Academic Director for English and Literacy
Tavistock College, Tavistock, Devon, PL19 8DD13 days remaining to apply
Start date details
January 2026
Closing date
16 October 2025 at 10am
Date listed
1 October 2025
Job details
Job role
- Head of department or curriculum
Visa sponsorship
- Visas cannot be sponsored
Working pattern
- Full time
Contract type
- Permanent
Full-time equivalent salary
- L6 - L10
Additional allowances
L6 - L10
Academic Director for English and Literacy job summary
About the role:
The Academic Director provides strategic leadership of all subjects in the Academic Directorate. They line lead the post-holders in the Directorate and are responsible for monitoring and evaluating the quality of provision and ensuring high standards of behaviour for learning in all subjects. They are responsible for driving accountability across the directorate and managing the performance of the team. They report directly to the SLT on all aspects of provision and outcomes and work closely with other ADs to ensure consistency and coherence. The role may require travel to Trust educational settings and offices.
Academic Director for English and Literacy
This role will specifically focus on driving an improvement in outcomes for all young people in English, focusing on the monitoring, evaluation and review of curriculum, teaching and learning, quality of personal development and behaviour and culture within the department.
Main Duties and Responsibilities:
This job description is not a comprehensive definition of the post. Discussions will take place on a regular basis to clarify individual responsibilities within the general framework and character of the post as identified below.
You may be required to carry out any other duties within your capacity which the Employer may reasonably require.
Roles and Responsibilities
Core duties and purpose:
To play a leading and highly visible role in the day-to-day management of the department, ensuring both the pastoral and academic success of all students across the department.
To oversee the strategic management of data, assessment and target setting (including reporting achievement data to governors and external bodies as required), working with the Principal and Vice Principal to set challenging and aspirational targets within designated department and subject areas.
To establish successful raising achievement plans and intervention programmes for Years 7-13 within English and any other areas of responsibility.
To establish, within the designated subject area, a range of successful intervention programmes to close the gap, with particular focus on specific groups of students, to include: SEN, disadvantaged and More Able.
To line manage and support our reading and literacy co-ordinator, to ensure that reading practices both in classrooms and in personal development time are standardised and quality assured.
To fulfil the role of a coach as part of our Teaching and Learning professional development programme.
To be accountable for our English as an additional language (EAL) strategy.
Being committed as an experienced, outstanding teacher to lead and demonstrate to others what a quality classroom experience looks like for all learners.
To lead and collaborate as part of our extended leadership team (alongside Academic Directors, Heads of Year and the senior leadership team) on our College improvement priorities.
Contribute to the values and beliefs of the academy and the Trust
Provide strategic leadership and vision to the Academic Directorate.
Line lead Faculty, Curriculum and Subject leaders within the directorate
Provide strategic leadership which ensures explicit links across Academic Directorates within the school, and across Academic Directorates within the Trust.
Raise standards of student attainment and achievement within the whole and to monitor and support student progress.
To be accountable for overall standards and improving results measured against national benchmarks.
To develop and enhance the teaching practice of others.
To ensure the provision of an appropriately broad, balanced and relevant and ambitious curriculum for students studying in the Academic Directorate.
To be accountable for leading, managing and developing the subject/curriculum areas of the Academic Directorates.
To be accountable for effective behaviour management, and an ambitious culture of behaviour for learning across the Academic Directorate.
To establish and maintain an environment where students and staff feel safe and enjoy and achieve.
To be pro-active in developing and supporting transition between key stages and year groups.
To raise student attainment in the Academic Directorate subjects as evidenced by external examinations and assessments.
To lead and coordinate all elements of the teaching in the Academic Directorate to ensure high quality curriculum provision and effective teaching and learning.
To lead the development of appropriate syllabuses, resources, schemes of work, marking policies, assessment and teaching and learning strategies in the departments.
To actively monitor and follow up student progress by identifying and providing appropriate intervention strategies.
To work with colleagues to formulate aims, objectives and strategic plans for the Academic Directorate which have coherence and relevance to the needs of students and to the aims, objectives and strategic plans of the Academy.
To lead the strategic improvement planning and quality assurance activities within the Academic Directorate.
To work in close partnership with Heads of House to ensure a clear synergy between the work the inclusion and curriculum teams to enable all young people to be successful .
Teaching and learning
Ensure effective teaching in the Academic Directorate through structured monitoring and evaluation and review processes.
Promote extra-curricular activities which enhance learning opportunities.
To liaise with Senior Leaders to ensure the delivery of an appropriate, comprehensive, high quality curriculum programme.
To be accountable for the development and delivery of the Academic Directorate subjects.
To lead curriculum development and assessment across the subjects within the Academic Directorate.
