Interview: Heathlands School’s co-Headteachers on their recent double Outstanding grade (BSL)

Could you tell us a bit about Heathlands for people who don’t know about the school?

Heathlands School is a specialist school for deaf children from the ages of 3 to 18 offering a primary and secondary department as well as a residential provision for students who cannot travel daily.

Following a Total Communication approach, Heathlands is now the largest Deaf school in the UK that uses sign language. Heathlands is based in St Albans, Hertfordshire and was the last deaf school to be built back in 1975.

Congratulations on your recent success with the Ofsted inspections. Could you tell me more about how you’ve pushed the school forward – what have your main aims been?

Heathlands was graded as Outstanding for the high quality of education in 2017, the main aim was to maintain and consolidate this.  We wanted to build on the outstanding reputation of Heathlands, create a deep sense of pride in the school and continue to further develop the staff team.

We have a fabulous school community, a highly trained teaching team across both lower and upper school and a strong sense of school pride amongst all that attend Heathlands.  Heathlands students also have established themselves in the community, standing up and talking at the BSL Act rallies, taking part in international competitions and generally being proactive showing that signing children can achieve!

Did you expect to get such a strong result from the inspections?

We knew that the provision and education offered at Heathlands is outstanding and this is seen  daily in the progress of every student. But in an inspection, you need to ensure that the inspectors also see this.  The leadership team did a great job to showcase all of the good work and all lessons observed were of the standard Heathlands high expectations.

The school ran as normal during the inspection and despite some initial nerves the inspectors were able to view everyday practice from all.  Ofsted inspectors rarely have experience and backgrounds in deaf education, so it was vital that we made sure they understood how deaf children learn and demonstrated this well.

What are your main aims for the future – where do you see the school in a few years time?

Heathlands is growing! Due to increasing numbers building work has begun on site for additional primary and secondary classrooms! But most importantly, this summer we have finally had Local Authority approval to extend the age range at Heathlands up to 18 which means from September 2024 we will be offering A Level education.

This is essential because signing deaf students who want to take A Levels are very restricted in where they can attend. There is no setting where deaf students are taught directly by a subject specialist Teacher of the Deaf alongside a signing deaf peer group to ensure they maximise their potential. A Levels is a huge jump from GCSEs, however with subject specialist teachers delivering the curriculum through a Total Communication approach we know our students can achieve A levels and go on to further education.

Over the years we have been dismayed at how some of our leavers have struggled and it can take an extended time to achieve their path into University due to lack of accessibility and limited peers in education which also affects well-being.  We look forward to students updating us on their future careers and learning destinations and enabling them to achieve their full potential.

I noticed that you share the role of headteacher – how does that work?

We share the Headteacher role equally and retain 50% of our previous roles- Pastoral Lead and SENCO. The Co-Headship works well as we both have different backgrounds being deaf and hearing, primary trained and secondary trained yet the same goals- that deaf children should be achieving highly and embracing all opportunities that are offered to them.

What are you most proud of from your work at the school?

There are too many things to be proud of at Heathlands, the staff team are amazing, our Governors are very supportive, the children are bright, enthusiastic and love learning and we have a lovely network of families.  The progress we have all made as a school community is inspiring and drives us all on to achieve higher every term and every year.

Slowly sign language is becoming more valued in education with research evidencing the difference that having BSL as a first language makes to deaf children’s language development and educational achievements. It will be exciting with the development of the BSL Act as well as the BCSL GCSE to see what the future holds!

Find out more about Heathlands at: https://heathlands.herts.sch.uk