Our approach

National Star enables young people with disabilities to realise their potential through education and personalised learning opportunities, and by providing other transition and accommodation services.

The college itself offers programmes that are tailored to meet individual aspirations and abilities, with a strong emphasis on creative and performing arts, sports, communication skills and life skills. Learner progress is monitored through the setting of individual goals and targets, and a strong multi-disciplinary team, including speech and language therapists, physiotherapists, occupational therapists and behaviour specialists, ensure a holistic and person-centred approach is taken.

These programmes are offered at both the national centre in Ullenwood, Gloucestershire, as well as at a local level, where National Star is working with partner organisations.

As a community resource, the national centre is also able to offer short break opportunities, and other health and wellbeing services such as activity and therapeutic breaks; and as a recognised centre of excellence, National Star is able to use its expertise in order to offer training and development programmes for professionals.

And in order to support individuals who move on, National Star is offers long-term accommodation services in both independent living and residential care facilities.

All of the above is helping us to achieve our vision of ‘a world in which people with disabilities are able to realise their potential as equal and active citizens in control of their lives’.

Commitment to quality

At National Star, we work hard to achieve the highest standards, and everything we do is continually inspected by a variety of regulators, including Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission.

Maintaining rigorous internal quality assurance systems and processes such as learning and teaching observations, care audits, appraisals and supervision all ensure a high quality service delivery. We listen and act upon the feedback we receive from learners, staff and other stakeholders, and regular reviews allow us to keep improving our provision and working practice. We also use data to regularly manage performance measures through monthly information reviews. We also undertake an annual internal quality assurance inspection using external assessors to support our annual self-assessment process.

National Star’s commitment to quality is reflected in the outstanding feedback we receive from students, residents and their families on a regular basis.

The mother of one student said recently: ‘Our daughter, who has very complex needs, has received outstanding support from the knowledgeable, committed and experienced staff at National Star during her time there. The progress she has made, particularly from the specialised therapies that have been made available to her, has been wonderful to see.’

Another parent commented: ’National Star provides the perfect combination of meeting our son’s medical needs, his therapy needs and his educational needs inside and outside the classroom that enables him to become a perfectly rounded adult.’

Student Union President (2022/23) Chelsea said: ‘The education that we are receiving is unbelievably outstanding. The progress we are making is much better than what we would achieve at a mainstream FE college and hopefully the next generation of students will continue to get even better marks.’

We are rated as a Good provider by Ofsted, with an outstanding grading for behaviour and attitudes under the Ofsted Education Inspection Framework (EIF). We’re rated outstanding or good by the Care Quality Commission for all student and long-term living residences.

As an employer, we also emphasise the importance of continued professional development. As a result, we run a number of in-house training and development programmes which, amongst others, includes manual handling, safe handling of medication and safeguarding.