View this email in your browser

Important Tute updates from Vanessa, Tute’s Managing Director

Dear Tute partner,

With only three months of the school year left, the Tute team is busy preparing for the next academic year and I am very pleased to share some of that with you.

As you may know, we have now been delivering online learning for 12 years with alternative provision being the majority of what we do in the past few years. You could say we’re experts in the online space! But, we don’t rest on our laurels and know that you have high expectations of us. This is why we are working on the following:

Online Education Accreditation Scheme (OEAS)

Launched last year, the OEAS is the DfE’s accreditation scheme for online providers. After a tender process, Ofsted were appointed as the quality assurer and, for a fee, will carry out a visit to determine if providers meet a set of standards set by the DfE, which Tute fed into back at the consultation phase. If the standards are met, the DfE can accredit, and the provider appears on the Get Information about Schools webpage.

Tute will be applying for this accreditation in July and will look forward to updating you on progress when we know more. We have not been eligible to apply before this because we are not based in England, despite about 95% of our 5,000 students being in England! So, such is our dedication, we have decided to move…

Office move

We are packing up our stuff and moving to Chester! The OEAS drove this decision, but we recognised that our growing team deserve a great place to work and we are now busy planning our office fit-out.

We would absolutely love to invite our partners to the new office for a cuppa, to meet the team, and to discuss provision. You would be more than welcome!

Platform development

We continue to invest heavily in the development of our platform to give you the best overall experience alongside the tools needed to make engaging with the platform as easy as possible. We shared recently the focuses until the end of this year and into next and are prioritising the partner experience. Soon, you will be able to:

• Enrol students into curriculums directly in the platform

• Create accounts for your team, parents, and for students

• View accessible reporting dashboards that give you all the information you need to get the best out of your investment with us

  
  

If you’d like to shape the platform development with us, please do get in touch.

New brand

With such change, evolution, and growth our brand is out of date – it doesn’t represent who we are. You know us to be supportive, professional, visionary; an organisation that truly puts the student (and you!) at the heart of everything. We want our message and our visuals to make that clear.

So, since the end of 2023, we’ve been working on a total rebrand and are so excited to share the results of that with you in the next few months. Being teachers, we’re planning for a September launch and can’t wait.

New roles: Inclusion, SEND, and pastoral support

With around 75% of our students accessing Tute as the main or only source of education and around 50% of them having SEND, we are very pleased to introduce two key roles aimed at strengthening our provision: the Assistant Head of Teaching and Learning – Inclusion and SEND, and the Student Support Associate. These roles will drive our commitment to inclusive education, ensuring every student, particularly those with special educational needs, receives comprehensive support and high-quality learning experiences tailored to their needs.

Quality assured by the DfE

The OEAS is not the only way an organisation like Tute is quality assured or verified. Amongst tenders, DPS frameworks and so on, and as a tuition partner in the NTP, we have been subject to rigorous QA by the DfE for the last 4 years.

The last two years have meant three annual audits based on:

• Organisation – governance, financial management, HR, data security  

• Safeguarding – policies, recruitment, compliance, monitoring, reporting

• Quality of provision – assessment, teaching and learning standards, support services

Last year, we met all criteria for each of the elements, This year again, we have met all criteria for safeguarding and quality and are to submit our evidence for the organisation audit early next month.

You can view the reports on our website.

As you can see – the team is busy but always available to discuss your needs and how we can support your challenges. For more information or to arrange a discussion, please feel free to contact me directly.

Thank you for your ongoing partnership. We are excited about what lies ahead and look forward to continuing our journey together.