Aspen Heights British School see GL progress results increase using CENTURY

Kate Plumb, Vice Principal and Head of Secondary, at Aspen Heights British School spoke to CENTURY about the platform’s impact on GL scores across English, maths and science.

What initially prompted you to choose CENTURY for your school?

Initially, one of our sister ISP schools, who had experience of using CENTURY, shared with us that they felt it had a great impact on teaching and learning. We then started a few years ago, with a very small year 11 trial and have built from there to use across the core subjects from year 7 to year 11.

How have you found the process of getting set up and the ongoing support?

The support to set up was phenomenal. We had lots of online and face to face sessions. This meant we could set up our SLT, MLT and our teachers. 

How do you use the platform?

We use it in class for starter activities and also as flipped learning for homework, and then again to consolidate learning. For our year 11s, we’re currently using it a lot to set whole year group interventions. Using question analysis of the mock exams, heads of department have then set specific units on CENTURY.

Since launching, what’s the feedback been from your teachers? 

Once they got used to the dashboard and the configuration, they found it so easy to use. The data for intervention groups and stretch groups is all easily accessible. 

Has the platform reduced workload and saved teacher time?

Yes it has. We use the platform in a variety of ways and have really seen an impact in terms of homework. It doesn’t require any marking by teachers, and the dashboards make it very easy to see how students have progressed, whether you set them a diagnostic or a nugget.

What’s the feedback been like from students? 

The students are super invested, because they saw their results go up from last year. The students enjoy using it, but especially now they see the impact on their own results, they are really motivated, which is marvellous.

What kind of impact have you seen since using CENTURY?

Our biggest impact has been through our external GL progress testing series data for English, maths and science, particularly our year nine cohort, which was one of our year groups that needed more intervention and support. We invested heavily in CENTURY usage with that cohort, and we saw the ADEK attainment results for English and maths go from weak to good and very good, and for science to go from weak to outstanding.

What do you do to monitor progress with CENTURY?

We incorporate it into our assessment cycle now for our half-termly data drops. Our teams are encouraged to use CAT4 and GL data, so they know the potential of the children, but also to have the CENTURY dashboards open. This is really helpful to see the intervention they’ve put in place, how they’ve stretched them. They can look at the modules against their summative assessment data as well to make a really accurate judgment. 

Is there anything else that you do to measure success with the platform?

We review usage of the platform in our MLT Twilight sessions. Every term we have, we do a deep dive into CENTURY and into some of our other platforms as well. We look at the usage and where we can improve in certain areas, and we map that into our departmental action plans.

Have parents and guardians provided any feedback about the platform?

We do a family workshop at the beginning of every academic year to demonstrate the platform to parents and guardians. For us, it’s an investment in our school, and we wouldn’t make that investment if we didn’t feel that it had a great impact. When we showcase the platform to parents, we get a much bigger buy-in from them. 

What are your plans for going forward with CENTURY?

The next stage of development for us is to map performance against our GCSE results and again complete some deep dive subject analysis. 

If you would like to learn more about embedding CENTURY in your international school, book a demo. If you are already a CENTURY customer and want to learn more about how Aspen Heights British School integrated the platform at their school, contact your Account Manager.