To lead shared curriculum and assessment development with other ADs across the school and across the Trust.
To keep up-to-date with national developments in the subject area; including curriculum development, assessment, teaching practice and pedagogy.
To actively monitor and respond to curriculum development and initiatives at national, regional and local levels.
To support the establishment of vibrant curriculum-based networks across and beyond the Trust.
Talent management
Ensure that staff development needs are identified and that appropriate programmes are designed to meet such needs.
To undertake My Talent reviews of relevant faculty leads.
To ensure that My Talent becomes a powerful driver for teachers’/ subject leaders’ development within the Academic Directorate.
To make appropriate arrangements for classes when staff are absent, ensuring appropriate cover within the Academic Directorate liaising with the Cover
To promote teamwork and to motivate staff to ensure effective working relations.
To participate in the interview process for teaching posts when required and to ensure effective induction of new staff.
To be responsible for the day-to-day management of faculty leaders within the Academic Directorate and act as a positive role model.
Quality assurance and monitoring
To ensure the effective quality assurance processes.
To establish the process of the setting of targets within subjects across the Academic Directorate and to work towards their achievement.
To establish common standards of practice within the faculties and subjects within the Academic Directorate and to develop the effective teaching and learning in all subject areas.
To monitor and evaluate standards within the Academic Directorate.
To ensure that effective use of My Talent drives improvement and the raising of standards across the Academic Directorate.
To drive effective self-evaluation and improvement planning across linked subjects so that they sit at the core of raising standards across the Academic Directorate.
To ensure that faculty and subject leads drive and contribute to effective and accurate self-evaluation and improvement planning processes; both within their subjects and across the Academic Directorate.
To monitor and track multiple data points which expose the quality of inclusion across curriculum planning and implementation.
Please see attached job description for further details.
Data Protection / General Data Protection Regulations Compliance
The Privacy Notice sets our general principles in relation to Data Protection and the General Data Protection Regulations. You should also abide all Trust policies relating to the use of data including but not limited to:
Acceptable Use Policy
Records Retention Policy
Personal Data Breach Procedure
Employee Code of Conduct
E-safety Policy
Social Media Policy
Use of Personal Devices Policy
Our Privacy Notice for Employees explains how we use your personal data. Teachers must abide by the Teachers’ Standards throughout their career. Teachers (and staff appointed under Teaching Staff Terms and Conditions) must have an understanding of, and always act within, the statutory frameworks which set out their professional duties and responsibilities.
You should note that a duty of confidentiality applies to all personal data they see prior to their first day of employment (for example, pupil lists for the purposes of lesson planning or other activities to support teaching and learning). This reflects the custom and practice of teachers’ contracts of employment starting on the first day of term while recognising the need to be aware of and plan to support pupil needs.
Dartmoor Multi Academy Trust is an equal opportunity employer and welcomes applicants from all backgrounds to apply.
We reserve the right to close this vacancy early if we receive sufficient applications for the role. Therefore, if you are interested, please submit your application as early as possible.
All schools in The Dartmoor Multi Academy Trust are committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people and expect all staff and volunteers to share this commitment.
The successful candidate will be required to undertake an Enhanced Disclosure via the Disclosure Barring Service (DBS).
‘This post is exempt from the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (2013 and 2020). This means that certain convictions and cautions are considered ‘protected’ and do not need to be disclosed to employers, and if they are disclosed, employers cannot take them into account. Guidance about whether a conviction or caution should be disclosed can be found on the Ministry of Justice website: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/new-guidance-on-the-rehabilitation-of-offenders-act-1974.’
Your application form will be processed by My New Term who act for DMAT as a data processor- please see our Privacy Notice for more information about how we process job applicant personal data.
Further information about the job
Commitment to safeguarding
Our organisation is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, young people and vulnerable adults. We expect all staff, volunteers and trustees to share this commitment.
Our recruitment process follows the keeping children safe in education guidance.
Offers of employment may be subject to the following checks (where relevant):
childcare disqualification
Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS)
medical
online and social media
prohibition from teaching
right to work
satisfactory references
suitability to work with children
You must tell us about any unspent conviction, cautions, reprimands or warnings under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975.
Applying for the job
This school accepts applications through their own website, where you may also find more information about this job.
CVs will not be accepted for this application.
View advert on external website (opens in new tab)About Tavistock College
- School type
- Academy, ages 11 to 18
- Education phase
- Secondary
- School size
- 1270 pupils enrolled
- Age range
- 11 to 18
- Ofsted report
- View Ofsted report
- School website
- Tavistock College website
Large secondary academy in Tavistock, Devon with 6th form. Current students on role 1280 March 2019
School location
Similar jobs nearby
Get a job alert when similar jobs are listed
Find more school jobs in Devon, Plymouth and Torbay