We are celebrating the good news from our recent OFSTED. I was delighted that they increased the judgement on Leadership and Management to ‘Good’ and agreed that our Behaviour and Safety is still ‘Good’.

Because of the acknowledged strength of leadership and management parents should feel assured that, notwithstanding the need to further improve results, OFSTED have judged that we have the ability to do that by ourselves and so from now onwards we will no longer be monitored by an HMI. I copy parts of the section on Leadership and Management below.

The leadership and management are good.

• Leadership and management are good because senior leaders, under the tenacious leadership of the headteacher, are swiftly tackling weaknesses in teaching and students’ achievement. Leaders have set a clear agenda which insists on every teacher wanting the very best for each student. As a result, there is a clear pattern of improvement across the school. For example, the proportion of students making expected progress in English is now above the national average.
• School leaders are ambitious and share the headteacher’s vision for the school. They believe that all students should have the opportunities to develop their talents. Leaders use their time effectively in improving the school because they have clearly defined roles and responsibilities and are held to account by the governors.

‘Teaching is improving quickly.’ Our latest set of performance data which was published just days after the visit shows that progress of pupils in the school is significantly above national progress.

Our English results are in the top 14% nationally for pupil progress and Maths is in the top 38%.

It is this difference that we are addressing and with new Maths teachers joining us at Christmas and a great boost from the overwhelmingly positive report we have started 2015 on a real high! We are pleased to hear them describe our school ethos as ‘strongly promoting tolerance, respect and understanding of democracy’ and I am delighted that again they confirm that the behaviour of our pupils is good, ‘Students are polite, courteous and helpful. They are proud of their school.’ And so am I.