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Greensward College


		11-16 schools

		6th form schools

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The college

Greensward College is an 11–19 mixed comprehensive serving the village of Hockley and some surrounding southeast Essex communities. In 2005 the college had over 1,500 students. It is a well-established technology college and has been actively involved in a number of new developments that include a five-term year and a three-period day. As a Leading Edge school, it provides a significant amount of advice and support to other schools. It has network links in the local area to disseminate good practice, a regional training centre for information and communication technology (ICT), network management training and an initial teacher training centre.

Vocational background

The college has tried to develop the curriculum to take account of the nature of its intake, of broadly average attainment. However, attempts to introduce vocational subjects have been variable in their success. At various stages, the college has offered intermediate GNVQs in ICT and leisure and tourism. Successive reviews of the curriculum have seen these subjects replaced by GCSEs in vocational subjects.
In September 2001, the college introduced intermediate GNVQ in science for all of its year 10 students as a replacement for the double award GCSE. The first cohort of 239 students completed the GNVQ in August 2003, and 6.8 per cent gained a distinction, 30.9 per cent a merit, 60.2 per cent a pass and only 2.1 per cent were not graded. The pass rate confirmed what the college had thought about the use of GNVQ as a vehicle to deliver the science curriculum, ie that the vocational nature of the qualification had:

increased the motivation of all students, particularly the lower-ability boys
improved already high attendance rates
decreased already low incidences of poor behaviour to virtually none.

The college’s own survey of the satisfaction rating of parents and students showed that 78 per cent of parents thought that the science faculty was ‘good’ or ‘very good’ compared to the previous year’s figure of 69 per cent. This was backed up by the Ofsted inspection findings in February 2004, which stated that the provision of science at the college was ‘very good’. Therefore, the withdrawal of intermediate GNVQ in science from 2007 caused some dismay within the science faculty at the college.

The choice of alternative provision

The science department identified the major factors that would influence its choice of alternative provision, namely:

the curriculum content of replacement qualifications
the mode of assessment
the ability profile of the school population
the resources needed to teach the replacement course
the qualifications and experience of its staff.

To assist the decision-making process, the director of science formed a subgroup of the science faculty, comprising the heads of chemistry, physics and biology, the key stage 4 coordinator and the faculty’s assessment coordinator. They reported through the director of faculty to the vice-principal (curriculum). Based on the current curriculum time for science of 17 per cent in year 10 and 20 per cent in year 11, the group decided that the science faculty would offer AQA GCSE in science double award (coordinated), AQA GCSE in science double award (applied) and Edexcel BTEC First Diploma in applied science.
The college feels that the new courses retained some of the best elements of the intermediate GNVQ in science, particularly the content of the applied GCSE. However, the reason for offering vocational subjects, namely the appropriateness of the mode of assessment, has been largely lost in all except the BTEC First Diploma in applied science.
An action plan was put in place to introduce the alternatives from September 2006, which is also when the new statutory programme of study comes into effect. There was detailed discussion regarding which students should study which provision. The college has extremely rich data on students’ abilities, with details of their cognitive activities test (CAT) and national curriculum test scores together with internal data.
It was anticipated that considerable staff training would be needed as no one within the department had any experience of teaching or assessing the qualification.
The science faculty planned to concentrate on planning schemes of work for the new courses in the summer term. Changes would be communicated to students, staff, parents, governors and employers through the usual channels, for example assemblies and meetings.

Rejection of other possible provision

Choosing such a variety of awards at key stage 4 meant that not many courses were rejected. The GCSE in modular science was not chosen because the faculty’s previous experience had been that students did not appear to take the modular examination seriously. Faculty also felt that there was a great deal of administrative work to complete. The single award GCSE was not a viable option because the college did not want to change the amount of time allocated to science and wanted students to attain a double award. Finally, the separate awards in chemistry, physics and biology were rejected because there is not sufficient time to accommodate teaching within the time allocated to science and using an additional option block conflicts with the college’s commitment to a broad and balanced curriculum.
How the alternative provision supports the college’s goals
The college’s stated goal is ‘To make our best better’. The flexible provision for science should enable the students to choose a science course that is relevant and suited to their needs.

