Shepwell Short Stay School (PRU-Medical)

School report Shepwell Short Stay School

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Bilston Lane, Willenhall, Walsall, WV13 2QJ

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Overall effectiveness

Previous inspection: Good 2 This inspection: Good 2 Leadership and management Good 2 Behaviour and safety of pupils Outstanding 1 Quality of teaching Good 2 Achievement of pupils Good 2

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

 In this happy school, all students whether educated on site, at home or in hospital make good progress and achieve well.  Teaching is good. Teachers plan carefully to make sure that individual students’ work is at the right level of difficulty. Teachers’ good subject knowledge and effectively-used resources motivate students.  Students’ behaviour is outstanding. Students are unfailingly courteous and thoughtful towards staff and each other. Feeling very safe and secure, they can confidently explain how to keep safe in different situations.  Leadership and management are good, providing a clear sense of direction and ensuring a close-knit staff team. The school excels in encouraging students’ confidence and excellent behaviour.  Programmes of study encourage a good range of skills, contributing very well to spiritual, moral, social and cultural development through the arts, visits and visitors.  The management committee has a thorough

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Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

knowledge of the quality of the school’s work. This enables its members to hold leaders to account.

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It is not yet an outstanding school because

 Occasionally, time is not used fully to ensure a brisk pace for learning.  Sometimes, teachers do not make sure other adults are supporting students effectively.  In Key Stage 4, marking in English and science does not always show students how to improve.

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Information about this inspection

 The inspection was carried out by one additional inspector.  He observed six lessons taught by six different teachers, a lunchtime art club, and a whole school assembly.  The inspector held meetings with members of the management committee and reviewed minutes of their meetings. He met staff, including those doing home and hospital tutoring, and students. He also held telephone discussions with a representative of the local authority and the school’s improvement partner.  Twelve responses to questionnaires voluntarily completed by staff were analysed.  There were not enough responses to the Ofsted online questionnaire, Parent View, to show results, but the inspector spoke to a small number of parents bringing or collecting their child from school and looked at the results of a recent school survey of parents’ views. The inspector also looked at examples of reports sent to parents and their comments on these.

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Information about this inspection

 The inspector observed the work of the school and looked at policies and records relating to safeguarding, behaviour and attendance. He examined samples of the work of students educated in the school and tutored at home and in hospital, and looked at records of their progress. The inspector reviewed the school’s self-evaluation documents and its plans for further development, records of teachers’ performance management and summaries of observations of teaching.

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Inspection team

Michael Farrell, Lead inspector Additional Inspector

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Information about this school

 Shepwell Short Stay School is a medical pupil referral unit educating students with a variety of medical, psychological and emotional difficulties and, occasionally, pregnant girls.  All students are on the roll of both their mainstream school and Shepwell (dually registered). Their length of stay at Shepwell can range from a few days in hospital to two years in the school, depending on their needs. Where appropriate, students return to their mainstream school after a period at Shepwell. Sometimes, the same student may be educated in hospital, then educated at home, and later educated at Shepwell.  Less than a quarter of students are eligible for free school meals. The school does not receive any pupil premium funding to support these students, as this is retained by the mainstream school on whose role the dually registered students remain. However, the school receives top-up funding from the local

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Information about this school

authority which aims to help the school plan its finances, given that students may be on roll for different, and not always predictable, periods of time.  The school does not receive any Year 7 catch-up premium.  Many students start at different times of the year to the usual admission times.  A small number of students have statements of special educational needs for medical or emotional needs.  Almost all students are White British and a small number are from minority ethnic groups.  Most students are educated on the main site and a smaller number at home or in hospital.  At the previous inspection, hospital tuition was the responsibility of one member of staff. This is now shared by several staff who also work in the school.  Since the previous inspection, when there was no assistant headteacher, the school has appointed one.

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What does the school need to do to improve further?

 Improve the overall quality of teaching from good to outstanding by ensuring that:  teachers always deploy other adults fully throughout lessons  the pace of lessons always encourages students to make rapid progress  marking in Key Stage 4 English and science consistently shows students how to improve.

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The leadership and management are good

 Leaders and managers, including the management committee, communicate high expectations. The headteacher’s strong leadership ensures a clear sense of direction and a cohesive and well-motivated staff team. Subject and pastoral aspects of the school are well led; middle leaders make a good contribution to school improvement.  Teaching is good, being checked accurately and regularly. Effective management of staff performance and carefully chosen training ensure that staff and school needs are both met.  Self-evaluation is accurate. Work in the school, hospital and home tuition is coherently shared.  The school is working well with the local authority and other schools, for example in devising a common approach to assessment.  The thoroughly planned range of programmes of study enables students to learn well. Spiritual, moral, social and cultural development is highly promoted through special themed days, visits and visitors, and

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The leadership and management are good

team building programmes. Good quality careers advice and guidance help students make informed choices about their future.  Since the previous inspection, the school has sustained its good and outstanding aspects, while broadening leadership and improving students’ writing standards. This demonstrates the school’s capacity to improve further.  The school works closely with parents who say the school is ‘very welcoming’ and that they are kept well informed. The school works especially effectively with the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services to benefit students.  Equal opportunities are promoted well through close monitoring of students’ progress, coupled with interventions if a student is slipping behind. Discrimination of any kind is not tolerated.  Having an accurate view of the quality of the provision, and working closely with managers, the local authority supports and challenges the school effectively.

