How to find out how well a school is doing ??

[NutcrackingXmas]

Was chatting to another mum the other day about the kids school, and she said that tbh if it weren't for the fact that her daughter has many friends etc, she would remove her from the school.

I asked why and she said that in her opinion in the last year the school had started to go down hill. Apparently, they didn't even have a full intake of students for reception this year, where as in the past few years they have been oversubcribed.

I have had my own concerns about the school becoming more and more disorganised and have gnerally feklt that it is going downhill too.

Where can I find out how the school is doing academically etc ??

[mummydear]

Ofsted reports , when was it last inspected ? If it had a bad OfSTED report then the school should have put in place an action plan to rectify faults.

Key stage results - publisehed evry yera , I believe, school should have a copy of these but I think they may be found on OFSTED website aswell.

I wouldn't worry about it being undersubscribed, this could vary due to birth rate and number of other factors besides academic issues.

Have a look at most recent Governors report or have a chat or write to one of the Governors if you have concerns .

[fisil]

try the dfes site as well as ofsted. generally if you put a schools name in as a search term it will come up with lots of links about results.

[NutcrackingXmas]

Thankyou both, will check all that out.

[piffle]

www.upmystreet.co.uk
pop in your postcode, then choose local area from the link below and that brings up schools and latest results.
HTH

[LIZS]

I read somewhere that there was a blip in Reception intake (those born between 09/00 and 08/01) this year due to the impact of Millenium babies being born in the preceding months, so don't use that alone as an indicator. The balance may be redressed next year. Is the school under the same headship ?

[NutcrackingXmas]

Same head yes, and I cannot stand the woman tbh. I think she is more bothered how the school looks on the surface than under it iykwim.

[HRHQoQ]

DS1's school was undersubscribed this year - yet it's an "outstanding" school..........the reason???

One of the nurseries in town told parents "not to bother" putting their child down for the school as it was so oversubscribed they wouldn't stand a chance of getting in............and so they didn't - absolutely no children from one of the nurseries (which usually has quite a lot going on from it) in town at all.

Mind you very glad I didn't send him to the school which led on from his nursery - picked DS1 up from school yesterday and saw a mum I recognised from his nursery - but was sure that her duaghter had gone to the school attached to the nusery.......spoke to her and she said yes she had gone to X school, but wasn't happy at all, called DS1's school found they still had a place left and transferred her over!

[NutcrackingXmas]

Ok 2004 achievment and attainment test results were ...

English 73%
Maths 82%
Science 90%

[mummydear]

Very similar thing in our area- school extremely popular and very well though of , under subscribed for intake Sept 05 , because parenst were put off because of that fact it is always oversubscribed !! Hope that makes sense

Birth rate for millemium babies - heard the same thing myslef when we were lookking for schools for Sept 05, all the education staff we spoke to said that the birth rate was low as many had their babies first part of 2000, some of us wanted to get drunk on New Years eve !!

[mummydear]

NTXmas - How do those reports compare with other schools in the area?

I think the value added result is an important factor, basically it measures how well the children improve . I'm sure someone else could explain it more.

[bev1e]

NutcrackingXmas - you need to compare these results with the national averages.

I'm a great believer in "gut feeling" and if the school doesn't feel good for you then I'd say that there is a problem that needs addressing. This might be vocalising your concerns to the head to begin with and assessing how s/he handles them.

Also wouldn't put too much emphasis on the OFSTED reports. There is often a big gap between inspections and before you know it an "effective" school can be an "inadequate" school as a friend of mine all too recently found out!

[NutcrackingXmas]

The LEA average is English 74%, Maths 70% and Science 83%.

There are a few that have better results but a few with worse ones too.