Best Practice

Case study: Working closely with your PRU

Close working between secondary schools and local PRUs can have a big impact on exclusion rates – something which has been demonstrated recently in Bristol. Aileen Morrison, head of St Matthias Park, discusses how better relationships and a focus on working together is achieving success

In Bristol we hit “peak exclusions” last year, with numbers rocketing to the point where almost three out of four of students were coming to us through this route.

So far this academic year, we have had only referrals rather than formal exclusions from the city schools.

It is not that young people are no longer experiencing difficulties and crisis during their school careers, but that we have all become more adept at recognising that permanent exclusion is too blunt and harmful as a tool.

In the last 12 months, all Bristol schools have recognised that opportunities may have been missed to tackle some of the underlying issues that led to disruptive behaviour. Working together is changing the role of PRUs from the place of last resort to a positive opportunity to embrace change for a student.

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