School Improvement Plan

I've been asked to share our schools improvement plan and thoughts behind it.

When myself and the Exec Head took up our positions, we knew that we had a task ahead. I don't think we realised how much of a task it was going to be. But, one thing we had to re-work and refine over and over again, was our School Improvement Plan. When literally every aspect of the school needed work, it had to be not only a useful document that wouldn't just be shoved in a drawer, but it was vital that is was a working document, with buy in from the whole school community.

It started off as a huge, cumbersome document, and we quickly realised that it was overwhelming (mainly for me!) and in the first year, the agenda (which was supposed to be just Autumn Term) ended up lasting an entire year. I kept my own copy and scribbled, added notes, put in milestones and used it as an action plan for English, Maths and SEN provision (we didn't have anyone leading any of these areas at the time). I still have the copy, mainly for posterity purposes, but also as a reminder of how far we've come and an indicator of how we are embedding good practice, rather than establishing.

Since then, after lots of discussion, reflection and looking around at the ways other schools use their School Development Plans, we have all our objectives on a one page overview. We decided to enlarge this and put it on display in the entrance hall; one of our fab academy schools had done this and I liked the idea that we could share it with a wider audience. It also gave us some ownership and accountability. I wanted to demonstrate our commitment to improvement.

The parents, pupils, staff, visitors, stakeholders can see what we're doing, why we are doing it and how it's going. I ask that anyone who does CPD, has visitors, visits anywhere, anything to do with the wider curriculum is put on a Post-It note, with the impact and places it on the SIP Board so that we have a truly 'living' board - this is later added to the RAG rated SIP each term.

We use the OFSTED headings, mainly because it allows us to ensure nothing is forgotten in a holistic view of the school. Underneath this, we have our action plans - who, what, when. It means the entirety of the staff can take ownership of their bit to move the school forward and can see what else is being done, which bits dovetail, keeping an eye on deadlines, or areas that haven't yet been completed and what we are doing about it. It bases discussions around the impact that we are directly having on our pupils, and if the areas are still 'red' we discuss whether its relevant, useful or needs an extended deadline.

Each member of the team have a copy of the SIP. They use this to base their appraisal targets (We use Coaching into Appraisal) so all members can choose their own targets, based on our SIP, their own areas of interest or development which they want to pursue, which means that people aren't wasting their time on things already working, in place or doesn't keep the fire in their belly. Each member of staff is assigned a coach and have between 3-6 coaching sessions a year, to choose, implement, talk about, organise and action their targets, which has had a huge impact on the quantity, quality and collaborative working that has taken place across the school. I strongly believe that there is power in knowledge, and teamwork is a catalyst for positivity.

Last year's Post-It notes became a memory book of the impact we have as a collective group of people, who care deeply about the education and well-being of our children. We continued to use it as our action plan for core subjects, being a small school, i'm very aware that workload can become unmanageable if  I am expecting separate action plans for every subject, when some teachers (we only have four, one an NQT) are wearing multiple hats it just becomes paperwork for paperwork's sake, and no-one needs that!

There are still things I'd like to change. We recently had our SEF completed with an outside HMI inspector, who used the new OFSTED framework headings. I haven't yet pulled both documents together, to pinpoint more specific targets in our English and Maths and I'd like  governor objectives added to the SIP, as they are currently doing a lot to support the school's development, in terms of challenge and monitoring visits.

It's been great looking at the range of ways this is done in other schools, and some really useful documents shared to support this ongoing work.

Thank you :)