The Oldham College

Overview

The Oldham College is judged as ‘Requires improvement’ for overall effectiveness and the quality of education, particularly for young people. However, the report highlights ‘Good’ behaviour and attitudes, personal development, leadership and management, adult learning, apprenticeships, and provision for learners with high needs.

Strengths

• Students and apprentices engage in activities that build ‘employability skills, confidence and resilience’, becoming ‘valued members of their community’.
• Staff create ‘inclusive and respectful environments’, with students celebrating diversity and supporting refugees and asylum seekers.
• Apprentices are ‘motivated and keen to learn’, developing the specific knowledge and behaviours employers require.
• Leaders show a ‘relentless’ drive to improve attendance for vulnerable young people, implementing targeted support strategies.
• Governors provide ‘support and challenge’ to senior leaders, ensuring accurate oversight and swift improvements.

Areas to improve

• Review curricula for young people to ensure they are ‘ambitious and challenging’, addressing issues where work is too easy or poorly sequenced.
• Improve teachers’ use of assessment strategies to ‘rectify misconceptions or gaps in learning’ so students make expected progress.
• Enhance feedback following assessments so students know how to ‘improve their work and achieve merit and distinction grades’.
• Improve support strategies for students with high needs in vocational areas, such as using ‘time out’ for sensory overload.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.