Ethos

Ethos and Curriculum Intent:

At the heart of our ethos is the moral imperative to improve the life chances of all our young people. We start by putting children and their parent carers first in our decision making. We promote a rich and balanced curriculum that is enjoyable, aspirational, ambitious and innovative for our children. We have created a safe, healthy and caring environment in our academies where children can grow up confidently. We work collectively and cooperatively across our academies to achieve the synergies that a multi-academy trust can bring and this is enhanced by the active participation of the University of Lincoln in working with us. All the Trust’s academies are expected to uphold its mission, values and curriculum intent, whilst interpreting them to meet their local community needs.

Mission:

To inspire our young people to be confident they can make a positive contribution to the world in which they live, by establishing high aspirations, promoting educational excellence and providing a caring and safe environment.

Our vision is a Trust that is:

Contstantly focused on improving the quality of education in our academies
Committed to a broad and relevant curriculum with a wide range of opportunities beyond the classroom
A first choice destination for parents/carers, pupils and staff
A community of academies that enhances the personal development of pupils, so they become confident citizens
Creating life-long learners able to update or reskill themselves throughout their lifetime
Promoting an understanding of fairness, justice, equality, discrimination and democracy
Seeking to improve social mobility in everything we do
Providing learning environments that are exciting, stimulating and high quality
Providing opportunities to raise aspirations and opportunities for pupils and staff by working with the University of Lincoln
Commited to equality of opportunity and supports staff in progressing their careers
Prioritising professional development for all our staff and promoting teamwork
Ambitious to grow the number of academies in the Trust in a carefully managed development, but also to develop partnerships and alliances
Providing outstanding leadership and strong governance at all levels

Curriculum Intent

Create a curriculum which embeds the mission and values of the Trust yet is crafted in a manner that meets the distinctive needs of each community and all the stakeholders in each academy.
Provide our young people with access to the knowledge, experiences and skills necessary to equip them for life, building their cultural capital so that they are knowledgeable about a wide range of cultures and have access to a broad range of experiences to deploy during their life.
Consult regularly with parents, carers and young people on their curriculum needs to ensure we have the right balance of provision which is broad and balanced, recognising that our young people learn in different ways and have different needs and interests.
Ensure there are different pathways to learning, yet guaranteeing equality of opportunity for all young people.
Prioritise learning in communication, literacy and numeracy for every young person.
Develop skills and knowledge that enable young people to be confident and healthy citizens in the digital world.
Provide opportunities for developing interest and talent in sports, music and creative arts
Promote learning, on occasions outside the classroom, which develops resilience and self-worth.
Build knowledge, skills and understanding in a way that engages and inspires young people in an intelligent, logical and sequential manner.
Celebrating success at all levels to help build confidence and help create develop confident and ambitious young people.

Operational Principles

The operational principles set out how the Trust works which are important to the academies in the Trust and those considering joining it. They are subject to adjustment only in case of significant or sustained underperformance by an academy.The Trust believes it has a moral imperative to work to improve young people’s life chances through high quality educational provision, care and support in south Lincolnshire and its surrounds.

The Trust puts children and young people first in its decision-making.
The Trust has the support of the University of Lincoln as its sponsor, to enhance opportunities for its young people and to provide guidance to its executive staff.
The Trust has clearly defined roles for Members, Trustees and Academy Governing Committees.
The Trust is committed to being an employer of choice, working to national and local conditions of service for staff as well as being members the teacher’s and local government pension schemes.
The Trust seeks to empower its Principals by devolving maximum responsibility to them, as it believes that through their leadership they will drive their academy forward and optimise the educational and developmental performance of young people in their care.
The Trust seeks to have very low central cost for our academies, to ensure the maximum resources are available to support learning and young people.
The CEO/DCEO/Executive Principals have a key role in running the Trust and monitoring performance, but are seen as facilitators of partnership working with Principal’s having a key role in academy policy decisions.
The Trust has common child protection and safeguarding policies.
The Trust has common accountancy policies and systems
The Trust has common policies and procedures for all employment matters
The Trust has common policies for health and safety, including fire safety.
The Trust does not pool academy budgets and its policy is not to do so. It is committed to maintaining the national/local allocated funding for each academy.
Each academy is expected to run within a balanced budget or better during each academic year.
The Trust allows all academies to maintain their own reserves, if reserves have to be used by another academy, it will be arranged through an intra-trust loan, set for a period of time and agreed by the Trust.

If we have Condition Improvement Funding (CIF) delegated, it would be allocated across the Trust on a needs base criteria agreed by the Trust

Our Approach

Our approach to continuous improvement in our academies is based on five tenets:

Setting high aspirations for every learner in all aspects of academy life.
Knowing every learner and designing support and encouragement in a manner that ensures each can grow and know they can achieve in a safe environment.
Providing Inspirational teaching by high quality staff that embeds literacy and numeracy in the curriculum, whilst providing a broad and diverse curriculum that captivates children and young people so they become life-long learners, as well as accelerating the learning of disadvantaged students.
Maximising and celebrating every learner’s achievementsand progress through high quality teaching and support.
Promoting exemplary behaviour that is characterised by a respectful and caring environment, in which rules are understood and accepted.