College rated inadequate by Ofsted
A WEST Lancashire college has been rated “inadequate” by a recent Ofsted report – after poor leadership was found to have a “detrimental effect” on teaching.
The detailed report is broken down into four categories, and Burscough Priory Science College was graded “inadequate” for each one.
The categories are: effectiveness of leadership and management, quality of teaching, learning and assessment, outcomes for pupils and personal development, behaviour and welfare.
The report, prepared last November, criticises the college leadership.
But the head teacher, Graham Clarke, has said it is already working to address highlighted issues.
The report says: “Senior leaders, in all areas of the school, do not provide effective strategic leadership.
“This has a detrimental effect on the quality of work of middle leaders and classroom teachers.
“Staff do not benefit from strong, coherent leadership. The head teacher recognises that he has not been successful in making sure his senior leadership team ‘works proactively’.”
Eleven of the 45 respondents to a staff questionnaire did not feel that the school was well led and managed.
Similarly, more than half of the parents who evaluated the school in an online questionnaire left negative responses.
In particular, the treatment of disadvantaged pupils within the school was criticised.
The report adds: “Leaders do not routinely monitor and evaluate the impact of their actions.
“Consequently, they do not know whether what they are doing is having a positive impact on pupils’ progress. This is particularly the case in relation to how they have spent the pupil premium funding in recent years.
“Leaders and governors have not used this money effectively to help disadvantaged pupils to achieve their potential.
“In this school, disadvantaged pupils have low attendance, are excluded frequently and make much less progress than other pupils.”
It adds: “Leaders do not focus enough on disadvantaged pupils when allocating places on enrichment activities. For example, on a recent key stage 3 trip to a university for a mathematics challenge day, only two of the 22 pupils were disadvantaged.”
It has been recommended that the Trevor Road college should be placed into special measures, because “it is failing to give its pupils an acceptable standard of education and the persons responsible for leading, managing or governing the school are not demonstrating the capacity to secure the necessary improvement in the school”.
But the college, which was previously graded “good” by Ofsted in October 2012, was praised for safeguarding.
The report says: “Leadership of this area is strong. The work that the school does to keep its pupils safe is of a very high standard.
“Staff know and care for their pupils extremely well, particularly those pupils who are vulnerable.”
Mr Clarke said: “Although we are disappointed with our latest Ofsted report, we accept the issues raised by the inspector’s findings and, with the support of the local authority, have already started to make improvements where they are needed.
“The report did contain some praise including the high priority given to the care and wellbeing of our pupils and the achievement made by some pupils in their GCSE’s across a wide range of subjects.
“The inspectors also noticed the good behaviour of our pupils, and their politeness and friendliness.
“We are developing a long-term improvement action plan with clear timescales to address the issues that have been identified.”