Education Bulletin - 8 July 2022

Updated 8 July 2022

From Ming Zhang
Service Director of Education, Participation and Skills

Dear colleagues,

Today, the Government had its fourth Secretary of State for Education in 10 months with the new boss of the Sanctuary Buildings facing the enormous tasks of implementing the Schools White Paper. One of the ambitions set out in the White Paper is that 90% of primary school pupils meet standards in Reading, Writing and Maths by 2030. This year's national SATs results published on Tuesday revealed that the nation has a long way to go to realise that ambition, with only 59% of 11-year-olds in England hitting expected standards, a slump following the Covid pandemic, compared to 65% in 2019. However, this is not a surprise considering the challenges that schools have had to overcome in the past two years.

SATs Results Day

Locally in Plymouth, primary schools were able to access end of KS2 assessment outcomes, and we know that many school leadership teams are in the process of reviewing outcomes to inform key priorities for the next academic year. In the local authority, we are also busy collating and analysing data in order to identify citywide priorities for improvement, as well as areas of strength.

We are still receiving local data. However, based on the information I have so far it is probably sufficient to say that Plymouth is now in line with national (combined 59% at EXS) and also in line with national in reading and maths; we are slightly below national in GPS and writing but not significantly so. Both nationally and locally we have seen a drop in outcomes in English writing since 2019 but this was to be expected as the pandemic presented schools and children with exceptional barriers to teaching and learning writing.

As a city we want to improve the primary school results by firstly catching up with the national standards before moving up fast to a position that is better than England's average.

I would like to acknowledge that school leaders and teachers have been working incredibly hard in the past two years. Thank you for all your hard work and success. Going forward, Special School Improvement Partnership (PSSIP) will be a catalyst in continuing our long improvement journey, governed by the Plymouth Education Board.

Plymouth Education Board

At Plymouth Education Board last Friday, we heard some amazing progress and success in the city partnerships for education improvement, in particular school leadership capacity which is imperative to long-term education improvement in Plymouth.

Colleagues in Strategic Education Group (SEG), PSSIP, Early Years Board and Skills and Employment Board are all playing a leading role in developing and implementing our education improvement strategies and initiatives.

Here I would like to specifically mention and thank Tony Bloxham, our Place-based Programme's Implementation Lead, who will be leaving the role at the end of the summer term. Tony has been doing an outstanding job in leading the Secondary School Improvement work and helping the PSSIP and Early Years Board to make connection of the improvement plans for all phases of the education system. I would like to say a big thank you to Tony for the significant contributions that he has made to Plymouth education.

The National Marine Park Big Blue Splash

I would like to share with you the exciting opportunity of Big Blue Slash activities that will be taking place across Plymouth's waterfront from 23 and 24 July.

There will be a wide variety of free to book activities available from swimming to paddle boarding, rockpooling to wakeboarding and much more to try out and get involved in.

The booking system for these activities is now live. To ensure your school or local community groups have the opportunity to try out these sessions, the organisers have reserved half of all ticket allocations. This is all part of the aim to make sure that everyone in Plymouth has the opportunity to get in, on, under and next to the waters of Plymouth Sound thanks to the National Lottery Heritage Fund. To access your reserved tickets, just visit the below link, pick out the activities you like, and when you register for your ticket on Eventbrite, enter the promo code NMP at the top and you will find your allocated tickets.

https://www.visitplymouth.co.uk/bigbluesplash

As these sessions are limited we would encourage you to only book the spaces that you know you are keen to attend, and please choose the Community Tickets where there is availability, and if anything changes please do cancel so that we can open up the opportunity for others to benefit from.

If you have any questions please do feel free to get in touch with Tors Froud, National Marine Park Engagement and Inclusion Manager at tors.froud@plymouth.gov.uk

Best regards.

Ming

Education updates

Transition Programme Events - Message from Siobhan Meredith

Thank you to everyone who has signed up for the first of the Transition Programme events. The Cross Phase Transition Networking Event will take place on Tuesday 12th July, 8:30am- 12:30pm at the Elfordleigh Hotel.

The agenda for the morning is attached and you will see that we have representatives from another Local Authority who have been successful in developing a thorough and consistent approach to transition at all phases. Initially we will look to improve the arrangements between Year 6 to 7 across the city but it is really important that we have everyone's voice in this important piece of work.

Currently, the schools/MATs who have signed up to attend the event are:

• Discovery MAT
• Pennycross Primary Marine Academy Primary Boringdon Primary School
• Devonport High School for Girls Hele's School
• Devonport High School for Boys Reach South Academy Trust Goosewell Primary Academy Mount Wise Primary School
• St Andrew's CE VA Primary UTC
• Eggbuckland Vale Primary Lipson Cooperative Academy
• The Inspire Multi Academy Trust (South West) Mount Tamar School
• Courtlands Special School Tor Bridge Primary School
• Yealmpstone Farm Primary School Tor Bridge High
• Coombe Dean
• Old Priory Junior Academy Ernesettle Community School Beechwood Primary Academy Shakespeare Primary School High View School
• Knowle Primary School 
• UTC Plymouth St Paul's 
• St Peter's RC Mary Dean's 
• Stoke Damerel Primary Academy

If you have not signed up yet then please do - it does not need to be Headteachers that attend (although you are very welcome!) and can be Transition Leaders from within your school or those staff who have responsibility for completing the transition paperwork. The link to sign up is: https://forms.office.com/pages/responsepage.aspx?id=ANFnJ7uhbkaPzNmdcpyGxsTSG8AUM dZHrdTU1d3Gas5UN0NLVVJaVkFMOFZEOVNNUE5MOTJPNDdFRy4u

If you have any questions then please do not hesitate to contact me via email on: Siobhan.Meredith@tedwraggtrust.co.uk

Apprenticeship Opportunities Bulletin

Attached is the Apprenticeship Opportunities Bulletin, please share widely among your students, colleagues and networks.

The bulletin has over 250 local apprenticeship vacancies across all sectors, as well as useful information on choosing a career, local events, training and open days.

Featured events in this month's bulletin include fantastic Early Careers Fair taking place at Plymouth Argyle this Saturday 9th July between 10am and 2pm - an event not to be missed!

They are also following this up next week with a parent/carer webinar session on Wednesday 13th July between 6 and 7pm via Microsoft Teams.

Finally, the Health and Care Jobs Fair on Saturday 30th July, 11am to 3pm Place de Brest outside Barclays Bank in the city centre.