Headteacher

Headteacher

Accountable to: The Governing Body

Scale: Grade 22-28 (£83,464 - £96,673)

Nature of Contract: Permanent, Full Time

Pension: Teachers Pension Scheme

Purpose

The Headteacher will provide vision, ambition, leadership and strategic direction, underpinned by clear values, to ensure that the school is managed and organised effectively by working strategically with all partners and stakeholders to develop outstanding provision to transform the educational and future opportunities for all pupils.

Statutory and Non-Statutory Requirements

• Fulfil all the requirements and duties as set out in the School Teachers’ Pay and Conditions Document relating to the conditions of employment of the Headteacher.
• Operate within the framework outlined in the Headteacher’s Standards to ensure best practice within our setting
• Seek to achieve any performance criteria, objectives or targets agreed with, or set by, the Governing Body in accordance with the requirements set out in the School Teachers’ Pay and Conditions document.
• Promote and safeguard the welfare of all children, young people and staff within the school by ensuring that the school’s policies and procedures relating to safeguarding children and vulnerable young adults are fully implemented and followed by all staff sensitively and effectively.

Main Duties

• Be the lead professional and positive role model within the school community.
• Work to an agreed vision, underpinned by clear values which are evident throughout the school.
• Have a direct impact in raising achievement to the highest level through uncompromising high ambition.
• Lead by example in determining the professional conduct and practice of teachers to the highest standards.
• Enable a climate that supports pupils to display exemplary behaviour.
• Be a positive role model in helping others recognise and celebrate difference and respect cultural diversity.
• Have ambition and seize opportunities for the school beyond its boundaries.

Personal Qualities

• Hold and articulate clear values and moral purpose focused on providing an outstanding education for all pupils.
• Demonstrate optimistic personal behaviour, positive relationships and attitudes towards pupils, parents and carers, Governors and the local community.
• Lead by example, with integrity, creativity, resilience and clarity, drawing on your own scholarship, expertise and skills, and that of those around you.
• Sustain wide current knowledge and understanding of Education, SEND and school systems locally, nationally and globally and pursue continuous professional development.
• Work with political and financial astuteness, within a clear set of principles centred on the school’s vision, ably translating Local Authority and National Policy into the Special School context.
• Communicate compellingly the school’s vision and drive strategic leadership, empowering all staff and pupils to excel.

Pupils and Staff

• Demand ambitious standards for all pupils with particular reference to personalised progression, overcoming barriers to learning and disadvantage whilst advancing equality and instilling a strong sense of accountability in staff for the impact of their work on pupils’ outcomes.
• Secure excellent teaching through an analytical understanding of how pupils learn and the core features of successful classroom practice and curriculum design, leading to rich curriculum opportunities and enhanced pupils’ well-being.
• Establish an open educational culture as a basis for sharing good practice within and beyond school, drawing on and conducting relevant research and robust data analysis.
• Create an ethos within which all staff are motivated and supported to develop their own skills and subject knowledge and to support each other.
• Identify emerging talents, coaching current and aspiring leaders in a climate where excellence is the standard, leading to clear succession planning. Hold all staff to account for their professional conduct and practice.

Organisational Management

• Ensure that the school’s systems, organisation and processes are well considered, efficient and fit for purpose upholding the principles of transparency, integrity and probity.
• Provide a safe, calm and well-ordered environment for all pupils and staff focused on safeguarding pupils and developing their exemplary behaviour in school and the wider society.
• Establish rigorous, fair and transparent systems and measures for managing the performance of all staff, addressing any underperformance, supporting staff to improve and valuing excellent practice.
• Welcome strong governance and actively support the governing body to understand its role and deliver its functions effectively, in particular in setting school strategy and to hold the Headteacher to account for pupil, staff and financial performance.
• Exercise strategic curriculum led financial planning to ensure the equitable deployment of budget, resources and accommodation in the best interests of pupils’ achievements and to maintain a sustainable future.
• Distribute leadership throughout the organisation, forging teams of colleagues who have distinct roles and responsibilities and hold each other to account for their decision making.

Continuous School Improvement

• Create an outward facing school which works with other schools and organisations in a climate of mutual support and challenge to champion best practice and excellent academic outcomes.
• Develop effective relationships with fellow professionals and colleagues in other public services to improve social and health outcomes for all pupils.
• Challenge educational orthodoxies in the best interests of achieving excellence, harnessing the findings of well evidenced research to drive school improvement.
• Shape the current and future quality of the teaching profession through high quality training and sustained professional development for all staff. Model entrepreneurial and innovative approaches to service improvement, leadership and governance, and to be confident of the vital contribution of internal and external accountability.
• Inspire and influence others within and beyond school to believe in the fundamental
• importance of Special Education and to promote its value.

The Headteacher will contribute to the school’s objectives in service delivery by:

• Enactment of Health and Safety requirements and initiatives as directed
• Compliance with Data Protection legislation
• At all times operating within the school’s equal opportunities framework

A copy of this document will be held on file in school and may be amended at any time after consultation with the post holder

How to Apply

In addition to the information contained within this pack, you can find out more about our school by visiting our website at www.heartoftheforestschool.co.uk

Copies of our Safeguarding and Safer Recruitment Policies can be found on the Vacancies page of our website.

You are also encouraged to visit the school before completing your application. Please contact: Lizzie Spowart or Olivia Lord on 01594 822175 to make an appointment.

We hope that when you have completed your research you will be excited at the prospect of joining us at Heart of the Forest. So please read the person specification carefully and take the

opportunity to demonstrate that you have the qualities that we are looking for when you complete the application form.

Please submit your application to Wendy Gallagher, Governor Services, Gloucestershire County Council. Email: governor.services@gloucestershire.gov.uk

The key dates of the selection process are: 

Closing Date: Friday 28th February 2025 at Noon

Interviews: Wednesday 19th and Thursday 20th March 2025