The following schools were visited to observe trainees’ and NQTs’ teaching: