#ChooseWhatYouLove
By Kate Finlay, Head of department; Hethersett Academy
Kate Finlay shares with us her amazing journey as HOD of an award winning, outstanding department and offers some go-to advice.
Looking around a potential new school is like viewing a new house. It comes down to a gut feeling. When I looked round Hethersett Academy in April of 2015, everything felt great. Hethersett is an 11-16 state school just outside Norwich. At the time, the D&T department had 1.5 members of staff and on interview I very quickly could see the amazing potential.
I had been teaching for 12 years but I had never been a head of department. Like most people who have taught for that time I had done aspects of the job, but ‘the buck’, so to speak, had never fallen to me. Rather than be daunted by this, I was quite excited.
Coming from a large team of 9 teachers in my previous school, I was really worried about keeping up to date with changes in our subject, I was concerned about resourcing, and I suppose, in all honesty, I was slightly worried about being good enough to support other colleagues.
I knew I wanted the subject to be an opportunity for the pupils in our care to build their own love for the subject, to explore new technologies, to design freely and I wanted D&T to be the subject that pupils looked for in September when they got their timetables. In my eyes, that's when you know you have made it, D&T was always my number one to check first.
I was aware of my energy levels too. Teaching a full timetable and at that time having two small children, I needed to make everything manageable. I would honestly say to you now, this is my weakness. Why start one project when you can have 6 things bubbling at once....
In the early days, when the department was small, this was OK. But as the department grew in staff numbers, it became something I needed to be aware of. I call it ‘prioritising my D&T excitement!’ From 1.5 teachers and a technician, we have grown to a team of 9 teachers and 2 technicians. Some of these staff are part time.
One of the biggest challenges when I first started was the small numbers of pupils that chose GCSE. After two years of speaking to pupils and going through the motions, it really frustrated me that some of my most competent and keen pupils were not choosing D&T. I did not want to be pushy with them and force them to do it, but I was really interested in why they didn't choose it. I had completed surveys at KS3 and KS4 and everything was extremely positive, but this was not translating into class numbers in Years 10 & 11. Without children choosing us at GCSE I could not really expand the department and get more staff, and I wanted to do this so I could broaden our D&T offer.
There were a few reasons given as to why D&T was not chosen. Sometimes it was down to the options table, sometimes students said it was to do with friendships. I felt there was other things going on too, so I decided to investigate.
One afternoon, a week before options evening, I spoke to a group of totally awesome year 8s; my class 8X. Many said they were not choosing D&T as a GCSE option. So I bluntly asked; ‘Why don't you want to do GCSE D&T with me?’ This was met with a very polite silence. Once they started talking I discovered the following things:
Students were very good at linking future careers to school subjects, but at 13 or 14 years old, most of the students didn’t know the direction of their career, so knowing the career paths available was not influencing their decision.
Some said their parents did not want them to do it, (in the defence of parents, I still am not sure it was as black and white as that, but it gave me good feedback to put more effort into showing families at home what we do in D&T.
That evening on the drive home, I reflected on the conversation with 8x class, it seemed to me that they loved D&T but that wasn’t enough to persuade them to choose it.
I love my job; I am incredibly fortunate to have fallen into a career that I love to bits. I wanted my pupils to find something that they loved. If they love D&T, then why aren't they choosing it? That evening my new campaign emerged... D&T - choose what you love. It was not about the curriculum anymore, or even the parents at home. To get pupils to choose my subject I had to get them to realise that they need to choose subjects they loved. So that is exactly what we did, and we never looked back.
#choosewhatyoulove
Ok... so it wasn't just our hashtag line that sent our GCSE options numbers through the roof. The village of Heathersett had more housing being built and numbers were growing. That October the school was inspected and gained Outstanding status. The school was oversubscribed. However, the rate of growth in D&T was even faster than the rest of the school. We suddenly had two groups of food students and we were able to move from 2 groups of Year 11 D&T to 3.
This year we have 4 groups of Food and 5 groups of D&T. We offer Graphics & Architecture, RM/Product Design and Textiles & Fashion. Our grades have improved as well, we still had a range of grades but having more D&T teachers in the team has really helped to raise the standard and expectations. Teachers work together which directly reduces workload.
We had been successful, we had become popular where previously we were not the ‘go-to’ choice, our pupils had become motivated to take D&T. Pupils were actively investigating D&T-based pathways post 16, they were considering which GCSEs would fit with D&T. The conversations had shifted.
At this time, there were also lots of other things we did that contributed to a change in motivation and in the department. As I do love a list, (it fills me with good intentions and organisation, if only for a fleeting moment.) I thought it might be helpful to list the key points in motivating students in D&T:
Where is the vision? What does D&T look like in your department and how are you visualising that to your pupils? They need to invest in something they can see.
Get to know the pupils you teach. Talk to them, make sure they realise how good they are in D&T but also praise them when they meet a challenge and smash through it.
Keep on top of what is happening in the D&T world. BUT, don't feel overwhelmed by it. Use social media to see what is going on in other schools and D&T organisations. You may not agree with everything, but you may also find moments of inspiration.
How will you market your department? To the rest of the school, parents and families, the children, your staff and outside companies? We used newsletters, postcards home, emails about amazing work and twitter (@madeinhethersett)
Enter competitions. You get great resources and that helps with planning, also often the prizes are awesome. If you can do this with KS3 it is another way to encourage engagement with your subject.
Resourcing and funding. I applied for lots of grants. I do not think that many teachers do this, but I feel that this has helped us be successful. It is easy to say do not worry about funding, but there are lots of ways that you can get extra funding. One of my favourite ideas is having an Amazon (or other) wish list. Then, you may need the approval of your head, write to parents and families, but ask if anyone works for a company that might like to sponsor them. This could be paying for materials or buying a piece of equipment. The great thing here is that you are not asking families, you are asking companies.
