Oasis Academy MediaCityUK

Inspection of a good school: Oasis Academy MediaCityUK King William Street, Salford, Manchester M50 3UQ

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Inspection dates: 14 and 15 September 2021

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Outcome

Oasis Academy MediaCityUK continues to be a good school.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils are proud of the diverse nature of their school community. They respect each other’s individuality. Pupils also benefit from learning about each other’s cultural differences.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Younger pupils welcome the support and reassurance offered from older pupils. All pupils value being able to seek advice from ‘pupil welfare ambassadors’ and the safeguarding team on a variety of issues, such as emotional well-being. This reassures pupils. They feel well cared for, happy and safe.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Most pupils have positive attitudes to their learning. They are confident that their teachers want the best for them. Many pupils are eager to get a deeper understanding of the subjects that they are studying. Overall, pupils achieve well at Oasis Academy MediaCityUK.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils are typically well behaved in lessons and around the school site. They are courteous and respectful to one another. This is due to leaders’ high expectations and staff’s consistent approach to managing behaviour. Pupils said that bullying of any sort is rare. They are confident that should any incidents of bullying arise, staff will deal with them swiftly.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils benefit from a wide range of opportunities to support their wider personal development, including extra-curricular activities. Pupils enjoy activities that build their self-confidence and resilience.

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What does the school do well and what does it need to do better?

Leaders, including those responsible for governance, have an accurate view of the quality of education that the school provides to its pupils. Leaders are determined to improve the school further. They have built on the strengths identified at the previous inspection and tackled areas where improvement was needed. 14 and 15 September 2021

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The curriculum that leaders have implemented recently is broad and ambitious. Senior leaders have placed the English Baccalaureate at the heart of the curriculum. Pupils in Years 7 and 8 have the chance to study two languages. This had not previously been the case. Leaders are committed to raising pupils’ aspirations. They ensure that pupils have appropriate information about the full range of education, employment and training opportunities available to them.

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Curriculum plans are clear. Leaders have thought carefully about how to build up pupils’ knowledge in different subjects in a logical way. Consequently, pupils make effective use of their prior knowledge to develop a deeper understanding of more difficult concepts over time.

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Teachers have strong, secure subject knowledge. They use this knowledge to provide clear explanations to pupils about new learning. They also use assessment effectively to find out what pupils know and can remember. However, in some lessons, teachers do not always choose the most appropriate activities to help pupils understand specific subject concepts.

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The special educational needs coordinator (SENDCo) has processes in place to identify quickly emerging additional needs among pupils. Teachers receive regular and relevant information about those pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND). Nevertheless, leaders and teachers do not always use this information well enough to adapt subject curriculums for these pupils. As a result, some pupils with SEND do not achieve as well as they should.

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School leaders prioritise reading. They have put in place a range of suitable strategies to support those pupils who are behind with their reading. These pupils are catching up quickly. In addition, Year 7 pupils benefit from dedicated time to improve their reading knowledge. They are becoming increasingly adept at using the knowledge they gain to help them read and understand subject-specific texts.

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Leaders are determined that pupils should be considerate and behave well. Pupils value the school’s behaviour code. Pupils said that teachers manage behaviour in lessons and around the school building with consistency. Pupils said that bullying was rare.

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Pupils enjoy a range of activities that foster their wider personal development. They spoke enthusiastically about initiatives that address prejudice and discrimination, for example a mentoring scheme that encourages pupils of Black heritage to apply to university. Most pupils believe that personal, social, health and economic education lessons are a strength of the school.

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Trust leaders are well informed. They hold leaders to account and use their expertise to help leaders improve the quality of education. Staff value leaders’ work to support them with their workload and well-being. 14 and 15 September 2021

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Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.

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Safeguarding

Leaders provide pertinent safeguarding training to all staff. They ensure that staff keep up to date through weekly briefings and bulletins. Staff know that if they have a ‘niggle’ they must report it. Those staff responsible for safeguarding maintain clear and thorough records. There are effective systems in place to share information among key staff and with wider external agencies.

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Safeguarding

Staff are knowledgeable about the risks that pupils may encounter in the local area. To help address this, leaders have designed an appropriate programme to help pupils understand potential dangers, including peer-on-peer abuse and knife crime.

