Cathays High School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Through inspirational leadership and a culture of high ambition underpinned by the mission of 'opportunities for all', Cathays High School is a highly inclusive and aspirational learning community where pupils and staff thrive. Leaders have forged an ethos where pupils and staff feel valued and encouraged to excel.

They are dedicated to developing both pupils and staff to get the very best out of them. Leaders at all levels maintain an unrelenting focus on evaluating and improving all aspects of the school's work, especially the effectiveness of classroom practice. Staff are knowledgeable, enthusiastic, and whole-heartedly committed to improving the life chances of pupils.

High expectations and well-established classroom r...outines provide a dynamic learning environment. Staff have an unwavering commitment to sharing good practice, improving teaching, and enabling all pupils to fulfil their potential. As a result, lessons are planned carefully and are adeptly delivered to stimulate pupils' interest and inspire them to achieve highly.

Valuable arrangements for supporting learners with a diverse range of needs are flexible, highly tailored to individuals and draw expertly on internal and external provision to remove barriers to learning. Bespoke programmes for different groups of learners, such as new arrivals with limited English language skills, skillfully support pupils in their learning and everyday school life. The provision for personal and social education is effective for most pupils.

There is a firmly established culture of safeguarding that pervades the school. All staff, through all aspects of their work, take personal ownership for ensuring that all pupils' needs are catered for in a sensitive and safe way. As a result, pupils thrive in this happy, safe, and caring environment and are exceptionally proud to belong to their school community.

Pupils place great value on and actively celebrate the school's cultural diversity. They treat each other with respect and successfully develop the key attitudes and behaviours that will help them to become life-long learners and ethical, well-informed citizens of Wales. They are polite and friendly and behave impeccably in lessons and around the school.

They display an undeniably positive attitude towards their learning and school life in general. Clear priorities emboldened by effective professional development support most pupils to develop their literacy, numeracy, digital, and Welsh language skills very well. The school's location at the heart of Cardiff and the diverse nature of the local community are important influences on the curriculum.

This, along with the celebration of individuality and cohesion within the school community helps the school to develop and sustain its own bespoke cynefin (habitat). Recommendations R1 Strengthen the provision for personal and social education in Year 11 What happens next The school will draw up an action plan to address the recommendations from the inspection. Estyn will invite the school to prepare a case study on its work for dissemination on Estyn's website.