Cirencester College

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Summary of key findings

This is a good provider Governors, leaders, and managers know their local area particularly well.

They ensure that the curriculum meets students' individual needs and prepares them well for their next steps. Most students and apprentices make at least good progress during their time at college or work. Staff support their students well, helping them to remain in learning.

Students attend regularly, are highly motivated to learn, enjoy their studies and work hard during lessons. Students and apprentices benefit from well-resourced classrooms, practical areas and open study areas. A very high proportion of students move on to high-performing universities, apprenticeships or employment....

Teachers use their expert knowledge well to help students deepen their understanding and aspire to achieve challenging targets. The large majority of apprentices complete their programme on time. They develop the high-level technical skills and behaviours that their employers value.

A small minority of teaching does not challenge the most able or support the least able students sufficiently. Consequently, these students do not make the progress of which they are capable. Too few A-level students who plan to go into employment or apprenticeships have a work placement with an external employer.

Too few students studying on level 2 vocational courses or following intermediate apprenticeships complete their programmes successfully.

Information about the provider

Cirencester Sixth Form College is located on a single campus. Most students are aged 16 to 18 and follow level 3 programmes.

Of these, two thirds study on a broad range of A-level programmes and a third combine A levels and vocational programmes or take vocational programmes alone. The College has a small adult learning provision previously delivered by a sub-contractor. The College currently has 122 apprentices in training.

The immediate local area has a low unemployment rate. The wide college catchment includes very rural areas of Gloucestershire with poor infrastructure and isolation and urban wards in Gloucester and Swindon which experience high levels of deprivation. Over a third of students come from Swindon, which has one of the lowest rates of progression to higher education in England.

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