Survey of Parental

Perceptions

Oldmachar Academy e-Magazine

Contents

Context ... 3

Core Parental Priorities 45

Homework & Challenge 67

Expectations / Recommendations 89

Perceptions of Our Systems 1011

Other Priorities 1213

Health and Wellbeing 1415

Special Features

Read about:

How parents rate our schools delivery of education

What we are going to do to take on board the perceptions of parents

This e-magazine collates a range of articles which have featured in recent school

newsletters. They have all featured aspects of the recent parental survey of percep-

tions, which was conducted in October 2013. This survey can be compared to a previ-

ous survey which was concluded in 2011.

344 parents took the trouble to complete the survey, giving us a strong evidence base

for our future planning. We thank everyone for the effort they took. In response, the

articles shown here give a detailed analysis of perceptions of parents across a range

of issues. We will use this information to get everyone thinking about what we need

to do now to improve our school further.

3

This e-magazine collates a range of articles which have featured in recent school

newsletters. They have all featured aspects of the recent parental survey of percep-

tions, which was conducted in October 2013. This survey can be compared to a previ-

ous survey which was concluded in 2011.

344 parents took the trouble to complete the survey, giving us a strong evidence base

for our future planning. We thank everyone for the effort they took. In response, the

articles shown here give a detailed analysis of perceptions of parents across a range

of issues. We will use this information to get everyone thinking about what we need

to do now to improve our school further.

Analysis

We tested the attitude of parents to

the new school blazer for S4S6 and

its potential to improve ethos in S1

S3.

The tables below show the strong

endorsement for the implementation

of the blazers. In summary, parents

can be said to have expressed the

following views:

S4S6 Blazer

Approve: 70%

Disapprove: 7%

Dont Know / Care: 22%

S1S3 Blazer

Approve: 64%

Disapprove: 24%

Dont Know / Care: 12%

We will now reflect on how we can

take forward the implementation of

an S1S3 blazer for next session.

Pupils will be consulted about this

development over the next few

weeks.

Core Priorities

4

In 2011 we undertook a major survey of stakeholder attitudes to our school. We did this to get a

sense of what our parents felt our planning priorities should be. Two years on, we have updated

the survey. Thank you to all of the parents who responded.

344 completed questionnaires were returned representing over 40% of the parent body. A num-

ber of statements were tested, to show parents attitudes. We are very pleased to report that over

25% of parents said that the school had improved in the past year. This is a strong endorsement of

our improvement planning.

Our parents also supplied a written comments which we will be reading and responding to in due

course.

5

Analysis

Our parents have told us that they

believe the school has improved over

the past year.

1/4 of parents surveyed confirmed

that this was their view, with only

very few saying that they felt the

schools performance had got worse.

Parents have rated the school overall

higher compared to the survey two

years ago.

The three factors that parents felt the

school was best at are:

Control of Bullying

School Discipline

School Security

The three things that parent rate

lowest are:

School facilities

Careers Advice

Computer Access

In 2011 we undertook a major survey of stakeholder attitudes to our school. We did this to get a

sense of what our parents felt our planning priorities should be. Two years on, we have updated

the survey. Thank you to all of the parents who responded.

344 completed questionnaires were returned representing over 40% of the parent body. A num-

ber of statements were tested, to show parents attitudes. We are very pleased to report that over

25% of parents said that the school had improved in the past year. This is a strong endorsement of

our improvement planning.

Our parents also supplied a written comments which we will be reading and responding to in due

course.

Weighted Previous %

Criteria Score % Survey Change

Control of bullying 69.8 64.8 +5.0

School discipline 69.6 67.1 +2.5

School security 69.2 67.4 +1.8

Developing moral values 68.3 67.6 +0.7

Exam results 67.9 68.3 -0.4

Levels of homework 67.0 67.7 -0.6

School communication 66.9 65.3 +1.6

Social health education 66.8 67.4 -0.6

Caring teachers 66.3 63.9 +2.5

Happiness of child 65.8 65.6 +0.2

Choice of subjects 65.4 66.4 -1.0

Developing confidence 65.3 63.0 +2.3

Teaching quality 64.8 65.2 -0.4

Availability of resources 64.5 62.5 +2.0

Developing potential 64.5 64.4 +0.1

Truancy control 64.3 64.4 -0.1

Community spirit 64.3 67.3 -3.0

Computer access 62.6 63.3 -0.7

Careers advice 61.6 66.3 -4.7

School facilities 56.9 56.8 +0.1

"Overall" Rating 72.9 72.1 +0.8

Analysis of Homework

Our parents report that students in

Oldmachar Academy are doing more

homework than they were two years

ago.

