In education, ‘value-added’ is a term that takes into account the starting point of each pupil and compares it to their actual outcomes. It offers a fairer and more accurate measure of a school’s performance than exam results on their own.

At Heritage, we use the Cognitive Abilities Test (CAT4) suite of tests to measure the starting point of each pupil, helping us to assess how pupils think in areas that are known to make a difference to learning; verbal reasoning, quantitative reasoning, non-verbal reasoning, and spatial reasoning. We use these tests because they help us evaluate our own judgments about pupil attainment and potential relative to national standards, and they help us monitor pupil progress over time.

Using each pupil’s CAT4 scores, a ‘most likely score’ for each I/GCSE subject is determined. This most likely score is then compared to actual exam results when we have them. So for example, if a pupil’s CAT4 score correlates with a likely I/GCSE result of 6.2 for a particular subject, and the actual result for that subject is 6.6, the value-added is determined to be +0.4.

For 2023 exam results, the average value-added score for Heritage School was an impressive +1.1 meaning that, on average, Heritage added 1.1 points to every pupil’s exam results, across all subjects. This number has consistently been over +1, with a six-year average of +1.3. In addition, our analysis of scores and self-reported alumni data reveals no gender bias in outcomes.

Of course, there is far more to a school’s value-added than what can be measured and, as we have said elsewhere, we keep our eye on a more distant horizon–what kind of people are our pupils becoming? What kind of life are they being prepared to live? And we work to maintain a culture that values learning for its own sake.