Setting

Mrs Lynne Blomley Headteacher Colne Primet Academy Dent Street Colne Lancashire BB8 8JF

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Serious weaknesses monitoring inspection of Colne Primet Academy

Following my visit to your academy on 2 June 2015, I write on behalf of Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Education, Children’s Services and Skills to confirm the inspection findings. Thank you for the help you gave during the inspection and for the time you made available to discuss the actions which have been taken since the school’s previous monitoring inspection.

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Serious weaknesses monitoring inspection of Colne Primet Academy

The inspection was the second monitoring inspection since the academy was judged to have serious weaknesses following the section 5 inspection which took place in November 2014. The monitoring inspection report is attached.

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Serious weaknesses monitoring inspection of Colne Primet Academy

Having considered all the evidence, I am of the opinion that at this time:

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Serious weaknesses monitoring inspection of Colne Primet Academy

The academy is making reasonable progress towards the removal of the serious weaknesses designation.

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Serious weaknesses monitoring inspection of Colne Primet Academy

This letter and monitoring inspection report will be published on the Ofsted website. I am copying this letter to the Secretary of State, the Chair of the Governing Body and the DfE – Academies Advisers Unit.

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Additional Inspector

CfBT Inspection Services Suite 22 West Lancs Investment Centre Maple View Skelmersdale WN8 9TG T 0300 123 1231 Text Phone: 0161 618 8524 enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk www.ofsted.gov.uk Direct T 01695 566932 Direct F 01695 729320 Direct email: hcarnall@cfbt.com

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place in November 2014

 Rapidly improve the achievement of all groups of students and the quality of teaching so both are consistently good or better, especially in mathematics, by making sure that teachers: - have high expectations of what all students, including the most able, can achieve - plan and set work that matches the needs and abilities of all groups of students, particularly for those students who are disadvantaged, those with disabilities and those with special educational needs - check students’ knowledge and deepen their understanding of what they are learning by asking searching questions - frequently mark students’ work to provide them with clear and specific advice about what they need to do to improve and insist that students act upon this advice - raise expectations of the quality of students’ written work, presentation, spelling, grammar and punctuation, especially of boys - make effective use of students’ mathematical skills in other subjects

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place in November 2014

- improve students’ attitudes to learning by ensuring they are fully engaged in, and make a good contribution to, improving their progress - manage the additional support for students more effectively in class to ensure that the help they are given is at least good.

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place in November 2014

 Improve the impact of leaders, managers and governors by acting swiftly to ensure that: - the quality of teaching and achievement in mathematics, history, geography and science improve so they are consistently good or better and there is no inadequate teaching in the academy - subject leaders are always fully held to account for rigorously checking the quality and impact of teachers’ marking and of students’ learning in order to make sure that students are making at least good progress - staff are diligent in ensuring that no students smoke on site and that all students are made fully aware of the dangers of smoking - governors rigorously check the impact of the pupil premium funding to make sure standards are swiftly improving for disadvantaged students.

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place in November 2014

An external review of governance should be undertaken in order to assess how this aspect of leadership and management may be improved.

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place in November 2014

An external review of the academy’s use of the pupil premium should be undertaken in order to assess how this aspect of leadership and management may be improved.

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Evidence

The inspector met with the headteacher and other senior leaders, the Chair of the Governing Body (who is also a member of the Pendle Education Trust Board which shares responsibility for governance of the academy), the Chief Executive of the Trust, a School Improvement Adviser, a group of heads of curriculum and a group of students. The inspector also observed four lessons.

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Context

Since the previous monitoring inspection in February, the temporary deputy headteacher has been appointed full time with responsibility for monitoring the quality of teaching and learning. Two members of staff have left and their replacements have been appointed. A new governor has been appointed.

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The quality of leadership and management at the school

The headteacher and the governing body have continued robustly to address the weaknesses identified by the last section 5 inspection. The action plans which were evaluated last time have been sharpened so that it is easier to identify how much progress is being made to improve achievement and the quality of teaching and learning. The academy continues to work well with its school adviser. He has assembled a carefully tailored training and support programme for academy staff and this is already demonstrating improvements in leadership and management, especially in terms of analysing and using data. The links with a successful local technology college have been strengthened and more academy staff visit the college to observe good practice and share ideas. Curriculum leaders have particularly benefited from this link and have grown in confidence and effectiveness as a result. The external review of governance has taken place and the report is very positive

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The quality of leadership and management at the school

about the effectiveness of the governing body. The external review of the academy’s use of the pupil premium funding (additional government money) has been arranged but not yet taken place.

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Strengths in the school’s approaches to securing improvement:

 The new Improvement Challenge Board enables governors and senior staff to keep a tight grip on how initiatives are being introduced and how effective they are in raising achievement. It meets regularly and is skillful in monitoring trends in student performance. The board keeps the governors well informed of how well the academy is meeting its improvement targets.  The monitoring of teaching and learning is more rigorous than at the time of the section 5 inspection and the quality of teaching and learning is improving as a result.  All teachers are now able to analyse assessment data carefully and are better placed to identify quickly where extra support is required for students falling behind. As a consequence, almost all students in Years 10 and 11 are making reasonable progress towards meeting their achievement targets.  Teaching assistants have had training to improve their support for students

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Strengths in the school’s approaches to securing improvement:

with learning difficulties and this has enabled most supported students to make better progress.  Students said that behaviour has improved over this year and, although never poor, is now contributing well to the faster pace of students’ academic progress in lessons. Incidents of smoking have been eradicated since new, tougher measures have been introduced to deal with them.  A new marking policy is helping teachers to improve their feedback comments in students’ books and students have been given special time in some lessons to compose their responses to teachers. Students thought these improvements were helping them to improve their work better than before.

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Weaknesses in the school’s approaches to securing improvement:

 There is still inconsistency in the quality of teachers’ planning to meet the needs of all groups of students effectively. This is especially the case with the most able students, whose tasks often lack appropriate challenge.  Students said they needed further help and guidance to improve their written responses to teachers’ comments in their books.  Curriculum leaders said they would benefit from further guidance on how to revisit skills and concepts as the year progresses. This would help improve their analysis and tracking of student progress.  Despite the introduction of a better marking approach, there is still inconsistency in the quality of teachers’ comments in books. Students confirmed this in their comments about marking.  It is still not clear how well students’ mathematical skills are used in other subjects. The academy is to undertake a review of the curriculum to address this issue.

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External support

The School Improvement Adviser has created a high-quality package of support for the academy, including training on specific issues identified in the section 5 inspection, link work with other schools and briefings from local authority advisers where these are pertinent to the improvement work of the academy. Staff at the academy value this support highly. The Trust also provides valued support on specific issues related to improving the academy’s performance. The effectiveness of this support is seen in the improving achievement of students and better-quality teaching and learning.

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