This is true in all year groups, with

the exception of S4, in which year the

figure has fallen slightly.

It is important that our students re-

ceive meaningful homework, which is

one way in which we provide an addi-

tional challenge for young people.

Levels of homework have improved

markedly in S1S2.

We continue to be concerned at the

gap between the levels of homework

being done by girls compared to

boys.

The lesson from this is that perhaps

boys need to spend a bit more time

doing homework tasks.

Amount of Homework

6

Information about Homework

The tables above show the number of hours that parents report

young people are doing on a weekly basis.

The top table shows the figures overall.

The middle table shows the figures for boys.

The bottom table shows figures for girls.

One thing that concerns us is that it looks as though parents feel S4

students could be doing more homeworkwe will be addressing this.

7

Reflection on Challenge

One of the things that teachers are

reflecting on is the extent to which

our courses and programmes are

challenging to the young people.

Overall, 11% of parents believe that

their children are being pushed too

hard in at least one thing. While,

30% of parents believe that their chil-

dren are not being pushed hard

enough in anything.

This session we have new curricular

programmes in operation for stu-

dents in S3 and S4 and this has

changed significantly the experience

of learning for young people in thee

two years.

In particular we will be considering

parental feedback on these two year

groups, especially as half of our S3

parents have told us that their chil-

dren are not being pushed hard

enough in any one thing. Since our

S3 curriculum is designed to promote

breadth, this is perhaps not surpris-

ing. Indeed, almost 30% of parents

thought their S3 child was being

pushed too hard overall. Teachers

will want students to feel challenged

and will reflect on how to take for-

ward the S3 curriculum.

On the contrary, S4 seems to present

a much more significant challenge

that it did two years ago. Signifi-

cantly, fewer parents think that their

children are not being pushed hard

in anything.

Level of Challenge

Here the views of parents of S3 and

S4 students from 2011 are com-

pared to the same year group for

2013. Fewer S3 parents think their

children are being pushed hard

enough in anythingbut many

more S4 parents think their young

people are being challenged.

Pushed too hard?

Not pushed hard enough?

Expectations

It is important to us that parents of

students coming to the school feel

that it meets their expectations. We

want people to have high expectations

of our school and we work really hard

to meet these high expectations.

72% of parents new to the school told

us that it was as expected, or better.

This is a good endorsement of our

work. Only 4% of parents thought

that the school was worse than ex-

pected. A quarter of parents ex-

pressed no opinion. This may be part-

ly explained by the fact that the survey

was done after ten weeks of the ses-

sion being completed.

The graph below shows this broken

down by primary school. This infor-

mation may ne of use to our primary

colleagues and can be useful in plan-

ning future transition processes.

Expectations & Recommendations

8

Expectations & Recommendations Parental Recommendations

In this section we look at the overall level of parental recommendation of

Oldmachar Academy. We can report that 90% of parents would recom-

mend this school to another parent. This is very pleasing information for

us to have. However, staff of the school will consider how we might ad-

dress the fact that a number of parents would not recommend the school.

The tables below show the way in which parents recommendations

change depending on the gender of their child, with boys parents rating

us higher. In addition, the lowest recommendation level we received was

from S4 parents (78%). While this is still very good, nonetheless, we

would like to explore this with parents in cure course.

9

Analysis of Recommendations

It is important that the school has the

confidence of its parental body and that

it builds trust with them over time. A

number of factors can interfere with the

level of confidence that a group of par-

ents can have.

We will be exploring the factors that

may have led girls parents to rate us

lower than boys parents.

We will also be exploring the factors

that have led our S4 parents to rate our

work less highly that the parents of oth-

er year groups.

Some factors might be related to the

fact that this year we are implementing

new national courses for young people

in S4. This has been a challenging devel-

opment and it may have affected the

confidence of parents in our work.

We will review this with teachers in the

coming months.

School Discipline

Two of the most improved areas of

school performance over the past few

years is that of School Discipline and

Control of Bullying.

