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North Leamington School


		11-16 schools

		6th form schools

		Colleges

The school

North Leamington Community School and Arts College is situated in Royal Leamington Spa, Warwickshire. In 2005 there were 1,530 students on the roll, 300 of whom were based in the sixth form centre on a separate site.

Vocational background

The school offered GNVQs in the sixth form only, as part of a one-year, year 12 student apprenticeship offer that comprised:

an intermediate GNVQ or (from September 2005) the BTEC First Diploma in media
key skills qualifications in application of number, communication, information and communication technology (ICT), improving own learning and performance and working with others
a one-day-a-week work placement relevant to the GNVQ studied
the opportunity to gain NVQ units in the workplace
GCSE resit classes in mathematics and English
one-year courses in photography, Italian, art and human biology.

Successful completion of the vocational intermediate programme qualified students to progress to the advanced programme in the following year. A personal tutor, responsible for pastoral care and guidance, supported all learners on the student apprenticeship programme.

Position at September 2004

There were 19 students taking a one-year, year 12 course in one of three intermediate GNVQs in business, health and social care and leisure and tourism. The majority of these students intended to stay on at school and take A levels. While they had a free choice of A levels, GNVQ students tended to opt for vocational subjects as they found the teaching approach familiar and the ratio of examinations to coursework plays to their strengths.

Methodology

Planning for the withdrawal of GNVQs involved:

researching alternatives to GNVQs
analysing best fit with the needs of students and expertise of staff
deciding on timescales to suit the school’s needs.

Teachers from all three vocational areas (business, health and social care and leisure and tourism) were expected to attend training so they could obtain information from the awarding bodies about courses. Although there was no requirement to use the same awarding body for each area, it would help colleagues to support each other if they were to choose the same one.

Alternative provision

During the spring term 2005, North Leamington canvassed its local schools to try to devise a Warwickshire strategy for dealing with GNVQ withdrawal. All those approached were offering subjects that have their last assessment in summer 2007 and all were reluctant to make decisions until they felt they had to.
At North Leamington, the media department was committed to the introduction of the BTEC First Diploma in media and offered it to one-year students instead of the existing GNVQs from September 2005. The staff liked the practical basis of the course and thought that it would prove popular with the students because of this. Assuming viable numbers were recruited, the school would gain firsthand experience of BTEC.
Staff teaching other vocational areas shadowed the media team to learn from their experience. As all the staff teaching business, health and social care and leisure and tourism went through the assessor training for D32/33/34 and taught vocational courses for a number of years while the media staff taught only traditional A levels, GNVQ staff were able to support their media colleagues in vocational approaches and assessment.
Health and social care staff took a provisional decision to offer the BTEC First Diploma in health and social care. This decision was based largely on information from a course that the staff attended and the support offered by the BTEC advisor. They believed that the units would engage the interest of students and enable them to maintain a similar teaching style to the one they had previously used. The course was scheduled to start in September 2007.
The business and leisure and tourism departments planned a one-day meeting with health and social care staff and a possible visit to centres already offering BTEC first diplomas and OCR nationals to make provisional decisions during the summer term.
As GCSEs in vocational subjects were equivalent to only two GCSEs, staff did not feel that these provided an appropriate basis for a full-time one-year intermediate level programme. They would need to be combined with other subjects in order to make up a full course. Staff also thought that assessment requirements within GCSE might lead to a decline in pass rates.
The Warwickshire applied business support group proved valuable, enabling schools to share resources and expertise. The other schools involved only offered applied business in key stage 4, but North Leamington was able to use their support and advice in deciding on what to offer post-16.

Curriculum design

The sixth form had a timetable based on 30 50-minute periods and five option blocks. As student apprentices had work placements one day a week, they had 24 periods of available teaching time. Assuming that most students would retake GCSEs in English and mathematics, they needed to study a subject that required 12 periods a week to complete their timetable. The intermediate GNVQ occupied the right length of time.
Students normally completed all of their units by the end of May, giving them time to revise for their GCSEs. Both of the alternatives (OCR Nationals or BTEC First Diplomas) demand the same amount of teaching time (360 hours) as the GNVQ, so the school did not anticipate any problems. These qualifications are also based on six units, giving curriculum managers flexibility when it comes to deciding who teaches what and when.

