EXPIRED

Assistant Headteacher (Culture & Belonging)

Highcliffe School, Christchurch, Dorset, BH23 4QD

This job expired on 3 April 2025 – see similar jobs

Job start date
1 September 2025
Closing date
3 April 2025 at 9am
Date listed
24 March 2025

Job details

Job role: Assistant headteacher
Visa sponsorship: Visas cannot be sponsored
Key stage: Key stage 3, Key stage 4, Key stage 5
Working pattern: Full time
Contract type: Permanent
Pay scale: L12-L16 £65,286 - £72,162

What skills and experience we're looking for

We seek an experienced teacher and leader to join our Senior Leadership Team to play a key role in the strategic leadership and day-to-day management of the student culture. The successful candidate will work closely with the Senior Leadership Team (SLT) to ensure student culture aligns with the whole-school priorities, fostering a culture of high expectations, excellent behaviour, excellent outcomes, and personal development.

The school offers outstanding induction, training and career development opportunities through HISP Learning Partnership

What the school offers its staff

Highcliffe is a remarkable school with a special atmosphere. We are very highly respected in our community, with whole generations of families coming here for over 50 years from Christchurch and the New Forest. Former students, current students and their parents frequently speak of their powerful emotional bonds to our school lasting a lifetime. Although we have raised our PAN twice in recent years, demand for places still exceeds availability. This is a result of our caring and aspirational ethos combined with our engaging curriculum and excellent extra-curricular opportunities, although our track record of exam success is surely another factor. Our students are lovely young people to work with who respond enthusiastically to good teaching and are keen to learn.

Former students go on to work in international finance, law, education, politics, engineering, medicine, science, and in the Paris fashion houses, or as great chefs, carers, artists, musicians, mechanics, gardeners and much more – but not before they have thrived at Highcliffe academically, creatively and socially. We have an excellent record of success placing students into the top universities in their chosen field. Every year for the last 12 years at least on of our Sixth Form students have gone on to study at either Oxford or Cambridge universities; In the last 3 years, 10 students have had the opportunity to progress to Oxford or Cambridge. Our Sixth Form achieved an ALPS Gold Award in 2024 for value-added outcomes inside the top 25% nationally. We have successful programmes for students accessing careers in medicine, the law and engineering. We are an outwardly focused community with extensive school links in France, Spain and Japan including a unique exchange programme with a school in Hiroshima.

Our teaching staff are highly experienced, knowledgeable professionals who work together superbly. Our SEND, pastoral, clerical, financial, technical and site staff, who form a good team, are also extremely good at their jobs and committed to the school’s success. We are a friendly, welcoming and supportive environment in which to work or learn, located in a great part of the country. As part of the HISP Multi Academy Trust we offer our team extensive opportunities for professional development; direct collaborative working with Thornden School in Chandler’s Ford and more widely across the Trust region; and career progression routes associated with our development as a regional Hub for school improvement and professional development delivering NPQs, the local ECT programme, and the Science Learning Partnership. We are a happy and upbeat school, characterised by warm and trusting relationships between staff and students. We recently completed a £1.8 million capital project improving heating and hot water, and in December 2022 successfully entered the School Rebuilding Programme to replace 18 classrooms with brand new buildings. We expect to formally engage with the DfE as a Phase 3 school in April/May 2025, with completion by July 2029.

We have a strong focus on staff well-being and an exceptional in-house professional development programme for teachers, ensuring that Highcliffe is a positive and supportive working environment for our staff. Visitors and new staff remark on how we feel like ‘one big family’.

Commitment to safeguarding

HISP MAT is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people and expects all staff to share in the commitment. This appointment is subject to an enhanced DBS check, social media check and positive references.

This job post has expired.

Additional documents

If you need these documents in an accessible format, please contact the school.

Assistant Headteacher - Culture and Belonging Recruitment Pack.pdf - 954 KB (opens in new tab)

About Highcliffe School

School type: Academy, ages 11 to 19
Education phase: Secondary
School size: 1509 pupils enrolled
Age range: 11 to 19
Ofsted report: View Ofsted report
School website: Highcliffe School website
Email address: aparsons@highcliffeschool.com
Phone number: 01425 282323
See more jobs: teaching-vacancies.service.gov.uk/organisations/highcliffe-school-bh23-4qd

Highcliffe is a remarkable school with a special atmosphere. We are very highly respected in our community, with whole generations of families coming here for over 50 years from Christchurch and the New Forest. Former students, current students and their parents frequently speak of their powerful emotional bonds to our school lasting a lifetime. Always popular, and usually over-subscribed, in the last two years our identity and success has attracted a rapidly growing number of admissions requests for Year 7. Although we have raised our PAN twice in three years, demand for places still exceeds availability. This is a result of our caring and aspirational ethos combined with our engaging curriculum and excellent extra-curricular opportunities, although our track record of exam success is surely another factor. Our students are lovely young people to work with who respond enthusiastically to good teaching and are keen to learn.

Former students go on to work in international finance, law, education, politics, engineering, medicine, science, and in the Paris fashion houses, or as great chefs, carers, artists, musicians, mechanics, gardeners and much more – but not before they have thrived at Highcliffe academically, creatively and socially. We have an excellent record of success placing students into the top universities in their chosen field. Every year for the last 10 years at least one of our Sixth Form students have, for example, gone on to study at either Oxford or Cambridge universities. We have successful programmes for students accessing careers in medicine, the law and engineering. We are an outwardly focused community with extensive school links in Germany, France, Spain and Japan including a unique exchange programme with a school in Hiroshima.

Our teaching staff are highly experienced, knowledgeable professionals who work together superbly. Our SEND, pastoral, clerical, financial, technical and site staff, who form a good team, are also extremely good at their jobs and committed to the school’s success. We are a friendly, welcoming and supportive environment in which to work or learn, located in a great part of the country. As part of the HISP Multi Academy Trust we offer our team extensive opportunities for professional development; direct collaborative working with Thornden School in Chandler’s Ford and more widely across the Trust region; and career progression routes associated with our development as a regional Hub for school improvement and professional development delivering NPQs, the local ECT programme, the Science Learning Partnership. We are a happy and upbeat school, characterised by warm and trusting relationships between staff and students; one big family. We recently completed a £1.8 million capital project improving heating and hot water, and in December 2022 successfully entered the School Rebuilding Programme to replace 18 classrooms with brand new buildings.