Parents report that these areas are

better than when we last surveyed

their perceptions.

This information correlates with feed-

back from students themselves, who

have also reported that these things

are better than in the past.

We have worked hard to improve this

area in the last two years. We have a

clear set of procedures for respond-

ing to incidences of pupil behaviour

which disrupts learning. We are also

implementing Restorative Practice, as

part of our Respect Campaign.

We will be introducing these ideas to

parents in workshops as this session

progressesthis should help parents

to feel even more positive about our

work.

Perceptions of Our Systems

10

Caring Teachers and Pupil Confidence

Two of the most important parental priorities are that we are caring as teachers

about young people and that we develop their confidence and potential. Most

parents think that we are good at this but there are a number of parents think

that we are neither good nor poor at this.

Over the next few months we will reflect on how we can improve these percep-

tions. This will feature in our discussions with parents and students. We hope

that everyone will support our work in developing this area.

Caring Teachers and Pupil Confidence

Two of the most important parental priorities are that we are caring as teachers

about young people and that we develop their confidence and potential. Most

parents think that we are good at this but there are a number of parents think

that we are neither good nor poor at this.

Over the next few months we will reflect on how we can improve these percep-

tions. This will feature in our discussions with parents and students. We hope

that everyone will support our work in developing this area.

11

Analysis

We are pleased that almost half of

parents think that the school website

is an effective source of information.

We also take some confidence from

the fact that very few people thought

that it was not an effective source of

information.

However, we will consider ways to

make the website a more useful envi-

ronment for all parents.

We plan to consider ways of laying

out information so that it is more ac-

cessible and easy to explore.

The most important aspects of our

website are that it allows to share

information about:

Curriculum for Excellence

Our students achievements

News of recent and forthcoming

events

Policy and procedure

Our school website

Systems for Communicating

In the last eighteen months we have had approximately 90,000 hits on our

school website. It is a rich source of information and has over two hundred

pages of content. When it was developed, we consulted with students and

parents about what to include.

In this session, we plan to review the material that is presented on the web-

site and would welcome the input of any parent who felt that they could

make a contribution to this process.

We also ask that if any parent has an idea about something they would like

to see included on the website, but which is not there at present, we would

be pleased to hear about it.

Other Parental Priorities Promoting Citizenship We are reassured to find that par-

ents perceptions of the other key priorities we sought their views

about have been so positive.

The strong endorsement of certain

issues related to the promotion of

citizenship is a sign that we are

working effectively with parents to

achieve our objective of ensuring

that all of our young people are

Successful Learners, Confident In-

dividuals, Effective Contributors

and Responsible Citizens.

One of the key Experiences and

Outcomes of Curriculum for Excel-

lence says that young people

should be able to do the following:

I recognise that each individ-ual has a unique blend of abili-ties and needs. I contribute to making my school community one which values individuals equally and is welcoming for all.

We cannot achieve this important

objective without parental support.

12

Issue Weighted

Score %

Promoting racial harmony 71.1

Treating all pupils fairly and equally 70.9

Attitude of non-teaching support staff 69.1

Encouraging local community activity 68.6

School uniform 67.1

Explaining to parents how to help their child 66.7

Encouraging and listening to parent views 66.6

Encouraging and listening to pupil views 66.2

Teaching for special needs 66.0

Quality of school management 65.5

Handling complaints 65.3

Tailoring workload to child's needs and ability 65.0

Ensuring pupils do best and make good progress 64.7

Celebrating and rewarding achievement 64.0

Extra curricular activities 51.3

Please note that survey results

of 65% approval or over reflect

a successful element.

Analysis

It is a good thing that our teachers

are generally in tune with our parents

and have a number of shared ideas

about what is important about the

school and how it meets the needs of

young people.

But there were one or two difference

of perception that we need to reflect

on. These are listed below:

Developing Confidence is a much

greater priority for our parents

than was appreciated by our

teaching staff. This is something

we can work on addressing

Caring Teachers is also a greater

priority for parents than the staff

of the school had considered it to

be. We will explore this discrep-

ancy in due course

Developing potential is in the top

three of parents priorities.

Teachers will reflect on this.

These three issues will feature in our

future planning as a teaching staff

and we will publish plans to address

13

Parents priorities and

teachers perception of them.

