63 North Road, North East Valley, Dunedin
View on mapSacred Heart School (Dunedin)
Sacred Heart School (Dunedin) - 11/10/2019
School Context
Sacred Heart School (Dunedin) is a small contributing (Years 1 to 6) Catholic school, located in north Dunedin. The current roll is 37 students.
The school states that its vision is to provide a respectful environment that acknowledges the uniqueness of each child while assisting them to develop their potential spiritually, academically, physically, culturally and socially. Its key values are centered on truth, respect, humanity and justice.
The current strategic goals include developing the special character, growing students’ performance in literacy and numeracy, and working to achieve the aims developed through the Dunedin Catholic Schools Kāhui Ako | Community of Learning.
Leaders and teachers regularly report to the board schoolwide information about outcomes for students in the following areas:
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the achievement of students in reading, writing and mathematics
-
progress in religious education and other aspects of the school’s special character.
The school is governed by a well-established board and led by a long-serving principal and staff. The school has close links with the church and its community.
Evaluation Findings
1 Equity and excellence – achievement of valued outcomes for students
1.1 How well is the school achieving equitable and excellent outcomes for all its students?
Reported learning information shows that the majority of students achieve at or above the school’s expected achievement levels in reading, writing and mathematics.
More girls than boys achieve at the school’s expected levels in reading and writing.
1.2 How well is the school accelerating learning for those students who need this?
The school is effective in accelerating progress for students who need this.
The school can show that in 2017 and 2018 most identified students made accelerated progress in reading, writing and mathematics.
2 School conditions for equity and excellence – processes and practices
2.1 What school processes and practices are effective in enabling achievement of equity and excellence, and acceleration of learning?
The school’s curriculum is responsive to students’ interests and prior understandings. It draws on parent and community knowledge, underpinned by the school’s special character. Teachers engage community experts and resources to enhance the curriculum in response to students’ interests.
Individual learning plans show teachers know the students and their learning aspirations well. Well-resourced support is in place for a range of additional learning needs, including the use of differentiated instruction and targeted actions for several groups of learners.
Transitions through the school are well supported at all stages. Leaders ensure that students learn in an orderly and supportive environment. Students at all levels have opportunities to learn leadership, service and advocacy skills.
Community and family collaborations with the school enrich opportunities for students’ learning and wellbeing. Parents are welcomed, involved, respected and valued. There are strong links with the local schools, church and community that contribute to reciprocal, learning centered relationships.
The board and principal use a range of communication processes to inform the school community and to support learning at home. Pastoral care is extended within the school and beyond for the wellbeing of all members of the learning community.
2.2 What further developments are needed in school processes and practices for achievement of equity and excellence, and acceleration of learning?
Leaders need to further build organisational conditions for increased equity and excellence for all students. This includes:
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developing a coherent framework for internal evaluation, including policy and curriculum review, to identify what is working well and where improvements are needed for students’ learning
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incorporating Māori perspectives across the curriculum to enable all students to know about New Zealand’s bicultural heritage and for Māori students to know their language, culture and identity are valued
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further developing guidelines for planning, teaching and assessment so that good practices are sustained for the future
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using assessment information to show the impact of interventions and to report on accelerated progress.
Leaders and teachers need to establish reliable and on-going ways of knowing about student learning, and strategic direction. Formalising the processes for gathering and using parent perspectives should help ensure their views are included when deciding the school’s strategic direction.
Assessment for learning strategies to strengthen students’ understanding of themselves as learners could be further developed.
3 Other Matters
Provision for international students
The school is a signatory to the Education (Pastoral Care of International Students) Code of Practice 2016 (the Code) established under section 238F of the Education Act 1989. The school has attested that it complies with all aspects of the Code.
At the time of this review there were two international students attending the school.
International students and their families receive personalised support from the school for learning and pastoral care. They are connected to community resources and are welcomed as members of the school community. Students are provided with appropriate levels of learning support to foster their language skills.
4 Board Assurance on Legal Requirements
Before the review, the board and principal of the school completed the ERO board assurance statement and self-audit checklists. In these documents they attested that they had taken all reasonable steps to meet their legislative obligations related to the following:
- board administration
- curriculum
- management of health, safety and welfare
- personnel management
- finance
- asset management.
