Praise for Islamic school
AN independent faith school has been praised by inspectors for making ‘significant improvement’.
Rochdale Islamic Academy, formed following a merger of the former Rochdale Girls and Rochdale Boys schools, has been rated ‘good’ by Ofsted.
It comes two years after the Greenbank Road school was said to ‘require improvement’ and criticised by the watchdog for poor standards of teaching and a lack of leadership.
But since then, Ofsted has reported, the privately-run school, has turned itself around.
Standards of teaching have improved and under the leadership of headteacher Aishan Akhtar the school now has a ‘clear vision and ethos with pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development at its heart’.
Inspectors praised the secondary school, which opened in 2003 and now has 107 pupils at its two sites, for making pupils feel safe, adding they are ‘taught how to stay safe from extremism in all its forms’.
A ‘significant strength’ of the school is the way the ‘curriculum develops pupils’ British values and sets them up well for life in modern Britain’.
In the last two years all pupils have gone on to further education, training or employment.
Pupils’ were described as ‘polite, friendly and articulate’ and the behaviour was said to be good
To improve further inspectors said the school should broaden the range of the curriculum and challenge the more able pupils. Ikram pleased School said: with trustee the “We Hafizgood are Ofsted report for our school.
“The school has improved significantly over the three years since the previous inspection. Thanks to all the teachers’ efforts and support including the headteach- er’s good leadership and governors’ high expecta- tions.” Chair of governors Shazad Malik said: “Our school team provides good leadership and we are proud of all our teaching and non-teaching staff for helping to achieve its educational objectives. “Our headteacher has overseen and led improvements to the curriculum, quality of teaching and pupils’ progress.
£We are confident in saying that the school now meets all of the independent school standards.
“We are also grateful for our generous donors for supporting school for many years.”