Why does a school with such fantastic SATs have such a mediocre Ofsted report?

[eastereggfeaster]

Now I know that great Sats do not make for a perfect school but surely if the SATS are exceptional at KS1 and KS2 (some tutoring going on at the latter stage so not as indicative of school quality), but the Ofsted was satisfactory that means one or the other of these is a flawed measure of a school's quality?

Read the Ofsted in more detail; it will say which areas the school has attained a 'satisfactory' and will also shows areas of concern.

They are not trying to measure the same thing. Ofsted is about how good a school is in every respect. SATs are about how good a school is at teaching children literacy and numeracy. You need to look at the detail of the Ofsted report to discover why this judgement has been made despite the excellent SATs results.

Have you read the OFSTED report itself? That will give you an idea of what the areas for concern were.

As an extreme example, a school that locked the children in all day every day and had them do virtually nothing but practice SATS papers would probably get good SATS results, but wouldn't get a good OFSTED report.

No, quite often parents will put up with a mediocre or satisfactory school if it means that their children are with children from similar backgrounds. Parental influence, either by direct involvement or indirectly in enrolling their children in sporting, musical and other educational extra-curricular activities can have significant impact on a child's outcome at 11. The Ofsted on our local church school indicated that the school got good outcomes because of parental involvement rather than the teaching of the school.

There are quite a few schools round here which get outstanding Ofsted reports but have mediocre Sats too, as well as the example I gave in the OP. Just doesn't seem to be much correlation.

School in my OP was criticised for outdated teaching methods and weak management (although the Ofsted report was a few years old and there's a new head.)

My high school got great A level results because the teachers bullied all the kids who werent going to get good grades until they left. Results in primary school not v important imho

dd's school, last year, got mediocre SATS but excellent OFSTED. Reason being its a lovely school, with excellent pastoral care, ethos, and teaching, and also has high numbers of children with English as a second language and children with SN.

This year, they got v good SATS as well, partly (according to dep Head) because there are less of the above groups in the year. The one they do really well in is the adjusted SATS scores - which I think says more about the teaching than the non-adjusted scores.

Good SATs are not necessarily a reflection of a good school but of a good entry level for most pupils. If most pupils on entry are SEN or EA SATs will often be lower, even if the school itself and all of the teachers are outstanding.

If the school is satisfactory but SATs are excellent it could suggest either that too much teaching time is taken up with the SATs or that very bright pupils on entry are coasting and being insufficiently challenged.

It is quite possible to be a poor school and have good SATs results. As people have already said-they may have a very bright year, with few SEN DCs or they may spend too much time teaching to the test. I never take any account of them. The school that came near the top in our LEA won't come anywhere near the top this year-simply very different DCs. The Ofsted is a better indication, but nothing beats a personal visit to see for yourself.

Or it could mean the school doesn't tick the boxes for ofsted but is a good school. Ofsted remember said Harrigey council was good weeks before baby P died.

They do get a lot of kids into excellent selective senior schools.

Prehaps the school's intake is exceptionally high quality. Even if the SAT results are good, OFSTED feel they should be better.

It is not rocket science to work out why a grammar school might get better SAT results than the special school I work at. However the special school I work at got a brilliant OFSTED report inspite of the fact that most children do not sit SATS, and none of them get the level expected for their age.

So RT would that mean it would be less worrying?

They do get quite a lot of kids into excellent selective senior schools.

Name changed....sorry for confusion!

I wouldn't judge a school solely on either of these flawed criteria. The only way to learn what a school is really like is to visit and talk to other people whose children go there.

TBH alarm bells would be ringing more with this scenario than an excellent Ofsted and satisfactory SATs scores, since Ofsted, whilst still not a true indicator, does at least look at the whole picture including breadth and quality of curriculum, pastoral care and the management of the school.