Survey of Parental Perceptions

14

Promoting Health and Wellbeing

In Curriculum for Excellence, all young people are entitled to develop skills for learn-

ing, life and work, with a continuous focus on health and wellbeing.

All teachers have a shared responsibility for this and the schools curriculum map en-

sures that health promotion is effectively planned for and delivered.

In the recent survey we undertook of parental perceptions, we gained important feed-

back on how our parents perceived this delivery. Several aspects were tested, includ-

ing our programmes for social education, as well as how we promote healthy lifestyles

in our young people.

The feedback from parents suggests that we could do better in encouraging a healthy

lifestyle through diet. There is much less approval for this than for the comparative

indicator for how we promote health through exercise.

We will explore this aspect as a priority in the next few months and use this infor-

mation to inform the updated school improvement plan.

Social Education and Happi-ness

We have thought deeply as a staff

about what kinds of attitudes we want

to encourage our young people to

have and how these attitudes might

help them be happier in school.

At the heart of health and well being is

the sense of person has of their own

self worth and how able they feel they

are to improve their own circumstanc-

es. A sense of achieving things in

school helps a young person to feel

motivated and positive about them-

selves.

Teachers understand the importance

of setting relevant and challenging

work for young people. Constructive

feedback on work can play a big part

in developing the skills and confidence

of young people.

We are always happy to hear from

parents if they have questions about

such things. If parents have any

doubts about their childrens learning,

it is better to raise there concerns

at an early stage.

We hope that as our systems for pro-

filing learning bed in this session and

next, and parents have better infor-

mation about their childrens progress

in learning, we can improve the per-

ceptions of parents about the wellbe-

ing of their children in school.

15

Planned Areas for Improvement

Out of Hours Learning

One of the weakest aspects of the recent survey of

parental perceptions was the range of extra-curricular

options that are available to young people in

Oldmachar Academy. We are working to share infor-

mation about such opportunities so that parents are

more aware of what we do. We also have specific

plans being developed for next session which are re-

ally exciting

Childrens University This session we are developing plans on behalf of

Aberdeen City Council to establish a Childrens Uni-

versity centre in Aberdeen. In this scheme, we work

with a range of partners to create different Out of

School Hours Learning opportunities for young peo-

ple. More information about this will be provided in

due course once our plans have evolved.

School Facilities

Our school facilities rated low again in the parental

survey. Some of the things that affect perceptions of

our facilities are beyond the schools control. We

have financial restrictions which affect the extent to

which we can deliver some of the improvements par-

ents might like to see. However, we will explore op-

tions again with our Parent Council. If any parent

has an idea about how we improve a particular as-

pect of the school, please let us know.

Upgrades to the Campus

We currently have plans in place to do the following

upgrades to facilities:

Toilet facilities in two areas will be improved

An upgraded ICT / Research Centre in D Block

Upgraded ICT servers to provide secure access

for mobile technologies in school

Continuous refresh and renovation of decoration

of corridors and classrooms

Nurture Space

Programmes of Work Related Learning

The recent survey identified Careers Advice as an

aspect that parents would like to see improved.

Since funding to Skills Development Scotland has re-

stricted the service they provide to us, we are being

driven to find other solutions. Partly, this will require

students to do more independent research about po-

tential careers. We will also be seeking new ways to

engage with partners, including parents.

Business Mentors

One thing we expanding is our use of Business Men-

tors. We have been part of a pilot scheme this year

involving Career Academies, which has seen a num-

ber of S5/S6 students benefit from weekly contact

with a mentor. This scheme really helps students to

focus on priorities. We hope to expand this pro-

gramme for next session. If any parent thinks they

could contribute to this scheme, please get in touch.

Feedback to Learners

We have been building new systems to improve feed-

back to young people in school. This involves a more

rigorous and structured use of Pupil Planners and use

of Tutor Time to allow young people to reflect on

their learning across the curriculum. This has had

particular benefits in engaging young people and giv-

ing them more control over their progress in learn-

ing. We will be building on this in future.

e-Portfolios

We have been building systems to communicate with

parents in different ways this session. These e-

portfolios are accessed through Glow (the Scottish

Schools Digital Network). We will be running work-

shops in due course to introduce parents to these

tools. We hope to improve these systems in future

and build on them.