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26th November 2024
College wins prestigious award for vital support of its vulnerable students
The College is delighted to announce it has secured an ARC Alex Timpson Award in the post-16 category this week. This prestigious award is in recognition of the impact of a key support service the College offers to support students who have been affected by trauma in their lives.
The College’s innovative Attachment and Trauma Aware Practice looks at how students behave through a trauma-informed lens, to ensure teaching staff, support services and parents are equipped to utilise adaptive teaching strategies to better support more vulnerable learners.
This now award-winning, learning-enhancing practice at The City of Liverpool College was developed to help improve support for a significant number of students from disadvantaged backgrounds, many of whom have not followed a traditional schooling route.
Gill Williams, Director of Personal Development and Progression, said: “This award is very meaningful to us as the College is very much committed to turning disadvantage into advantage.
“We attract students from all over the Liverpool City Region, including two local authorities in the top five areas of deprivation in the country. A quarter of our 16–18-year-old cohort access financial support and a significant number of our students have special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) or may have experienced the care system as unaccompanied asylum-seeking children. Because of this, becoming trauma aware was a key strategic aim for us, to help us fully understand and address complex issues faced by students.
“The award recognises the strong support services we have in place to ensure our affected students can learn in an inclusive, safe environment, ensuring students can overcome key barriers to succeed.”
What we did
To ensure a cultural change and drive up standards in further, the College ran intensive training for its executive and senior leadership team from Trauma Informed Schools UK (TIS), before broadening this out to all staff, who were all trained as part of the wider CPD programme.
To develop this further, the College collaborated with other colleges, joining the Attachment Aware and Trauma Informed (AATI) Colleges, a steering group of Further Education professionals that meet regularly to develop trauma informed approaches across the sector, presenting at the 2024 Association of Colleges (AoC) conference, as well as working with the Department for Education (DfE) to review policy and include key practices in teacher training.
The College has also been working with Liverpool Virtual School to help improve wraparound, holistic support for care-experienced learners and it also works closely with Ofsted to review how it grades and report on the most disadvantaged learners.
The College has noted impressive outcomes, including improved attendance and punctuality. Students are supported more closely in line with needs, improving their experience and educational outcomes.
The more flexible, agile curriculum in place is also helping students enrol onto higher level courses.
Sharing best practice
A Learner Support Agreement (LSA) is in place for young people in the care system, ensuring key support is provided to drive success in education, training and employment.
The College is building on this award-winning support and continues to collaborate with partners from across the Liverpool City Region and the wider FE sector, further developing ways of working and sharing best practice.
Damien Kilkenny, the College’s Deputy Principal, said: “We are delighted with this award recognition and the achievements that led us to win it. We look forward to the future, building support further and continuing our journey as a highly inclusive institution that helps learners from a range of backgrounds achieve their ambitions.”
Apply for a course at The City of Liverpool College here
College information: 0151 252 3000 or email: enquiry@liv-coll.ac.uk
