Carmel College retains its Ofsted Outstanding status!

Carmel College has retained its ‘Outstanding’ status after it was re-inspected by Ofsted at the end of April 2019.

The college was graded outstanding when it was previously inspected in 2007. This makes Carmel the only Outstanding Sixth Form College nationally, that has retained its outstanding grade over the last ten years.

Carmel has around 2300 students, including 300 higher education students. Fifty per cent of Carmel’s students come from widening participation postcodes, however the college is consistently ranked in the top 10 colleges nationally for the amount of progress students make.

The college attracts applications from over 90 high schools across St Helens and neighbouring boroughs.

Last year, over 75per cent of students who left Carmel went to work, train or continue their studies in employment areas identified as priorities by the Liverpool City Region LEP. In total, over 98 per cent of students made a positive progression from Carmel to university, further education, apprenticeships or employment.

The college work hard to support local schools to ensure that as many young people as possible, from our area of the North West, are able to progress onto sustainable and positive careers.

They provide local schools with support from staff and students who act as mentors to help motivate and aspire high school students, especially in the areas of maths, creative and digital and life sciences.

With support from the Chambers of Commerce and Liverpool Hope University, they have also this year launched the Carmel Service and Leaders Award. This builds on the community work and volunteering opportunities the college encourages all of our students to take advantage of, great emphasis is also placed on providing excellent careers advice and guidance.

The Ofsted report stated: “Students strive to achieve the very high standards their teachers set. They make excellent progress, achieve their qualifications and progress to aspirational destinations.”

Carmel College principal Mike Hill, said: “We are extremely happy with the Ofsted report and proud that we continue to be an Outstanding College.

“This is a fitting reward for the hard work of the whole staff at Carmel, both academic and support, who strive to uphold the college mission and ensure the best outcome for every individual student.

“The commitment and dedication of our fantastic students, who we are blessed to serve, also rightly received considerable praise from the Inspectors. We hope that Carmel’s success can also support and nurture the continued improvement in education across St Helens and help inspire younger students to perform at their very best.”