Building a Powerful Partnership for Hospital Education
Maudsley and Bethlem Hospital School (MBHS) is seeking partners from the hospital education sector in London and the south-east interested in exploring the benefits of a multi-academy trust focused on hospital education. We feel that a close-knit family of similar providers would enhance existing provision and allow our most vulnerable young people to thrive, by delivering on a vision of the best education for young people in hospital. We can build the best education for young people in hospital by: •
bringing together a family of providers into a coherent and collaborative hospital school trust that covers the wide remit of hospital education and community-based health-needs alternative provision.
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utilising the qualities, strengths and shared expertise of the family as a launchpad for developing excellence across this new trust.
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building capacity across the trust in the leadership of curriculum, pedagogy, care and support, to impact on quality in each setting.
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leveraging economies through the trust to provide further capacity to support the learning of pupils.
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using the formal and permanent partnership of the new trust to drive collaboration and develop next practice in hospital school provision, benefitting the trust and other hospital schools.
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creating an additional clear and effective voice to promote and advocate for hospital education, working within and supporting NAHE.
Why should we consider a specialist hospital school trust? •
Hospital education is a specific alternative provision. It often operates at regional and at times national level and is therefore different to locally commissioned provision for SEND or alternative provision for excluded pupils. Collaborative work will be most effective with similar partners.
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This collaborative work will help to build a coherent approach to hospital education, not requiring all settings to do the same thing, but building a mutually agreed framework that acts as a guarantee of quality provision in hospital schools.
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Individual hospital schools are small and often vulnerable, with limited local support available to develop practice. A family of such schools linked through a formal trust structure, can help to protect our unique provisions for future pupils, building quality provision across the sector.
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As educators we have a moral responsibility to develop and share high-quality work in order to have the most significant positive impact on the widest range of young people. Such an impact sits at the heart of the charitable aims of a school trust; a hospital school trust will deliver this for some of the most vulnerable young people in our society.
The contribution of MBHS to this family of hospital schools: •
We are an outstanding school (OFSTED 2011, 2016, 2021), based in world renowned south London psychiatric hospitals, Maudsley and Bethlem Royal.
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We work with a range of wards and services, ranging from general adolescent units to a psychiatric intensive care unit, an eating disorders service and a specialist enhanced treatment service providing Tier 4 care to pupils in the community.
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We deliver world-class education through: o individual learning pathways that provide the best educational outcomes for young people in hospital o a well-established set of progress and outcome measures that have been specifically selected and developed to enable us to measure how well our pupils are doing across a range of academic, classroom functioning and wellbeing standards o models of reintegration planning via a highly developed programme (Joining the Dots) which prepares pupils through guided learning and peer support to return to their home schools o established partnerships with a wide range of external organisations (e.g., London Sinfonia, Dulwich Picture Gallery) that build cultural capital and enable us to provide exciting opportunities to pupils beyond the classroom o a highly bespoke management information system (R3flect) created specifically for our school and hospital education in general and which is already being adopted by other hospital schools o high quality senior leadership experience in psychiatric and medical settings o capacity to develop and lead a hospital school trust o excellent governance with a commitment to developing collaboration for the benefit of young people Visit our website (link below) to find out more about our vision and values.
We are looking to begin a discussion with local and regional hospital education providers to explore this proposal, without any commitment to joining a trust or other family of schools. We envisage three phases to the discussions. Phase 1 – exploration This will consider the broad question of how a family of hospital schools and providers, either in a trust or another arrangement, would add value to the education of our pupils and the wider hospital education sector. We would also explore the optimum make up of such a family. At the end of phase 1, each participating provider would make a decision on whether to participate in phase 2. Phase 2 – development This will consider organisational, leadership and governance structures, as well as legal and technical issues relevant to the hospital sector. More importantly this will be the opportunity to refine a powerful and ambitious educational vision. At the end of phase 2, each participating provider would need the commitment of the Governing Body to move to phase 3. Phase 3 – implementation Creation of a full implementation plan, with dates for establishment of the trust and conversion of schools to academies, or similar for alternative structures. MBHS has engaged the services of Gordon Smith of Education-Leadership Ltd to support the delivery of this work. We would be delighted to meet with you to discuss this opportunity.
Maarten Crommelin Mickey Kelly Headteacher Chair of Governors
www.maudsley-bethlemhospital.southwark.sch.uk