Thompsons Academy trading as Navigators

Overview:

Thompsons Academy trading as Navigators is an independent specialist college providing education and training to young people with special educational needs and/or disabilities and social, emotional and mental health needs. The college has 149 learners studying individualised programmes at community venues across Greater Manchester. Leaders have designed effective support for learners who have significant challenges in their daily lives, and staff use their training and experiences to work sensitively with learners.

Strengths:

• Leaders have designed effective support for learners who have significant challenges in their daily lives.
• Staff use their training and experiences to work sensitively with learners, taking their time to get to know them and building trust.
• Staff help learners to manage their medication and develop strategies to improve self-regulation during times of anxiety.
• Staff work together to improve learners' understanding of coercive behaviours to ensure they stay safe.
• Learners value the effective support they receive from staff, and for many learners, this is the first opportunity they have had to develop positive and sustained relationships with adults who care about them.

Areas to improve:

• The quality of teaching is too variable and, in many instances, is not of a high enough quality.
• Too many learners do not achieve their qualifications, including in English and mathematics.
• Staff do not routinely monitor and identify learners’ small steps of improvement to ensure learners progress as quickly as they are capable.
• Too few learners have access to the information that they need to make informed choices about their next steps.
• Learners do not develop the skills and knowledge that they need for life after college.

Safeguarding:

The safeguarding standards are met, meaning that leaders and/or those responsible for governance and oversight have fulfilled their specific responsibilities and have established an open culture in which safeguarding is everyone's responsibility and concerns are actively identified, acted upon and managed.