Wyke Sixth Form College

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Information about this provider

Wyke Sixth Form College is located on the western edge of Hull.

It recruits its students from over 40 schools, with approximately half of the students coming from Hull, and the remainder from areas such as the East Riding of Yorkshire and North Lincolnshire. The college provides a broad range of academic, technical and vocational qualifications. At the time of the inspection, there were 2,450 students on programme, of whom 22 had high needs.

Most students are under 19 years of age.

What is it like to be a learner with this provider?

Students follow an ambitious and challenging curriculum that equips them with the skills, knowledge and behaviours nee...ded for their next step into higher education and prepares them for leadership roles in a wide range of professional careers. They develop very good employability and personal skills as part of their main study programmes.

They become confident leaders and team players, and learn how to take responsibility for managing their own time and organising their independent study time.

Students benefit from an extensive range of high-quality and rich experiences that develop their interests, talents and skills. Leaders have created a culture in which students' personal development is valued as highly as their academic achievements and provide a varied and comprehensive programme of personal development.

For example, students who are part of the sports journal society attend competitive sports fixtures to support their team, take photographs and create match reports, which are then broadcast to staff and students.

Students proactively pursue their interests through an extensive range of clubs and societies, some of which they instigate and lead. They take great pride in sharing their interests, perspectives and values with their peers and demonstrate high levels of courtesy and support for each other when doing so.

For example, working alongside Humberside police force, students who are part of the 'women today' group educate their peers about acceptable and unacceptable conduct. They support local campaigns that focus on the reporting of inappropriate behaviour witnessed in the community.

Leaders and staff show exceptional dedication to developing students' character, confidence and resilience.

They expose students to experiences and environments which provide opportunities for them to develop new skills, test their abilities and realise what they can achieve. For example, law students practise mooting in a courtroom setting. Students find these opportunities valuable and recognise the positive impact that the activities have on developing their confidence and character.

Students are exceptionally well behaved. They attend well and arrive at classes on time and ready to learn. They are purposeful, curious and diligent, and show respect towards each other and towards their teachers.

Students with high needs benefit significantly from the support that they receive. Support staff use their knowledge and experience well to provide students with bespoke and personalised levels of support and work diligently to develop positive relationships with students and parents. Parents highly value the time that staff take to listen to them, enabling staff to understand any concerns while maintaining high expectations.

Staff ensure that students are very well prepared for their next steps. They provide a highly effective careers programme which supports students to make well-informed choices about their futures. Students benefit from sessions aimed at developing their readiness for transition to university, further training or employment.

They value their frequent interactions with employers and university staff that enable them to understand the roles available to them, to practise their skills and to understand the realities of work in specific sectors.

Students make very good progress from their starting points and achieve high grades in their qualifications. Students with special educational needs and/or disabilities make progress in line with their peers and achieve their aspirations.

Most students, including those with high needs, progress to higher education, with many gaining places at prestigious universities. An increasing number of students take up higher-degree apprenticeships.

Contribution to meeting skills needs

The college makes a reasonable contribution to meeting skills needs.

Leaders and managers liaise with a range of stakeholders to understand and respond to the skills needs in the area and to develop the skills that students need to progress positively on completion of their course. They work with relevant agencies, such as universities, to gather information that enables them to support their students with their next steps into employment or further study. Leaders and managers engage with relevant stakeholders, such as secondary schools in the area, to understand the backgrounds of the young people who come to their college and to help students to realise their long-term aspirations.

The information that they gather from these stakeholders influences their curriculum offer.

Across most curriculum areas, managers work with employers and other relevant stakeholders such as the Probation Service in the design and implementation of the curriculum. They use these professionals with vocational expertise to support them well in the ongoing development of their programmes.

Students benefit from the experience and expertise of employers, which supports them in achieving the skills required for their next steps into employment or further study.

Leaders and managers are clear about how they contribute to meeting skills needs in the area. They frequently meet with leaders from other further education providers in the region to share best practice and ensure that the offer to young people in the local area is relevant.

What does the provider do well and what does it need to do better?

Leaders and managers have designed a highly ambitious curriculum that enables students to choose a mix of academic and vocational qualifications that equip them with the knowledge, skills, and attributes to extend their aspirations and prepare for a broad range of career opportunities. They are extremely aspirational for their students. They encourage and support them to achieve at the highest level in their academic and vocational qualifications.

Staff sequence the curriculum effectively to enable students to build and deepen their knowledge over time. In criminology, for example, teachers begin with topics that students are familiar with from their representations in the mass media before introducing them to more complex theoretical topics. Students apply this knowledge to the practical contexts of criminal investigations and judicial processes.

As a result, they develop technical skills underpinned by secure theoretical knowledge.

Teachers use a range of useful strategies to help students learn and remember new knowledge. They use frequent recaps at the beginning of sessions to reinforce students' understanding of topics.

This is supplemented by directed questioning and whole-group discussions. Teachers in A-level biology provide opportunities for students to repeat experiments to secure the knowledge gained from earlier lesson content. Students are encouraged to devise helpful revision techniques and tools to keep their knowledge live while studying new units, such as flashcards, mind maps and 'blurting'.

Teachers use assessment exceptionally well to check their students' grasp and recall of the topics that they have been taught. Students with high needs receive very effective support to enable them to achieve their potential.

Teachers develop students' academic writing skills very effectively.

Many students start with little experience of formal writing, particularly those on applied vocational courses. Teachers address this through frequent assessment and revision exercises in which students learn how to write evaluatively and accurately to a standard that prepares them both for their examinations and for their next steps into higher education.

Teachers develop students' English and mathematics skills successfully.

Students quickly develop a command of technical terms that they use confidently in classroom discussions. For example, students in A-level law are able to cite case law examples and accurately use the technical Latin terms that are common in law. Teachers support students to develop their mathematical skills in readiness for the job roles that they aspire to attain.

For example, students in health and social care interpret body mass index charts and use this information to create meal plans for different service users.

Staff support students well to understand what constitutes a healthy relationship. They discuss topics around consent, banter, sexual harassment and abuse through their tutorial sessions.

For example, students explore scenarios about harmful sexual behaviours and discuss the way these may be perceived by different people in society. As a result, students can confidently recognise harmful, unacceptable behaviours such as sexual harassment and coercive control. Students feel safe in the college and contribute fully towards maintaining a culture where such behaviours are not tolerated.

Staff are well qualified in their subject areas and have high levels of experience. They use their knowledge, skills and experience to inform the content of the curriculum and to link theory to practice. Teachers consistently apply the college's framework for teaching and learning without losing their creativity and autonomy.

They have very good access to professional development that enhances their pedagogical skills.

Leaders and managers support their staff very well and make well-being a priority. They are aware of the pressures on their staff and have worked actively to reduce workload responsibilities.

For example, teachers are encouraged to use their expertise to plan lessons and learning opportunities collaboratively. This saves teachers valuable time, while ensuring that resources are expertly informed and well designed. Teaching staff, including early career teachers, value this support and enjoy working at the college.

Governance is effective. Governors are highly experienced in education, engineering, science, business and finance, and use their knowledge and experience to challenge leaders in order to help shape the curriculum and maintain the high quality of education. Board members carefully scrutinise reports and data that they receive to provide effective support, scrutiny and challenge to leaders that ensures continuous improvement.

Leaders have created a link governor scheme through which governors attend the college twice a year to spend the day with staff and students. Governors value this opportunity to experience the college from a different perspective.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.