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The leadership and management are good

 The school’s arrangements to keep students safe meet statutory requirements.

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The leadership and management are good

 The governance of the school:  The management committee knows the school and its services well. Members ensure funding and resources are managed efficiently because they are aware of sources, use and impact of funding. They have a clear overview of the quality of teaching and of students’ achievement and related data. Members of the committee are involved in the headteacher’s appraisal and maintain effective oversight of the appraisal of other staff. They help ensure that teachers’ pay awards are linked securely to students’ progress. The management committee ensures that spiritual, moral, social and cultural development is promoted effectively and that students understand British values so that they are well prepared for life after school. The members attend a range of suitable training and have completed a skills audit to evaluate their work.

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Behaviour

 The behaviour of students is outstanding. They are very keen to learn and this contributes strongly to their progress. The scrupulously tidy building is enhanced by high quality displays and learning walls which include resources to support students’ learning and progress.  Students arrive at lessons on the dot, try their best and work hard. Where occasionally a student is distressed, this is dealt with supportively and learning soon resumes.  Parents, students and staff are confident that best behaviour is highly encouraged.  Students have a strong understanding of British values, such as tolerance and respect. Students’ behaviour is unfailingly courteous and respectful of others.  Students know about different kinds of bullying and about discriminatory language because the school teaches them about this. They say that they have not experienced such behaviour, but know they could speak to staff if any occurred and that something would be done.

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Behaviour

 Students attend regularly and often because they enjoy school. The school has evidence of dramatic improvement in attendance for individual students. This is strongly helped by the welcoming atmosphere and very close work with parents, and partners such as the health services. There have been no exclusions in recent years.  Although behaviour in lessons is exemplary, achievement is not outstanding because aspects of teaching inhibit very rapid progress.

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Safety

 The school’s work to keep students safe and secure is outstanding. Parents, staff and students are confident that safety is strongly prioritised.  The school ensures that the suitability of those working in the different aspects has been carefully checked.  Students say that they feel very safe and that there are no times or places in the school when they do not feel secure. They say staff are ‘nice to talk to’ and that ‘nobody judges you’.  They can explain clearly how to keep safe in different circumstances, for example regarding road safety. They are very aware of the potential risks of internet use, including social networking sites, explaining that ‘you have to be careful because you do not always know the real identity of people on such sites’.

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The quality of teaching is good

 Teaching, including in English and mathematics, is good, leading to students’ good achievement.  Staff ensure a positive climate for learning so that students are interested and engaged. Relationships are warm and touches of humour often enliven lessons. As students say, staff can ‘enjoy a joke’.  Teachers’ high expectations of students are evident, for example in the careful and individualised planning and challenging questioning. Suitable homework is set in all subjects.  Teachers skilfully and subtly change the direction of lessons to reflect the way students are responding, and explain things to them well because they have a good knowledge of their subjects. For example, in a science lesson, students concentrated hard as complicated aspects of energy transfer were lucidly conveyed.  Staff are very skilled at encouraging students’ best behaviour through their own examples of courtesy and respect, and through communicating high expectations. They are very sensitive to students’ changing

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The quality of teaching is good

needs.  It was not possible to observe teaching at the hospital or in students’ homes, but meticulous planning, records of progress and examples of students’ work indicate that this tutoring is of good quality and leads to good progress.  Resources, such as computers and video clips, are used effectively to promote learning.  Assessments of students’ attainment and progress are accurate and carried out with care.  Skilled adults who support students’ learning generally make a good contribution to students’ progress and well-being, especially when working with individual students or small groups within a class. However, teachers do not always ensure that these adults are deployed fully when the teacher is speaking to the whole class, slowing pupils’ progress.  Occasionally, the pace of lessons is not judged well enough to ensure students’ best progress and, where this is the case, students begin to lose concentration and progress slows.

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The quality of teaching is good

 The best marking is perceptive and encouraging, and shows students what they can do to improve. However, the school recognises that, in Key Stage 4 in English and science, marking does not always clearly show students how to do better.

