#EveryoneCan

At St Cuthbert’s, we believe that every single student has the potential to achieve at a high level. This conviction led us to adopt the High Performance Learning (HPL) Framework as the foundation of our teaching and learning philosophy.

HPL, developed by Professor Deborah Eyre, is grounded in decades of research showing that a person’s ability to perform at a high cognitive level is not fixed; it can be developed. Higher-order thinking is teachable, learnable, and available to all. By embedding HPL across our school, we are making a powerful commitment: we expect excellence from everyone, and we provide the tools, language, and culture to make that possible.

The Benefits to Our Teaching and Learning

The HPL Framework gives our teachers a shared, research-informed vocabulary and a clear set of strategies to stretch and challenge every learner. It is an approach that encourages all students to think deeply, reason carefully, and perform at the highest level.

By focusing on Advanced Cognitive Performance Characteristics (ACPs), such as the ability to think creatively, make connections, reason with evidence, and reflect critically, and on the Values, Attitudes, and Attributes (VAAs) that underpin high performance, such as resilience, perseverance, curiosity, collaboration, and a growth orientation, we are equipping students not just to succeed in school, but in life.

Our classrooms are becoming places where students are encouraged to wrestle with challenges, persist through difficulty, and take pride in the quality of their thinking. HPL provides the framework to make this happen consistently, across every subject and every year group.

Perhaps the most important shift HPL brings is cultural. We are actively moving away from a mindset that reserves high achievement for a select few, and embracing one that says: there is room at the top for everyone.

This is not wishful thinking; it is supported by evidence. When students are taught to think at a high level, given the language to describe their own learning, and exist in a school community that genuinely believes in their potential, they rise to meet those expectations. 

We call this #Think Mode, a state of active learning.

Our message to every student is clear and unwavering: #Everyone Can. Your background, your starting point, and your past results do not define your ceiling. You are defined by how you choose to think, how hard you are willing to push, and how open you are to growing.

The HPL Framework is not just a teaching tool; it is a statement of who we are as a school and what we believe about every child who walks through our doors. We are committed to a future where high performance is the expectation for all, the language is shared by everyone, and the results speak for themselves.

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