Welcome to the St Lawrence academy

At the academy our academic year is based around three terms – autumn, spring and summer.  Generally our dates fit in with North Lincolnshire with the exception of our staff inset days which are different.

The academy day is based on modules of one hour which my be in multiples for different subject areas i.e. in PE, students may have a two hour lesson whilst in Music they may have a one hour lesson.  Each day starts at 8.30am with lesson 1.  Our days are of varying lengths, on Monday and Tuesday the taught day finishes at 3.40pm, on Wednesday and Thursday the taught day finishes at 2.40pm and on Friday it finishes at 1.05pm.  The structure of the week works well for our students.  They have 26 compulsory taught hours along with many other opportunities to attend enrichment activities.

We have very high expectations of all our students in relation to:-

Appearance

• the academy uniform is compulsory 

• we expect all students to aspire to have 100%

• we expect all students to be polite, respectful and have a sense of pride and belonging not only to themselves but the academy  

• student voice is very strong in the academy and we want all our students to be proud of their achievements  

• we have high aspirations for all our students and we want them to achieve their potential, they are all talented individuals and we want to nurture those talents.     

Organisation Statement

Introduction

The academy will be organised so that it can deliver the vision and provide the context within which all students will be successful. This statement describes the structure, leadership and management and the use of time.

Academy Structure

The academy will have a roll of 600, 11-16 year old students.  Each year group will contain 120 students who will be organised into 5 mixed ability tutor groups of 24 students. This ratio will ensure that the tutor has the opportunity to know each student well and, take responsibility for his or her personal development and academic progress. Each student will have a personalised learning plan (PLP), which will be developed and evaluated by the student, parent/carer and tutor through the system of termly learning conferences.

To support these arrangements the staff will be members of the achievement teams for each year group, which are developed in the section below with reference to achievement team leaders.

The organisation of the curriculum is detailed in the curriculum statement and the organisation of the staff is below.

Leadership and Management

The leadership and management of the Academy will be the decisive factor in ensuring that every student is successful. Leadership will be distributed throughout the Academy and will enable students and staff to contribute and benefit from the high expectations expressed by the sponsors in the vision and ethos. From the outset, leaders will ensure that the Academy community have absolute clarity about these expectations and, will pursue them relentlessly through the systems and processes that will be put in place.

Principal

To ensure that the academy immediately establishes a strong strategic direction the principal will take responsibility for the most important systems and processes. She will use these to establish the ethos and culture of high expectations, which will drive standards forward. The main activities will be:

leader of the leadership team

strategic planning

academy development plan

school self review and evaluation

continuing professional development

BSF

Every Child Matters Agenda

Leadership team

The leadership team, led by the principal, will consist of:

Vice Principal responsible for learning and teaching and curriculum development

Director of Student Voice

Director of Specialisms

Director of Achievement

Director of Finance

The Vice Principal and the Directors have line management responsibilities for curriculum area leaders and for achievement team leaders as well as responsibility for one of the elements of the every child matters agenda. The Finance Director will line manage the Associate Staff and also have a curricular responsibility for economic well being.

The Vice Principal will teach for approximately 20% of the week and the Assistant Principals for approximately 40% and will have administrative support, to ensure that they have sufficient time to carry out their strategic roles and provide strong leadership to students and staff. The Principal will ensure that they have clear direction and accountability for their performance. They will model the ethos and vision for the academy as well as coaching and developing the staff and students for which they are accountable.

Curriculum Area Leaders

The five curriculum area leaders will be responsible for leading a team of subject leaders and teachers to develop the curriculum and the quality of learning and teaching. They will monitor and evaluate student progress and implement subject based strategies to improve the attainment of groups and individual students. Their teams will be based in an area of the school with a staff work room which will enable them to develop the team both formally and informally. They will model the ethos and vision as well as coaching and developing the staff and students for which they are accountable.

They will have administrative support to enable them to fulfil their roles effectively.

Achievement Team Leaders

The achievement team leaders will be responsible for the personal development and academic progress of each student. They will lead the team of tutors, a mentor and, will lead meetings of the teachers of each year group. The purpose of these meetings will be to monitor and evaluate the progress of students and, develop classroom strategies that can be implemented by teaching staff to address underachievement. They will complement the work of the curriculum teams because they will be bringing together the evidence from all subjects. Teachers that are being successful with a group of students will be able to share good practice with their colleagues.

Cross curricula initiatives such as numeracy and literacy will be able to be successfully coordinated and strategies implemented coherently. Where possible, tutors will also teach within the year group so that they have a better understanding of their students and can contribute more to these meetings. In an Academy the size of St Lawrence, it will not be possible to gather all of the teachers together for each year group and, through careful organisation it will be possible to gather the majority so that strategies can have an impact on progress. This will enable the Academy to make a step change in personalising the experience of each student because the teaching teams will have a clear understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of each student and, will be capable of collectively meeting their needs.

Achievement team leaders will model the ethos and vision and will coach and develop the staff and students for which they are responsible.

They will have administrative support to enable them to fulfil their roles effectively.

Student Leadership

The student voice will have an important role in the leadership and management of the school. This is recognised through the appointment of a Director of Student Voice and Enhancement to the leadership team, who will be responsible for developing leadership opportunities for students. This will include the student council, which will be both year based and whole academy based. The year based councils will mirror the achievement teams in that it will have a responsibility to evaluate the progress of the year group, and comment on learning strategies that students find most effective.

The Use of Time

The academy is committed to structuring learning time to:

• maximise the time for students to be ‘on task';

• provide a variety of opportunities for personal development and academic progress;

• facilitate partnership with the LA and other local educational providers to extend curriculum opportunity especially for 14-19 (see the curriculum statement)

   

Therefore:

• whilst the academy is supportive of a move to four or five terms with more balanced holidays, it will do so only when the LA can lead this change across all local schools;

• learning sessions will be 60 minutes and on Monday to Thursday a day will contain 6 sessions followed by assembly or tutorials and extra-curricular activities/homework club

• on Friday there will be four learning sessions for students followed by additional activities provide by outside coaches and leaders while the staff have team meetings and development sessions (the organisation is detailed in the curriculum paper) . This will be the only formal meeting time for staff;

• the academy will use theme and project days to provide opportunities for extended learning;

• the academy will provide ‘extended school' activities on Saturdays and during the holidays

• all students will take part in two week block of work experience in KS4;

• all students will take part in a residential experience in each Key Stage;

• in KS3 the residential will have an emphasis on personal development through an outdoor experience;

• in KS4 the residential will be based on the specialisms and will contribute to personal development and raising attainment;

• ICT facilities for administration will enable the effective use of time by staff and students.

   

  The Academy Day