During the review, ERO checked the following items because they have a potentially high impact on student safety and wellbeing:
- emotional safety of students (including prevention of bullying and sexual harassment)
- physical safety of students
- teacher registration and certification
- processes for appointing staff
- stand down, suspension, expulsion and exclusion of students
- attendance
- school policies in relation to meeting the requirements of the Children’s Act 2014.
5 ERO’s Overall Judgement
On the basis of the findings of this review, ERO’s overall evaluation judgement of Sacred Heart School’s performance in achieving valued outcomes for its students is: Well placed.
ERO’s Framework: Overall School Performance is available on ERO’s website.
6 Going forward
Key strengths of the school
For sustained improvement and future learner success, the school can draw on existing strengths in:
- a sense of community and care that ensures children learn in a responsive and supportive environment within its special character
- its individual approach to student learning and growth that provides each child with the level of support and development that they require.
Next steps
For sustained improvement and future learner success, priorities for further development are in:
- further developing systems and practices across the school so that students experience a more coherent curriculum, and to ensure the school sustains and improves its performance
- systematically gathering and using a range of data and perspectives as part of internal evaluation to better identify what is working well for students and what needs improvement.
Areas for improved compliance practice
To improve current practice, the board of trustees should:
- update and regularly review all school policies.
Dr Lesley Patterson
Director Review and Improvement Services Southern
Southern Region
11 October 2019
About the school
Location |
Dunedin |
Ministry of Education profile number |
3815 |
School type |
Contributing (Years 1-6) state integrated primary |
School roll |
37 |
Gender composition |
Boys 20, Girls 17 |
Ethnic composition |
Māori: 4 |
Students with Ongoing Resourcing Funding (ORS) |
No |
Provision of Māori medium education |
No |
Review team on site |
July 2019 |
Date of this report |
11 October 2019 |
Most recent ERO reports |
Education Review: May 2016 |
Sacred Heart School (Dunedin) - 04/05/2016
1 Context
Sacred Heart School (Dunedin) is a small Catholic school that provides special character education for children from Years 1 to 6. The school has some children from bilingual homes where English is a second language. The principal is long-serving and has worked along with the teachers, parents and board to develop and maintain positive relationships within the community, including local schools.
There have been significant changes since the last ERO review including the retirement of a long-serving teacher and the reorganisation of classroom structures from three classes to two. Children learn in large, well-resourced and attractive spaces. ERO's previous reviews show Sacred Heart School has a record of consistently good performance.
2 Equity and excellence
The school’s vision is to ‘provide each child a superior education by building on their desire to inquire and learn in a safe, caring and supportive environment'. The school intends to develop in children a healthy respect for self and others and to nurture their spiritual development. This is to be achieved through the school's core values of respect, humanity, justice and truth.
The school community wants its children to be inquiring, self-managing, literate and numerate learners who act in a climate of faith and who care and support one another.
Children overall achieve highly in relation to the National Standards (NS). The number of Māori children attending the school is low. Their overall level of achievement is high and similar to that of their school peers.
The school's National Standards data for 2014 and 2015 shows that:
- most Māori children attain high levels of achievement and those who needed their achievement accelerated made good progress and/or were identified for ongoing support
- children's achievement in writing is generally lower than in reading and mathematics, while remaining higher than average for the region.
Since the last ERO evaluation, the school has:
- undertaken a range of professional development to promote student learning, engagement and achievement and to implement more effective school evaluation and teacher-inquiry practices
- put in place individual achievement plans for all children requiring extra support to achieve at or above the National Standards
- continued to provide targeted programmes and a skilled teacher aide to support children in need of extra assistance.
ERO and school leaders agree that the content and use of the individual achievement plans for Māori children and for all children should:
- be extended and personalised
- provide evidence of what has worked and what else needs to be done
- show the ongoing record of support.
3 Accelerating achievement
How effectively does this school respond to children whose learning and achievement need acceleration?
The school uses the same processes to identify and support all learners, including Māori who are at risk of not achieving excellent and equitable outcomes.
Teachers are very well aware of the conditions that contribute to accelerating children's progress. These include:
- knowing each learner well and setting individual learning plans
- providing a positive class and school culture where children are able to take risks
- teachers having a thorough knowledge of curriculum
- teachers constantly reflecting on what works and using internal evaluation effectively
- board funding of extra support.
