Contact: John Clarke, Deputy Director of Children's Services, County Office

Tel 01962 846459 email [email protected] or

Gerry Price, Strategic School Improvement Manager, New Forest Local Office Tel 023 8081 6127 email [email protected]

1 Summary

1.1 Vigo Junior School was inspected by Ofsted on 7 and 8 March 2006. In accordance with section 13(7) of the Schools Inspection Act (1996) the Lead Inspector concluded that the school requires significant improvement and therefore has given the school a notice to improve.

1.2 The inspection team judged that the school has made significant improvement since its last inspection in terms of pupils' behaviour and attendance and that it offers a good, well supported curriculum. Leadership and management are satisfactory but the leadership team has a good capacity to improve. Teaching is satisfactory overall. Pupils' personal development and well being are judged to be good.

1.3 Inspectors found pupils' progress in mathematics and writing to be inadequate with a significant number of pupils not meeting their targets. The team judged that teachers need to focus more closely on meeting the needs of the pupils. They need to develop their questioning skills to ensure that pupils understand better and share with pupils the next steps in their learning. A copy of the report is attached as an appendix.

1.4 This report to the panel supports Aim 1 of the corporate strategy (maximising life opportunities) and the achievement of the 5 outcomes of the Children Act 2004. The quality of schools is clearly closely related to the educational achievements of pupils, and those educational achievements fundamentally affect each person's life chances. The purpose of this report is to inform Elected Members of the work being done to effect improvement in the school.

2 Background

2.1 Jackie Green is headteacher of the school, which has 16.9% of its population entitled to free school meals. The number on roll is 301. The percentage of pupils identified as having special educational needs (SEN) and receiving additional support in the form of School Action or School Action Plus is 25.6%.

3 Context of the inspection

3.1 Vigo Junior School was placed in special measures in November 2001. The headteacher resigned shortly afterwards and there was a period of acting headship. The present headteacher was then appointed. She inherited a demoralised school with an unstimulating learning environment. Children's behaviour was poor and parents did not generally engage with the school or with their children's learning. Staff turnover was high. Under the leadership of the present headteacher these issues have been addressed and the school was removed from special measures in November 2003. Recruitment of staff has continued to be an intermittent problem for the school and has contributed to slower progress in raising children's attainment than the school and the local authority (LA) would have wished.

3.2 The governing body and headteacher have welcomed the support of the LA. They are responding professionally and appropriately to the challenge and support provided. Actions taken by the school and the further support planned by the LA place the school in a good position to ensure that pupils make good progress in the future.

4 Standards in 2005 Key Stage tests

4.2 Mathematics is significantly below other schools at level 4. However, contextual value added data (Fischer Family Trust) show the school to be broadly in line with other schools at level 5 in all three subjects.

5 Actions since the inspection

5.1 Since the publication of the draft report, LA staff have taken the following actions:

· advice to the headteacher from the strategic school improvement manager (SSIM), the school improvement manager (SIM) and the attached inspector (AI)

· meeting between the SIM and the headteacher to discuss and agree the detail of the support to be provided to the school through the LA action plan. A copy of the plan is provided as an appendix

· setting up of a strategy group to co-ordinate and monitor LA support for the school across a range of services. The group will meet half termly.

6 Future action

6.1 The actions detailed in the LA action plan are already being implemented. Advice and support from the AI, mathematics and English consultants are scheduled for this term.

6.2 The strategy group led by the SIM will meet half termly to monitor the impact of LA support for the school. The AI will report on progress in the school to the SIM. The SSIM will receive reports on progress overall after each strategy group meeting.

6.3 The SIM will have contact with HMI when they re-visit the school. It is anticipated that this visit will take place in the autumn term.

7 Legal implications

7.1 None

8 Financial implications

8.1 None

9 Personnel implications

9.1 None

10 Impact assessment

10.1 Race and equality impact assessment has been considered in the development of this report and no adverse impact has been identified.

11 Crime prevention issues

11.1 None

12 Views of the Local County Councillor

12.1 The local county councillor is aware of the circumstances but has not been consulted in the drafting of this report.

Recommendation

1 That this report be noted.

Section 100 D - Local Government Act 1972 - background documents

The following documents disclose facts or matters on which this report, or an important part of it, is based and have been relied upon to a material extent in the preparation of this report.

NB: the list excludes

1. Published documents.

2. Documents which disclose exempt or confidential information as defined in the Act.

None