Staff and resources

Staff spend most of their time working with key stage 4 and post-16 students. Staff had some free time in the summer term when they anticipated holding their research meetings. Although the school did not plan to withdraw its GNVQs before 2007, staff were aware that factors might arise that could change that decision.
Staffing is a major factor in any change. Nine different staff, each with their own specialities, delivered the GNVQ units. North Leamington was keen to utilise staff expertise and experience, and took this into account when evaluating possible alternatives to GNVQs.
Space was not expected to be a major issue. All of the groups were small (six is the average size). However, the school was aware that increased coursework demands from the new courses could put more pressure on availability of computers for word-processing. The ICT system was already operating at full capacity.
Equipment was not a pressing issue in the subjects that the school planned to offer. New textbooks and resources were needed but could be built up as coursework decisions were made. Staff find it essential to build up relevant resources and teaching materials to make the units more meaningful for the students. It was recognised that it takes time to develop these new resources, visit companies, collect material and organise student visits.

Position at June 2005

Long-term decisions were made about what the school will offer when the GNVQ ends. The health and social care and business departments decided that they would join media in offering BTEC courses.

When selecting the BTEC courses, the school looked for courses that offered a suitable form of assessment and a wide variety of teaching and learning styles. The school liked the idea of 100 per cent continuous assessment/coursework as GNVQ students tend to get better marks on this aspect than in the formal examined units. Parents and employers would also be familiar with the BTEC name. The school felt that it would be important to be able to mix and match alternative provision with A level/AS level/vocational A level and resit GCSEs, as had been done previously. At the moment some students resit both mathematics and English, some students resit only one of these subjects and some are allowed to start on AS level. Further research will be done on this during the next academic year.

Plans for 2005/6

The school decided to focus on the introduction of the new applied A levels in existing VCE/GNVQ subjects in September 2005, leaving media as the only department to introduce BTEC First Diplomas in September 2005.

The health and social care department will introduce the BTEC First Diploma in September 2006; 2005/06 will be their planning year and they also have to register as a centre with Edexcel. It seems very likely that the business department will follow the same timetable, now that they have made their decision. The leisure and tourism department have yet to make a decision about the course that they will follow.

Media’s new BTEC First Diploma course was communicated via the sixth form Open Evening in February and the sixth form brochure, which contained details of all the subjects on offer. There was an induction day for the new sixth form at the end of June for students to collect more information on their chosen subjects and take part in taster sessions. The school has found that few students attend the GNVQ sessions on these induction days as they assume they will get high GCSE grades and progress to A levels, or they are still undecided about what they want to do. Most students make their minds up after the GCSE results come out and visit the sixth form centre on enrolment day in September to sign up for repeat GCSEs and a GNVQ subject.

The communication activities for the three existing GNVQs will follow the above pattern but will get a slightly higher profile on the Open Evening in 2006 to make parents aware that GNVQ is being phased out.

Key issues

The central aim of the school is ‘to provide a high-quality learning environment in which all our students strive to reach their full potential.’ North Leamington prides itself on the breadth and depth of its 11–18 curriculum and has identified provision of a high-quality, one-year, year 12 course as an area for development. The student apprenticeship programme is a step towards that provision.
The school is confident that the change from GNVQ will not affect the purpose of the student apprenticeship programme. The essential issue is that the delivery style remains the same. The one-year students need one-to-one support and the GNVQ was a successful vehicle for this. The school will ensure that the alternative provision replicates this level of support. The maintenance of the tutoring aspect of the programme, at a subject and personal level, is important to the success of the students who enrol as student apprentices.
One aspect that the school has not yet had an opportunity to analyse is whether the changes to these awards will affect the destination of the one-year GNVQ students. At the moment the majority of these students start traditional A level courses or VCEs and stay at the sixth form. If they enjoy the BTEC First Diploma course students might look for BTEC National Diploma qualifications. The school does not have any plans to go down this route at the moment and offers level 3 vocational courses based on AVCE. However, the school is very aware of the competition from local colleges with experience in delivering alternative provision.

A further issue for the school is that the level of demand for the BTEC First Diploma course is unpredictable. Another unknown factor is whether the forthcoming move into a new building in 2007 will hinder or enhance recruitment into the sixth form.

Also see

> Using alternatives to GNVQ