12:02pm Tuesday 16th March 2010
By Peter Magill
A SUPER school in Burnley, which has almost doubled its exam success rate, has been told it is making good progress by education inspectors.
Staff at Sir John Thursby Community College, Eastern Avenue, were asked to improve GCSE results and upgrade the quality of teaching and marking following a 2008 Ofsted inspection.
The school, formed following the amalgamation of Barden and Walshaw Highs under Building Schools for the Future (BSF), was given a satisfactory rating.
But the education watch-dog picks out institutions which have key areas of underperformance and revisits them.
Inspectors returned to Sir John Thursby in February and have told headteacher Elaine Dawson that they were impressed by what they encountered.
Last night Mrs Dawson said: “We are very pleased – now we have got to make sure we are consistent. BSF was not going to improve schools overnight but we are heading in the right direction.”
School governor Coun Martin Smith added: “The teachers, governors and pupils have put in a lot of hard work over the past couple of years.”
One factor highlighted by the inspectors was the move by the ‘super school’ into its newly-built accommodation, as part of the BSF programme.
Ofsted’s lead inspector Paul Chambers said: “The school has made good progress in making improvements and good progress in demonstrating a better capacity for sustained improvement.
“There have been clear gains in students’ achievement. Attainment remains low, overall, but a rising trend is evident in almost all key measures.”
Some subjects, including science, show results on a par with national averages.
And the percentage of students achieving five or more good GCSE passes appears to have risen from 26 to 42 per cent, from the inspection to 2009.
Mr Chambers said: “The measures introduced to improve teaching have had a clear impact, with appropriate support and training provided in key identified areas.” Important pieces of work, like tests or projects, are said to be marked diligently by teachers but inspectors are still looking for improvements in day-to-day monitoring.
The school already had high levels of attendance, which have improved still further.
Last December it was announced that the school along with Shuttleworth College at Padiham and Unity College, would share in a £2million windfall as an education trust, for measures designed to boost pupil achievements.
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