Children at risk of not achieving well in their learning are identified through standardised testing and teacher observations, reflections and discussions that also include parents and/or whānau. Targets are set for these children to accelerate their progress to achieve National Standards. They receive specific teaching by a specialist teacher and/or experienced teacher aides within and out of the classroom. Teachers are committed to instilling confidence and self-belief in learners.
Parents of children receiving extra support are informed and invited to be involved. Some are actively working in partnership with the school to accelerate their child’s progress. Teachers acknowledge (and ERO agrees) that this should be extended to become more visible in the achievement plans developed for each child receiving support for acceleration.
The principal is continuing to help raise the quality of teacher inquiries and modern learning practices.
A next step for the principal and for teachers is to show more clearly how the learning and achievement of children at risk of not achieving excellent and equitable outcomes are being accelerated. For example:
- information used for the individual learning plans could contain more information such as children's interests and strengths, and cultural backgrounds in a wider range of areas
- teachers' recording of support should be more regular and highlight key information about what is working well with evidence to support this
- reports to the board should show the number of children whose achievement was or was not accelerated over a given period of time to enable the board to better evaluate the effectiveness of the support provided.
4 School conditions
How effectively do the school’s curriculum and other organisational processes and practices develop and enact the school’s vision, values, goals and priorities for equity and excellence?
The board of trustees is well placed to sustain and improve the conditions required for all children, including Māori children, to attain equitable and excellent outcomes for individual success. Trustees bring a range of skills and experience to the role of stewardship of the school. They access external support to guide them when additional knowledge and skills are needed. They consult well with parents and the wider community about important decisions.
The board, principal and teachers are developing their understanding of effective evaluative inquiry. They increasingly evaluate the impacts of programmes, particularly focusing on teaching and learning, to make improvements for the benefit of all children. Trustees are well informed about school-wide achievement and what is needed to support children in their learning. This helps them in their decision making. They provide additional resourcing to support teaching and learning, and build the capacity of teachers to continue to grow and improve school performance. The principal and teachers regularly report children's learning information to parents and provide them with useful ideas to support their children.
Over the past two years, trustees have redeveloped the school's charter and annual plans to focus on key priorities. This continues to be an area that requires further development to ensure there are clear plans for how the strategic goals in relation to student learning will be implemented.
A culture of respect, trust and care is evident across the school. The principal and teachers are developing practices to empower children to take increasing responsibility for managing their own learning. It is timely to review the school's curriculum documentation to provide more specific guidance for teachers to support children to become self-managing learners. This includes involving children in assessment practices.
The school has continued to develop ways to value how te reo and tikanga Māori is experienced by children. Children told ERO they enjoyed learning and singing waiata and te reo Māori. The challenge for the school will be to maintain and build on these current good practices.
5 Going forward
How well placed is the school to achieve and sustain equitable and excellent outcomes for all children?
Leaders and teachers:
- know the children who need their learning and achievement need to be accelerated
- respond effectively to the strengths, needs and interests of each child
- regularly evaluate how well teaching is working for these children
- act on what they know works well for each child
- build teacher capability effectively to achieve equitable outcomes for all children
- are well placed to achieve and sustain equitable and excellent outcomes for all children.
ERO is likely to carry out the next review in three years.
6 Board assurance on legal requirements
Before the review the board of trustees and principal of the school completed the ERO board assurance statement and Self Audit Checklists. In these documents they attested that they had taken all reasonable steps to meet their legislative obligations related to the following:
- board administration
- curriculum
- management of health, safety and welfare
- personnel management
- asset management.
During the review, ERO checked the following items because they have a potentially high impact on student safety and wellbeing:
- emotional safety of students (including prevention of bullying and sexual harassment)
- physical safety of students
- teacher registration
- processes for appointing staff
- stand down, suspensions, expulsions and exclusions
- attendance
- compliance with the provisions of the Vulnerable Children Act 2014.
Chris Rowe
Deputy Chief Review Officer Southern (Acting)
4 May 2016
About the school
Location |
Dunedin |
|
Ministry of Education profile number |
3815 |
|
School type |
Contributing (Years 1 to 6) |
|
School roll |
41 |
|
Gender composition |
Boys: 21 Girls: 20 |
|
Ethnic composition |
Pākehā Māori Pacific Other |
30 3 2 6 |
Review team on site |
February 2016 |
|
Date of this report |
4 May 2016 |
|
Most recent ERO report(s) |
Education Review Education Review Education Review |
February 2013 August 2009 September 2006 |