Cardinal Hume school named as 1 of 9 schools leading new language hub
Cardinal Hume Catholic School in Gateshead has been named as one of nine schools leading a new national languages hub.
The main aim of the MFL Hubs programme is to improve access to high quality MFL subject teaching, particularly for disadvantaged pupils, drawing on the findings of the Teaching Schools Council review led by Ian Bauckham.
Each Hub will be led by a school, which has an established record of excellent MFL teaching, that will provide intensive support to four other hub schools to help them improve their MFL pedagogy, and less intensive support to a larger number of schools in their local area.
The specific objectives for each hub will be set at the beginning of the programme, but Cardinal Hume will expect to see:
- an increase in the proportion of pupils choosing to take MFL subjects at GCSE in the four hub schools;
- improvements in MFL teaching in key stages 3 and 4 in the four hub schools;
- free MFL CPD events which are offered to local schools; and
- resources to support MFL teachers being developed and made freely available
The MFL Hubs and Lead Schools will be supported by a Centre of Excellence (CoE) for MFL Pedagogy.
Where are the MFL Hubs and which schools are leading them?
There will be nine MFL Hubs and they are located in different areas of the country. The Lead Schools are:
- Archbishop Temple School, Preston, Lancashire
- Blatchington Mill School and Sixth Form, Hove, East Sussex
- Cardinal Hume Catholic School, Gateshead, Tyne and Wear
- Dartford Grammar School, Dartford, Kent
- Dixons Kings Academy, Bradford, West Yorkshire
- Presdales School, Ware, Hertfordshire
- Sir William Borlase’s Grammar School, Marlow, Buckinghamshire
- St James’ School, Exeter, Devon
- The Broxbourne School, Broxbourne, Hertfordshire
The Lead Schools were chosen through a competitive process. Around 280 secondary schools that met stringent criteria with regard to MFL results were invited to submit Expressions of Interest. 54 schools submitted Expressions of Interest and of those, 18 were invited to interview.
What will Lead Schools be doing?
Lead schools will have a vital role in the success of the MFL Hubs and will provide leadership for their hub. Lead schools will provide training and support to the four schools in their hub to enable them to improve MFL pedagogy. Although specific details of support will be agreed between the hub schools and the CoE, the range of activity is likely to include:
- Undertaking diagnostic work with hub partners to determine what support is required and inform planning of bespoke, school-to-school support packages;
- Developing school-to-school support that allows teachers to acquire skills to teach MFL GCSE to a wide ability range and increase the number of pupils studying the subject;
- Provision of intensive school-to-school support to four hub schools, each specialist teacher delivering an agreed number of days of intensive support to each partner school;
- Establishing teacher groups that use evidence-informed approaches to professional development such as “Lesson Study” and “Teacher Research Groups” which will develop schemes of work, lesson plans and a range of teaching resources;
- Developing resources to support hub schools which will be made widely available by the centre of excellence;
- Working with the CoE to deliver at least one regional CPD event per annum and help to publicise to schools in the local area.
Ultimately the aim of Cardinal Hume’s hub school is create and develop an ever expanding high quality network of MFL excellence across the partnership of schools within the North East that will inspire and motivate young people to explore, develop and nurture their language skills.
You can read more on this project on the Government website.