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The achievement of pupils

 Most students enter the school with attainment below that typical of those of a similar age because of the impact of their emotional and other difficulties and previously missed schooling.  Pupils educated at the school and those receiving home or hospital tuition make good progress and achieve well in English and mathematics and a range of other subjects. In a lesson in Key Stage 4, students developed a subtle understanding of characters’ motives in a scene from Romeo and Juliet, helped by the teacher’s penetrating questioning.  From different starting points, students do well in gaining GCSEs and vocational qualifications. The school does not enter students early for examinations and staff give careful consideration to ensuring that individual students are entered for examinations at the right time.  Disadvantaged students who are eligible for free school meals make similar progress to other students in

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The achievement of pupils

the setting because of individualised work and skilfully chosen resources. Given the small numbers, and the fact that some spend only a limited time in the school, it is not possible to make meaningful comparisons between the achievement of these students and other students nationally or within the school.  Students read widely and often, enjoying the library area, because the school conveys the value of reading to students.  Students develop a wide set of skills in English and mathematics and are well prepared for the next steps of employment or education, including their return to mainstream school. All students in the past year left the school for work or further education.  Boys and girls and students from minority ethnic groups make good progress. This is because the school sets very challenging targets, tracks individual progress very carefully, and intervenes where any student is at risk of slipping behind. Students whose circumstances make them especially vulnerable make good

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The achievement of pupils

progress because they are very well supported, including by close work with other services.  Disabled students and those with statements of special educational needs make good progress because the school uses staff and physical resources effectively for their particular needs.  The most able students achieve well and gain in confidence because work is tailored to their needs and challenging targets stretch them well.  Students know and understand their targets for learning and participation. This helps them to focus on what they need to do to improve their work further.

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Grade Judgement Description

Grade 1 Outstanding An outstanding school is highly effective in delivering outcomes that provide exceptionally well for all its pupils’ needs. This ensures that pupils are very well equipped for the next stage of their education, training or employment. Grade 2 Good A good school is effective in delivering outcomes that provide well for all its pupils’ needs. Pupils are well prepared for the next stage of their education, training or employment. Grade 3 Requires improvement A school that requires improvement is not yet a good school, but it is not inadequate. This school will receive a full inspection within 24 months from the date of this inspection. Grade 4 Inadequate A school that has serious weaknesses is inadequate overall and requires significant improvement but leadership and management are judged to be Grade 3 or better. This school will receive regular monitoring by Ofsted inspectors. A school that requires special measures is one where the school is failing

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Grade Judgement Description

to give its pupils an acceptable standard of education and the school’s leaders, managers or governors have not demonstrated that they have the capacity to secure the necessary improvement in the school. This school will receive regular monitoring by Ofsted inspectors.

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School details

Unique reference number 131619 Local authority Walsall Inspection number 447977

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School details

This inspection of the school was carried out under section 5 of the Education Act 2005.

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School details

Type of school Pupil referral unit School category Community Age range of pupils 11−16 Gender of pupils Mixed Number of pupils on the school roll 34 Appropriate authority The local authority Chair Diane Osborne Headteacher Stephen Pritchard-Jones Date of previous school inspection 29−30 September 2011 Telephone number 01902 632719 Fax number 01902 608081 Email address admin@shepwell.walsall.sch.uk guidance ‘raising concerns and making complaints about Ofsted', which is available from Ofsted’s website: www.ofsted.gov.uk . If you would like Ofsted to send you a copy of the guidance, please telephone 0300 123 4234 , or email enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk .

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School details

You can use Parent View to give Ofsted your opinion on your child’s school. Ofsted will use the information parents and carers provide when deciding which schools to inspect and when and as part of the inspection.

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School details

You can also use Parent View to find out what other parents and carers think about schools in England. You can visit www.parentview.ofsted.gov.uk, or look for the link on the main Ofsted website: www.ofsted.gov.uk

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School details

achieve excellence in the care of children and young people, and in education and skills for learners of all ages. It regulates and inspects childcare and children's social care, and inspects the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass), schools, colleges, initial teacher training, work-based learning and skills training, adult and community learning, and education and training in prisons and other secure establishments. It assesses council children’s services, and inspects services for looked after children, safeguarding and child protection. Further copies of this report are obtainable from the school. Under the Education Act 2005, the school must provide a copy of this report free of charge to certain categories of people. A charge not exceeding the full cost of reproduction may be made for any other copies supplied. If you would like a copy of this document in a different format, such as large print or Braille, please

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School details

telephone 0300 123 4234, or email enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk . You may copy all or parts of this document for non-commercial educational purposes, as long as you give details of the source and date of publication and do not alter the information in any way. To receive regular email alerts about new publications, including survey reports and school inspection reports, please visit our website and go to ‘Subscribe’.

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School details

T: 0300 123 4234 Textphone: 0161 618 8524 E: enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk W: www.ofsted.gov.uk

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