From 'serious failings across all areas' to 'good' - Inside Wellingborough's academic turnaround and The Lion Academy Trust’s influence

The fortunes of three schools in Wellingborough are on the up, five years after an academy trust stepped-in.

Warwick Academy, Olympic Primary, and Ruskin Academy have all now received ‘good’ Ofsted reports, citing major bumps in student satisfaction and learning standards.

The schools were taken over by the Lion Trust Academy five years ago and since then, the trust has implemented new strategies and developments to help improve staff training and student engagement, specifically in underperforming schools.

Christopher Stark of the Lion Academy trust said: “The trust is all about getting children the education they are owed.

"There’s no excuse for walking past low standards.

"When we come into these sorts of schools we’re always told ‘it’s the kids’ or ‘it’s the community’, there’s always excuses why [standards are low].

"As an organisation we’re just not about excuses, we’re about making sure that these schools deliver on what they should do.”

Justin James, CEO of the Trust said: "We have a standard set pedagogy that we expect to see in all lessons.

"I would say to any school ‘what does a typical lesson look like?’, ‘what does typical learning look like?’ and now we know, particularly with low socio-economic and EAL (English as an Additional Language) kids, that it should be child-centred.

“It’s about children engaged in their learning, it’s none of this chalk-and-talk ‘here’s a worksheet and off you go’, it’s very much around the facilitation of the learning.”

It’s hard to argue against the efficiency of the Lion Academy Trust’s philosophy, as the three aforementioned Wellingborough schools each received ‘good’ reports from Ofsted in January.

Warwick Academy and Olympic Primary each had successive ‘requires improvement’ scores in previous inspections, but since they became part of the trust, standards have improved substantially.

The organisation has schools in London, Essex, and now Wellingborough since 2018.

The report for Ruskin Academy in which inspectors visited on January 17 and 18 said: “Since joining the Lion Academy Trust, leaders’ hard work and commitment have improved the school significantly.

"School and trust leaders are ambitious for the pupils, the staff and the school’s local community.

"As one parent, with a comment that was typical of many, stated: ‘staff have high expectations for my child and support them to achieve their potential.’”

The Trust acknowledges that teaching can have a tendency to be too reliant on old or outdated practices, and much of the work that it does helps to modernise the approach. As such, it is sometimes important to dismantle the old ways of thinking.

Justin James added: “We help the teachers to meet those standards. Unfortunately, there are one or two that don’t want to meet our standard or, in some cases, we inherit a lot of teachers that shouldn’t be in teaching.”

"Often the vast majority [of teachers] buy into what we do and we help them to be successful, but there is a minority where sometimes the school might not be the right place because we have a high standard and we expect the best of our kids.”

Christopher Stark said: “Our standard operating model is that our most successful teachers in general, obviously there are exceptions to every rule, are the ones that we have had join us at an early stage of their career.

"Generally what we’re finding is that the culture isn’t ‘you’ve got to work 10 years as a teacher to then become an assistant head or 15 years to become a headteacher’, if you’ve got the attitude in this position and you’re good enough, you’re good enough.

"We’re very rigorous in how we train, support, and develop our staff because they’re hard to find, important to keep, and it’s vital that you’ve got a well trained, well supported, motivated workforce in any industry. “

Ruskin Academy, one of the trust’s schools, recently dropped out of the ‘Voice in a Million’ concert due to teacher strikes, which prompted a student to start petition to show their disappointment.

Industrial action has been a significant issue for many organisations in the public sector, and education is no different.

Speaking on the impact of strikes on the efficiency of child development and learning, Justin James was empathetic towards those taking strike action, but emphasised the importance of keeping the quality of learning high.

He said: “I’d be lying if I said it didn’t have some form of an impact, but at the same time we made sure our most vulnerable children were looked after and were catered for.

"Going on strike is a personal choice, and we understand why staff might do that.

"We understand what’s going on in the sector, but on those days it’s my responsibility to make sure we [conduct] business as usual.

"One of my biggest concerns is the funding of those pay increases, and much-deserved pay increases for our staff.

“I don’t disagree with that, but I think we’re in a good position because none of our schools are in deficit; we run a tight ship, because we have set models.

"I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t getting more difficult with the funding circumstances and I think the biggest thing is that we’re going into our budget modelling stage and there are so many unknowns.”

Christopher Stark added: “We could do with some clarity, but we’re not unique in that.

"I think all schools and multi-academy trusts would say the same.”