Compass Community School Aylward Park

Inspection of Compass Community School Aylward Park Crown Street, Leiston, Suffolk IP16 4AX

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Overall effectiveness Good

The quality of education Good Behaviour and attitudes Good Personal development Good Leadership and management Good Overall effectiveness at previous inspection Good

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Overall effectiveness Good

Does the school meet the independent school standards?

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What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils feel safe and valued at this small, nurturing school. Strong, respectful relationships underpin all aspects of school life and help pupils to make a fresh start. Staff understand the individual needs of every pupil and are skilled in helping them feel settled, secure and ready to learn. Staff provide the care and help that ensures pupils feel happy.

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What is it like to attend this school?

Expectations for pupils are high. Staff encourage and support pupils to take part successfully in learning, trips and work experience. Lessons provide new knowledge and skills, taught in easy-to-understand ways. Pupils quickly come to see that they can achieve. They grow in confidence and make progress, from catching up with reading to achieving a range of appropriate qualifications, including GCSEs.

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What is it like to attend this school?

The school is calm and purposeful. Staff use consistent approaches to support pupils to manage their emotions and behaviour. Pupils feel included and listened to. They understand right from wrong and show kindness to one another.

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What is it like to attend this school?

School life includes shared meals, regular visits to the park and adventures further afield. Assemblies and form times provide opportunities for pupils to learn social skills. They celebrate each other’s achievements and learn about the wider world. This supports pupils to develop a sense of belonging.

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better?

The school has designed an ambitious curriculum. It has rightly prioritised improvements in curriculum planning. As a result, the curriculum is well sequenced, broad and balanced. It includes academic, vocational and therapeutic elements. Pupils study a wide range of subjects, including humanities, science and computing, alongside important life skills. Pupils follow bespoke qualification pathways tailored to their needs and interests. They successfully overcome barriers to learning and progress well.

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better?

Leaders are committed to continually improving the school. Since the last inspection, they have introduced subject networks, strengthened reading provision and developed clearer systems to check what pupils have learned. Staff feel well supported. They value the subject-specific training and curriculum guidance they receive.

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better?

The school has introduced regular subject-specific professional development for staff. These changes have begun to strengthen the consistency in how the curriculum is taught. However, in some subjects, staff confidence and subject knowledge remain variable. This means that, occasionally, lessons do not support pupils sufficiently to make as much progress as they could.

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better?

All pupils have special educational needs and/or disabilities. The school makes sure that pupils’ individual learning plans reflect the provision outlined in their education, 8 to 10 July 2025 health and care (EHC) plans. An effective specialist therapy team provides bespoke interventions such as speech and language therapy. Staff ensure that lessons are adapted to consider pupils’ needs. This enables pupils to overcome barriers to their learning.

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better?

Staff know pupils well. Warm relationships support pupils’ confidence to engage with learning. Teachers help pupils recall and build knowledge, often revisiting key concepts and vocabulary to help pupils secure understanding. A new system is helping teachers and leaders to track pupils’ progress. This system is still in the early stages of implementation, but it is starting to support the school’s curriculum decisions and adaptations.

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better?

Pupils benefit from the school’s ability to make reading accessible, engaging and interesting. Staff make sure that pupils have a quiet moment to read every day. Pupils can choose from a wide variety of books in the ‘book nook’. Pupils who need to catch up with reading receive daily, personalised support. In lessons, staff support pupils to engage with increasingly complex texts. Pupils appreciate the way staff help them understand storylines, characters’ intentions and meanings of words in the books they are studying.

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better?

Behaviour is calm and well managed. Pupils respond well to the staff’s focus on helping them manage their emotions. Over time, this helps pupils’ social skills to improve. Pupils develop more confidence navigating friendships and new social encounters in the community. Pupils’ attendance is high. They see their school as a place where they feel safe, successful and well supported.

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better?

The school’s personal development programme, including the careers programme, is thoughtfully designed. Staff are adept at finding ways to support pupils’ emerging interests and talents. Pupils benefit from a range of enrichment activities and work experience options. They are taught how to make positive choices and understand important concepts such as consent, respect and resilience. Pupils learn about different cultures and beliefs. The school ensures that pupils feel and are ready to take their next steps in education, work or training. This includes how to navigate public transport.