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(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

 On occasions, teachers do not have the scope to choose the most appropriate activities to enable pupils to maximise their learning. This means that some pupils do not know and remember as much as they should of the planned curriculum. As they move forward with the new curriculum, leaders should ensure that teachers have the confidence to select the most appropriate activities that will enable pupils to have a deep appreciation of the concepts that they are learning.  Leaders are in the process of refining how they adapt the new curriculum for pupils with SEND. As a result, some teachers do not make sufficient adjustments to enable those pupils with SEND to achieve as highly as other pupils. They focus too much on generic pedagogy at the expense of subject-specific adaptations. Leaders should ensure that teachers have the knowledge of how to tailor their individual subject curriculums and pedagogies to meet these pupils’ individual needs.

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Background

When we have judged a school to be good, we will then normally go into the school about once every four years to confirm that the school remains good. This is called a section 8 inspection of a good or outstanding school, because it is carried out under section 8 of the Education Act 2005. We do not give graded judgements on a section 8 inspection. However, if we find some evidence that a good school could now be better than good, or that standards may be declining, then the next inspection will be a section 5 inspection. Usually this is within one to two years of the date of the section 8 inspection. If we have serious concerns about safeguarding, behaviour or the quality of education, we will deem the section 8 inspection as a section 5 inspection immediately.

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Background

This is the first section 8 inspection since we judged the school to be good in June 2016. 14 and 15 September 2021

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How can I feed back my views?

find out what other parents and carers think. We use information from Ofsted Parent View when deciding which schools to inspect, when to inspect them and as part of their inspection.

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How can I feed back my views?

The Department for Education has further guidance on how to complain about a school.

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How can I feed back my views?

If you are the school and you are not happy with the inspection or the report, you can complain to Ofsted .

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Further information

You can search for published performance information about the school.

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Further information

In the report, ‘disadvantaged pupils’ refers to those pupils who attract government pupil premium funding: pupils claiming free school meals at any point in the last six years and pupils in care or who left care through adoption or another formal route. 14 and 15 September 2021

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School details

Appropriate authority Oasis Community Learning

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School details

Website http://www.oasisacademymediacityuk.org/

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School details

Dates of previous inspection 8 and 9 June 2016, under section 5 of the Education Act 2005

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Information about this school

 Since the previous inspection, a new interim principal has been appointed.  The number of pupils on roll at the school has increased considerably over the last few years.  The school works with Navigators Alternative Provision, Salford Alternative Independent Learning and Edintervention to provide alternative provision for a small number of pupils in Years 10 and 11.

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Information about this inspection

 This was the first routine inspection that the school received since the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic began. Inspectors discussed the impact of the pandemic with school leaders and have taken that into account in their evaluation.  During the inspection, inspectors held meetings with the interim principal, other senior leaders, of whom one is the designated safeguarding lead, the SENDCo, middle leaders, teachers and members of support staff.  The lead inspector met with the chair of the academy council, which provides local governance for the school. 14 and 15 September 2021

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 The lead inspector also spoke with the chief executive officer of the trust and the national director for trust secondary schools.  Inspectors carried out deep dives in the following subjects: English, geography and science. For each deep dive, inspectors met with subject leaders, looked at curriculum plans, visited a number of lessons, spoke with teachers, spoke with some pupils about their learning and looked at samples of pupils’ work.  Inspectors met with the people responsible for safeguarding. They reviewed a range of documentation in relation to safeguarding, including the school’s pre-employment checks on staff. They spoke to staff and pupils about wider aspects of safeguarding. They also considered survey responses from staff, parents and carers around safeguarding.  Inspectors observed pupils’ behaviour during breaktimes, lunchtimes, in corridors and during lessons. They also spoke to pupils about bullying, behaviour and leaders’

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expectations of their behaviour. Inspectors also discussed pupils’ programme of wider personal development.  Inspectors considered the 10 responses from parents and carers to Ofsted’s online questionnaire, Parent View. This included the 10 comments submitted via the free-text facility.  Inspectors also reviewed the 39 responses to Ofsted’s staff questionnaire and the 95 responses to Ofsted’s pupil questionnaire.

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Inspection team

Alyson Middlemass, lead inspector Her Majesty’s Inspector

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Inspection team

Jonathan Smart Her Majesty’s Inspector 14 and 15 September 2021

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regulates and inspects to achieve excellence in the care of children and young people, and in education and skills for learners of all ages. It regulates and inspects childcare and children’s social care, and inspects the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass), schools, colleges, initial teacher training, further education and skills, adult and community learning, and education and training in prisons and other secure establishments. It assesses council children’s services, and inspects services for children looked after, safeguarding and child protection.

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