Belleville's next Ofsted report? Post Reply

[sw11_]

Hi - any idea when Belleville will be due another Ofsted report? It's last one was 6 years ago, so even though it was deemed Outstanding at the time surely it will need another one soonish?

[townieatheart]

Totally agree, especially with the extra site opening since the last inspection.

[sw11_]

And the change to Academy status too I guess..?

[audrey]

Ofsted website shows that they had an interim assessment back in June 2010, which didn't raise any concerns, hence no need for a full inspection that year. But it's about time that their next report should be forthcoming.

[rcourtney]

Hi - any idea when Belleville will be due another Ofsted report? It's last one was 6 years ago, so even though it was deemed Outstanding at the time surely it will need another one soonish?

Bellevilles last Ofsted report was in 2007. At that time it was deemed to be outstanding. Since then the school has changed alot (increased site, added a site, conversion to Academy etc) however, The Secretary of State has stated that Academy converting schools that were previously judged outstanding are longer subject to routine school inspection but performance will be monitored*.

So, how do you judge if Belleville is a good school or not, it hardly seems relevant to revert to a 2007 report given the huge amounts of change at the school. Should we assume, given the lack of information, that everything is ticking along and the school can still be viewed as outstanding?

*http://www.education.gov.uk/schools/lea ... tions-faqs

[sw11_]

I agree. It makes it much harder to make an informed decision when the I formation is so out of date. I know you can visit the school too but that is a long time not to get an ofsted report!

[rcourtney]

An extreme example, but highlights the point ..

http://www.localschoolsnetwork.org.uk/2 ... ls-ofsted/

[sezwedz]

As far as I'm aware it is due in the next month or so.

[schoolgatesmum]

My son started Belleville in 2006 and I still have children there. There have been a lot of changes since then but I would say that the school has gone from strength to strength. My children have been and are very happy there and we as parents are happy there. The main change though is in demographics - much less of a mix than when my son started in in 2006, mainly due to the ever diminishing catchment (which may be a positive or negative thing depending on what you're looking for). Go and visit the school - it really does give you the best picture. Open days are in a couple of weeks. Parents do the tours so there are lots of opportunities to ask current parents questions. I would say that you get a lot more out of asking current parents and pupils questions than you do from an Ofsted report!

[sw11_]

their upcoming open days are on a wednesday and thursday. do they do weekend open days at all?

[Fionag]

The way to check out how Belleville or any school is doing between Ofsteds is by checking the Performance Data as published by the government each year.
Data for Belleville can be found
http://www.education.gov.uk/cgi-bin/sch ... urn=100998
or you can search for any other school on this site.
Ofsted use this sort of data to decide whether a school needs to be inspected, ie if they see a problem with the results this will trigger an inspection.
If there has been no inspection for a few years, this means Ofsted have seen nothing to trigger a full inspection and are able to concentrate resources elsewhere. Although obviously this doesn't go on indefinitely and Ofsted can come knocking again at any point!
The data can be hard to digest and hard to make comparisons, a factor recognised by Ofsted so they launched what they call the School Data Dashboard last year which summarises these figures and presents them in a clearer format.
Belleville's can be found at
http://dashboard.ofsted.gov.uk/dash.php?urn=137563
Or you can search any school by going to the Ofsted website and clicking on School Data Dashboard.
A note of caution when looking at this data or any data about schools, there are two measures you should look for: test results and progress.
Test results are the level they achieve in controlled tests (some marked externally).
Progress means how much pupils have improved since they have been at a school.
So a good school may not have the top results but its pupils will have made progress significantly above national averages etc.
And likewise if a school has outstanding results (but the pupils have not made exceptional progress) it could just mean they started out with a good bunch.
And a final note of caution about these sort of statistics, hidden within the percentages will be children who do exceptionally well and those who don't for various reasons.
That is why you should go and visit schools and get a feel for their atmosphere and ethos, to see if it fits with your own ideas on education etc, as this is a very individual thing and your preference may be different from your neighbour's!
Good questions to think about are what are your attitudes to homework, how does the school give feedback, how do children and adults interact with each other etc
But it is also down to a 'gut' feeling and you should listen to that too, as you will know where your child and you will fit in best.
And yes I am a Belleville Parent but I also work in a Wandsworth secondary school and help organise Open Days there and point prospective parents in the right direction to find out this sort of information.