Governor's visit

On Thursday, just before half term, I visited staff and students at the North Liverpool Academy (NLA) sixth form, to find out what a typical school day was like and to get a feel for the challenges facing the staff and students and the overall culture that exists. It was a well organised, enjoyable, revealing and thought-provoking visit. As a governor, I have been to the school on a number of occasions, largely for formal meetings to discuss rules, regulations and progress etc. This was a targeted visit, in the light of my new role in supporting the school sixth form. Those of you at the NLA will know the "statistics", but for those of you reading from outside, a little perspective may be useful. So, you can skip the next part if you are a "local".

The NLA opened in 2006, following the merger of two community comprehensive schools: Anfield and Breckfield. The physical footprint of the NLA lies between Heyworth Street, to the West and Breckfield Road North, to the East: connected by Hamilton Road at the south end: the post code is L5 0SQ. It was built from scratch (see RHS) during the merger, under the stewardship of the then Chair of Governors, Nigel Ward. Nigel is now of a larger group of schools including NLA, under the banner of the Northern Schools Trust (NST). There are approximately 1500 students attending the NLA, of which 250 are in the sixth form, taking either A levels, vocational qualifications (such as BTECs) or both. The school head is Mr. Mike Westerdale and the Chair of Governor's is Dr. Geoff Wainwright from 2Bio in Liverpool. 

The school forms a small triangle (a 10 minute walk in either direction) with Liverpool's famous football clubs: Everton's Goodison Park and Liverpool FC's Anfield Park (see LHS). However, the area is on the bottom 10% of the UK's most deprived regions. One in four homes in the area are said to be workless, and over 70% of families earn less than £16, 000, which automatically entitles the children to register for free school meals. The very high levels of inter-generational unemployment have an enormous impact on the children and create a mood of low aspiration; something that clearly needs changing, and that lies at the heart of the school's pastoral and educational priorities.

Back to the visit! I was met by the Head of Sixth Form, who gave me a briefing on the numbers, the challenges and asked me to chat with some students. My first "interview" was with a student taking Maths, Economics and Chemistry A levels. We chatted about the value of algebra and the use of equations to describe and model phenomena and behaviours in Science and Economics. Very impressive! I then met with a group of students working on their various BTEC assignments in the sixth form resource centre (see above). 

One student was developing a performance piece in which she was aiming to dramatise a romantic encounter between two young people, that took place on daily train journeys, with inspiration from a song she liked. In the narrative, the boy sent his messages via graffiti on the walls alongside the girl's regular train journey. A great idea and a great conversation! I also discussed the issues around racial discrimination in public sector organisations and the logistics of travel planning by plane and train across Western Europe. Not only were the discussions engaging, it was clear that these students had developed a nicely balanced level of citizenship. Before we re-grouped, I bumped into one Y13, who had been interviewed for a place at three Universities for a graduate nursing programme. She had quickly learnt from each interview and had incorporated all of the  criticisms, to develop a much improved interview strategy. Again, very impressive.

Over a cup of tea, I listened to some of the challenges facing the teachers and students. One difficulty was the retention of information after a successful teaching session: students would engage in a lively dialogue, but often found it difficult to retain this critical insight in examinations. A problem, I am all too familiar with!  According to the staff, this is often a major barrier to securing high quality examination success: a problem shared by all teachers in schools and Universities. We finished with a discussion of how I might help. The result was a plan to develop some project based learning (PBL) initiatives: we are going to introduce a series of Grand Challenge projects (maybe a little less ambitious than the Bluebird!) for students entering Y12 in September of 2017: this is my homework for the summer! I am really looking forward to this. On a final note, I will follow up with my other interest in the school's Y7 diversity project, which will be brought to fruition in June and July with a night of celebration and a visit to the International Slavery Museum at the Albert Dock. More to follow on this soon!