Breaking Through the Gender Gap

Halton High School

Halton High School is one of a group of schools trialling an NHS change management process to improve boys' performance. Each school uses a Plan, Do, Study, Act methodology and shares the results to make a real difference for their pupils.

John Rowlands, Headteacher, and Sue Yates, Assistant Headteacher, talk about how the Breakthrough Programme has changed their school.

Halton High School is a school facing challenging circumstances that had experienced a difficult amalgamation. The Breakthrough Programme, run jointly by the NHS National Primary Care Development Team and the DfES Innovation Unit, provided an ideal opportunity to address a number of pressing issues within the school through participation in a national initiative. It was also an opportunity for the people involved to look beyond Halton, and network with schools across the country to broaden their perspectives and appreciation of what can be achieved in a school like ours. Most importantly, it was the vehicle by which we could break into the attainment gap between the performance of boys and girls while tackling complex issues relating to teaching and learning.

The number of boys gaining five GCSE passes at grades A*-C in 2004 improved nationally by 0.9 per cent. In Breakthrough schools the average increase was 3.9 per cent.

Five Breakthrough principles:

1. Use strong leadership to create the environment for change.
2. Focus on teaching and learning methods.
3. Use mentoring and targeted support.
4. Create capacity.
5. Use data to drive improvements.

The key to the success of the programme was the collection and analysis of data which enabled us to modify or extend PDSAs quickly to maximise impact.

Download the full article on Halton Hall, which was published in the Summer 2005 edition of Nexus magazine, here (PDF, 168 Kb).

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