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better?

The proprietor and governors regularly visit the school. Strong systems for oversight and compliance ensure that they are well informed. They hold the school to account effectively. This includes ensuring that the school meets the independent school standards (the standards). The proprietor has also ensured that the school is compliant with schedule 10 of the Equality Act 2010.

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Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective. 8 to 10 July 2025

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(Information for the school and proprietor)

 In some subjects, the school has not ensured that staff are supported to have the necessary confidence and subject knowledge to deliver the curriculum as intended. This means that pupils’ learning experiences are variable and, occasionally, lessons do not support pupils to learn all that they could. The school should support staff to develop the necessary subject expertise to deliver the intended curriculums confidently and effectively.  The school’s new assessment systems are not fully embedded. This occasionally limits leaders’ evaluation of how effectively teaching is building pupils’ knowledge in every subject. The school should embed its new assessment and monitoring systems so it gains more understanding of curriculum impact. This will support more targeted improvement work and help ensure all pupils build knowledge securely.

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How can I feed back my views?

or to find out what other parents and carers think. We use information from Ofsted Parent View when deciding which schools to inspect, when to inspect them and as part of their inspection.

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How can I feed back my views?

The Department for Education has further guidance on how to complain about a school. 8 to 10 July 2025

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School details

Type of school Other independent special school

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School details

School category Independent special school

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School details

Annual fees (day pupils) £71,000 to £109,000

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School details

Email address education.compliance@compass- schools.org Date of previous inspection 4 to 6 October 2022 8 to 10 July 2025

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Information about this school

 The school was first registered on 16 November 2021. This is the second standard inspection of the school. At the time of the first standard inspection in June 2022, the school’s overall effectiveness was judged to be good and all the standards were met.  The school provides education for pupils with communication and social interaction difficulties. All pupils are referred by local authorities and have an EHC plan.  The school is registered for pupils aged 11 to 17. However, it currently caters for pupils aged 11 to 16. Therefore, inspectors did not grade the sixth-form provision for this inspection.  The school uses one unregistered alternative provision.  The headteacher took up the role in April 2025.

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Information about this inspection

Inspectors carried out this inspection under section 109(1) and (2) of the Education and Skills Act 2008. The purpose of the inspection is to advise the Secretary of State for Education about the school’s suitability for continued registration as an independent school.

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Information about this inspection

Inspections are a point-in-time judgement about the quality of a school’s education provision.

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Information about this inspection

The school meets the independent school standards. These are the requirements set out in the schedule to the Education (Independent School Standards) Regulations 2014.

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Information about this inspection

 Inspectors discussed any continued impact of the pandemic with leaders and have taken that into account in their evaluation of the school.  The lead inspector held discussions with the chief executive officer, the chair of the proprietor body and members of the governing body. The lead inspector also spoke with a representative from the local authority. Inspectors jointly met with school leaders and the regional director.  Inspectors carried out deep dives in these subjects: English, mathematics, humanities and personal, social and health education. For each deep dive, inspectors met with subject leaders, looked at curriculum plans, visited a sample of lessons, spoke with teachers, spoke with some pupils about their learning and looked at samples of pupils’ work.  Inspectors considered a range of policies, documents and records, including those for attendance and behaviour. The lead inspector also completed a tour of the

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Information about this inspection

premises to check the school’s compliance with the standards.  To evaluate the effectiveness of safeguarding, inspectors reviewed the single central record; took account of the views of leaders, staff and pupils; and 8 to 10 July 2025 considered the extent to which the school has created an open and positive culture around safeguarding that puts pupils’ interests first.  Inspectors spoke with pupils in lessons and during breaktimes and lunchtimes and spoke with parents at the start of the school day.  There were no responses to Ofsted’s online surveys for parents, staff or pupils.

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Inspection team

Hannah Stoten, lead inspector His Majesty’s Inspector

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Inspection team

Russell Ayling Ofsted Inspector 8 to 10 July 2025 to 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, further education and skills, adult and community learning, and education and training in prisons and other secure establishments. It assesses council children’s services, and inspects services for children looked after, safeguarding and child protection.

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Inspection team

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Inspection team

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Inspection team

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Inspection team

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