18th July 2024

Dear Parents/Carers,

Progress Review 3 - End of year  Update - Years 7,8,9 and 10

I am writing to let you know that the progress data for years 7 to 10 has been released and is now available to view on Go4Schools. 

This is the last of three progress points that we will release this academic year. Can I please encourage you to log in as a parent to view this report. The details of how to do this are in the weekly parent bulletin. If you have any problems doing so, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Years 7,8 and 9

A reminder about the changes that have taken place this year - 

Targets

In Key stage 3 (years 7, 8 and 9) for English, maths, science, history and geography the students are assigned a target band from 10 (highest) to 1 (lowest). The students with the top 10% of SAT scores  will be given target band 10, moving in 10% bands down to target band 1. Our targets now focus on age related expectations using KS2 data as a benchmark rather than setting a GCSE target based on a national target setting system.

Other subjects use a different model based on age related expectations. In this system, students are set an end of year target labelled as either ‘Developing’, ‘Competency’ and ‘Mastery’. 

Grading Systems

For English, Maths, Science, History and Geography the current performance is given as a band that goes, like the target, from 1 to 10 with 10 being the highest performance band. All of the marks that are awarded for the assessments are split into 10% bands and students are assigned a performance band determined by their assessment score. You will now be able to easily see whether your child is performing at, below or above their target band. We have made this change as we felt that the previous system of trying to align progress with GCSE targets and grades was not accurate enough and was potentially confusing and potentially demotivating for our students. We hope that you will agree that this system is easier to understand and gives you a clear indication of progress against KS2 baseline data.

Example

For the practical subjects as well as French & German, we have been reporting on your child’s progress towards the Developing, Competency and Mastery targets using the terms ‘Working Towards’, ‘Working At’, or ‘Working Above’. As this is the final report of the year, your child’s report now states whether they are achieving Developing, Competency or Mastery descriptors for each subject.  

Year 10

Students in year 10 sat full GCSE papers under public exam conditions in the sports hall. We felt that it was important for the students to have this experience before starting year 11 when they will sit two rounds of mock examinations before starting their final exams in the summer. Because the students were sitting full papers it is likely that they will have been examined on content that has not been taught yet and so please do not be alarmed if the PR3 result was lower than you were expecting. Staff are now working hard to address misconceptions and gaps in knowledge. They will also be providing work for the students to complete over the summer break. We would appreciate your support in making sure that this is completed - details will be posted on the relevant google classrooms.

Attitude to Learning (ATL)

As part of the report, you will also see an ATL grade for your child in each subject. The descriptors for each of these criteria can be found at the bottom of the report.

Attendance

Attendance is crucial to success. The information presented in the report will allow you to see your child’s attendance up to the point of the report being released. All students are expected to have an attendance of 95% or higher, and we will continue to support families where attendance falls below this figure. As per my previous letter, data from our summer exams showed that students whose attendance was 95% or above achieved one whole grade higher in their results when compared to those whose attendance was 80% or lower.

Behaviour

The final section on the report details your child’s behaviour information. Here you will see the total of Team Rushden Achievement Points (Positive Points), and the number of NN’s (Negative Points) they have received so far this year. We continue to celebrate and recognise the successes of all students, and we hope that you will continue to support your child to keep achieving at school.

All teaching staff are fully aware of the targets that are set and carry out focused intervention and support as necessary following progress review points. If you would like to discuss your child's progress, or if you have a concern then please do not hesitate to contact your child’s tutor.

Yours sincerely,

Mr P Bocking

Assistant Principal