Our Secondary Strategy

Our ambition is that all TKAT secondary schools are Ofsted Good or better, that outcomes for pupils are at least at national average or better, and that every year we are closing attainment gaps for disadvantaged and underachieving children.

Most of all, we want every student in every TKAT school to feel safe and have fun. We want them to have a sense of themselves, to be part of their community, and to have outstanding opportunities and choices for the next stage of their lives at 16 and at 18.

Great teaching and learning is at the heart of everything we do. We are passionate about recruiting, developing and retaining the best secondary teachers. We are committed to delivering the best teaching we can through development, training and ongoing coaching and support.

We have TKAT Teaching and Learning Coaches that work together with schools and teachers to continuously improve our classroom practice. We want students to have the core skills and knowledge that will enable them to access and enjoy a broad curriculum.

We want young people to have a lifelong love of reading, and like in our primaries, we use Accelerated Reader to complement our teaching of reading and help assess children’s progress.

We challenge and support our secondary schools to offer a broad, balanced and exciting curriculum in Key Stage 3, and to then offer an exciting range of options for Years 10 and 11 and sixth form.

We believe that schools need some flexibility to make curriculum choices that best meet the needs of their local community. We provide lots of opportunities for our schools and teachers to share good practice and resources, and our move to an increased number of common programmes of study and common exam boards underpins that. We also have a Trust team of Secondary Strategy Leads and Subject Lead Practitioners who help our schools continue to develop their teaching, curriculum and assessment.

A key principle in our approach to assessment is that we have the data that can help us see where children’s learning is now and where they could make further progress. As well as GCSE and A level mocks, we use termly standardised assessments in all year groups to help see where we are as a Trust, and which schools and which children might benefit from further support.

Like our students, we are always excited to learn and we share best practice from both within the Trust and from our work with excellent external practitioners.

Matt Batchelor,
Senior Director for Secondaries