A Senior Her Majesty’s Inspector, Ofsted, confirms that Birchwood has plenty to celebrate

A Senior Her Majesty’s Inspector, Ofsted, confirms that Birchwood Community High School has plenty to celebrate

On 30 March we were visited by Shirley Gornall, Her Majesty’s Inspector, Ofsted, for our first monitoring inspection since we were judged to require improvement at our Ofsted inspection of May 2016.

Shirley met with our senior leadership team, governing body and representatives of the local authority, visited lessons and spoke to both staff and learners to identify actions which we had put into place to improve our school and move towards a judgement of good.

The findings of the report, which we are now able to share, reflect all the hard work and dedication that our staff have shown to improve outcomes for our young people.

Shirley identified that we had taken the findings of our last inspection very seriously and have developed a clear, comprehensive action plan that addresses all the areas for improvement identified by the previous inspectors.

She stated:

“The school’s work to improve the quality of teaching has moved on at pace and pupil’s views have influenced your thinking about school improvement.”

Pupils told her that they now felt clearer about what they are learning and liked having a ‘pattern’ to their lessons.

The report stated that:

“more effective practice is now found in a range of subjects” and “pupils responded to the teachers’ skilful questioning.”

Also

“Provision for pupils who join Birchwood with below-average attainment in English and mathematics has been enhanced with specialist literacy and numeracy teachers helping these pupils to make quick gains in learning.”

Shirley noted that “There is a ‘buzz’ of energy in classes, reflecting pupils’ positive attitudes to their leaning” and our “‘Right to teach: Right to learn’ approach has led to calmer behaviour and a more mature attitude to learning and that poor behaviour is now less common.”

We are delighted to share such positive comments from the report, a full copy of which can be found on both the Ofsted website and our school website here and we thank you for your continued support in helping us raise success and aspiration at our school.