While the maths intensives helped 30 % of students improve, the fact that 70 % of participants did not see improvement, and over a fifth actually saw their final GCSE grades drop, raises concerns about the overall effectiveness of those sessions.
Tutoring had a relatively strong success rate, with nearly half of the students improving their final GCSE grades. However, the fact that over half( 55 %) saw no improvement or declined suggests that there is room for improvement and should be looked into further should we decide to run similar projects in the future.
Confidence, motivation and engagement
The project also looked to improve confidence, motivation and engagement in English and maths, which typically are more difficult areas to quantify. This was measured through a pre and post programme questionnaires( see Section 3 below for analysis of all questions). Key findings were:
• 59 % of students‘ strongly agreed / agreed’ that they felt confident about achieving their target grade( this was 46 % in the pre-programme assessment);
• 45 % of students‘ strongly agreed / agreed’ that they felt confident about preparing for their exams( this was 29 % in the pre-programme assessment);
• 45 % of students‘ strongly agreed / agreed’ that they could motivate themselves to study when they needed to( this was 35 % in the pre-programme assessment).
The project was successful in that it ensured that the right students were targeted and it reached a large number of students who would benefit the most from intensive sessions in English and maths. The sessions were bespoke, designed to meet the specific needs of each student, and offered a personalised and effective learning experience. Unfortunately, those benefits were not reflected in students’ final GCSE grades but seem to have contributed to increased students’ confidence and motivation.
Recommendations for improvement include reviewing lesson plans and resources in advance of the sessions and setting clear targets for student participation and number of sessions that must be delivered, with financial consequences for not meeting those targets. A mid-project review should be conducted to assess student attendance and progress, and staff should visit the school during the project to shadow activities and provide relevant feedback and recommendations mid-project.