Position at June 2005

The science department, early on in the academic year, formed a subgroup comprised of key staff within the department. Their brief was to look at the alternative paths to accreditation for the key stage 4 science course, having due regard for the cohorts of students that would be entering key stage 4 in the next three years. The college had extensive information about the potential of the students in particular year groups, such as CATs and key stage 2 data. After extensive research using mainly examination boards’ websites, the subgroup recommended to the rest of the science department and to the senior leadership team the following alternative arrangements:

AQA GCSE science double award (coordinated) (3462)
AQA GCSE science double award (applied) (3861)
Edexcel BTEC First Diploma in applied science (4485).

The science faculty had experience of offering both GNVQ and GCSE science and recognised that certain modes of assessment suit certain types of students. They concluded that students with higher CAT scores are better at sitting examinations, whereas middle- and lower-ability students are more suited to the GNVQ type of assessment of portfolio building, in which achievement followed by detailed feedback raises their self-esteem. Students would be given a free choice, although many would be counselled into choosing the one best suited to their profile.
Students studying the GCSE in coordinated science should be able to cope with the content of the course, which requires learning information and recalling and applying it under examination conditions. Those studying the GCSE in applied science should be motivated by the more vocationally relevant content of the course, and the large coursework element should help them to attain a higher grade than if they had studied the coordinated GCSE.
Those studying the BTEC First Diploma in applied science are likely to be the weakest of the ability range, less able to cope with some of the content of the GCSE science courses (applied or coordinated) and should respond positively to the more practical nature of the BTEC course.
These recommendations will be implemented in 2007, following the withdrawal of Edexcel GNVQ science with courses starting in September 2006.The implementation of the GCSE double award and the applied GCSE requires little change to the current resources. Most science staff are already experienced at teaching GCSE so very little additional training is required.

In contrast, the implementation of the BTEC applied science will require a fundamental change in resourcing, timetabling and teaching. The resources are in addition to those that the department already had for GNVQ as there is much specialist equipment needed for the applied BTEC. It will require the current science technicians to become instructors. Therefore there will be a need for more technicians and training for the technicians in student management and other relevant issues. One other area that needs attention is the expense of vocational qualifications. The college’s change to a more vocational curriculum (ironically the reverse of what is happening in science) has seen an increase in its examination fees from £100,000 in 2002 to £150,000 this year.

Communicating the changes

The science department had not, in 2005, communicated the changes that will occur in 2007 simply because it was too early to do so. However, planning for the communication of the change was well under way.

A letter articulating the changes and the reasons for them was drafted.
This letter would draw parents’ attention to a page that was prepared for the college website with links to examination boards’ websites and other science-specific websites.
It was anticipated that assemblies would be held for all students in the first cohort to sit these exams. (This is the year 8 cohort of students in 2005.)
Governors would be informed via the Curriculum Committee.

The impact of the change process

The impact that GNVQ science had upon the college’s results was quite significant – 98 per cent of the first cohort obtained at least a pass at the GNVQ intermediate level. This is worth the equivalent of four GCSEs. This had the effect of improving the college’s five A*–C pass rate from 70 per cent to 88 per cent. However, the motivation for changing to the GNVQ was not to improve results, but simply to motivate the students in their science studies. This has happened by the implementation of the GNVQ and the college speculated that a return to a curriculum based predominantly on GCSEs would have a reverse effect. One surprise area of impact, although it should have been expected, was the effect on staff. Many were saddened by the withdrawal of GNVQs and did not want to return to the comparative ‘drudgery’ of the GCSE course.

While the science department decided to stick to its original plans to replace the GNVQ with GCSE double award, applied GCSE and BTEC applied science, the department, for the first time, thought about its provision at key stages 4 and 5 and introduced a vocational science course for key stage 5. Although the abolition of the GNVQ is a retrograde step, in the opinion of the science faculty, it has, nevertheless, focused the department’s thoughts about its provision at key stages 4 and 5.

Key lessons learnt from the managing of the change process

There are many lessons to be learnt from the withdrawal of the GNVQ science. Interviews with students encouraged the college to enhance the vocational mix. Indeed, in 2005/6, 96 per cent of students opted to study at least one additional vocational subject as well as the GNVQ. Student feedback on the most enjoyable aspects of their learning is now incorporated in the college’s monitoring process.

Also see

> Using alternatives to GNVQs