Setting

Store Street Manchester M1 2WD T 0300 123 1231 www.gov.uk/ofsted

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Nafisa Patel Principal Eden Boys’ School, Preston Adelaide Street Preston Lancashire PR1 4BD

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Ofsted visit to Eden Boys’ School, Preston

Following my visit with Michael Pennington, Her Majesty’s Inspector (HMI), to your school on 8 October 2020, I write on behalf of Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Education, Children’s Services and Skills to confirm the visit’s findings. Thank you for the time you made available to discuss your actions since September 2020, when the government expected all schools to open fully to all pupils.

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Ofsted visit to Eden Boys’ School, Preston

This visit was conducted under section 8 of the Education Act 2005 (as amended) and in accordance with Ofsted’s published procedures for visiting schools while routine inspections are temporarily suspended.

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Ofsted visit to Eden Boys’ School, Preston

Ofsted’s visits to schools during the autumn term are not inspections. We are not giving graded judgements. We did not undertake the usual range of inspection activities and were unable to check other sources of evidence, such as visits to lessons or looking at pupils’ work. The content of this letter gives an overview of our discussions about what has happened in your school this term.

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Ofsted visit to Eden Boys’ School, Preston

During the visit, we spoke with you, the vice-principal who holds responsibility for safeguarding, and the assistant principal. We did not speak to pupils because of the protective measures in place.

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Context

Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Education, Children’s Services and Skills is leading Ofsted’s work into how England’s education system is managing the return to full education for pupils, following an extended break in formal schooling due to the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic. In undertaking this focused work, HMI are visiting a broad range of schools. HMI will visit a sample of:

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Context

 approximately 1,200 schools across all Ofsted grades (outstanding, good, requires improvement and inadequate)  maintained schools, academies and free schools, special schools and centres of alternative provision, including those in cities, and coastal, town or rural communities.

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Context

The information from this visit will feed into Ofsted’s national reporting so that the insights can be shared with the government and the education sector. We did not find any significant concerns during the visit. In such a case, an inspection report would be published on our website and available to parents and carers.

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Context

We did not consider your response to COVID-19 during the spring and summer terms 2020, when the school was not open to all pupils.

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From this visit, inspectors noted that:

 You opened the school to all pupils on 2 September 2020. All pupils are expected to attend full time.  Attendance is slightly below your usual attendance rates for this time of year. You described how your staff are in weekly contact with every family in the school. This is to build relationships, to provide reassurance and to encourage pupils to attend school regularly.  Across all year groups, pupils are following all of the subjects in your usual curriculum. However, you explained that you are not teaching all of the content in subjects such as art, drama, music and physical education (PE). Instead, more time is being given to research tasks and individual work to help pupils make up for lost learning.  Your teachers carry out checks in all subjects to identify the gaps in pupils’ knowledge and understanding that may have emerged during the period when schools were only open to some pupils due to COVID-19 restrictions.

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From this visit, inspectors noted that:

You told us that teachers have a range of strategies to address these gaps. Pupils across the school are using the time between lessons to cover any missed learning.  You explained that teachers are providing additional sessions each week to help pupils in Year 7 catch up on what they have missed from Year 6.  In Years 9, 10 and 11, pupils have access to specialist facilities in subjects such as art, computer science and PE. You are providing extra support for pupils in Year 11 in preparation for their examinations.  All pupils can take part in their usual curriculum remotely if they are not able to be in school. You have systems in place to check that pupils have joined any lessons that are online. You are developing ways to monitor what pupils are learning. All of your staff are being fully trained in delivering remote education.

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From this visit, inspectors noted that:

Thank you again for contributing to this important national work. The views and experiences you have shared will help to inform future policy.

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From this visit, inspectors noted that:

I am copying this letter to the chair of the board of trustees, and the chief executive officer of the Star multi-academy trust, the regional schools commissioner and the director of children’s services for Lancashire. This letter will be published on the Ofsted website.

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