Stotfold: Roecroft Lower School downgraded by Ofsted

Roecroft Lower School had received an 'outstanding' rating under a previous inspection framework in 2008, and was not inspected again until December 2022. The report from the most recent inspection was only published in March.

While the school received an overall rating of 'requires improvement', it achieved a 'good' rating in three of the five categories up for inspection.

Inspectors rated it 'good' in 'behaviour and attitudes', 'personal development', and 'early years provision'.

They praised the school's "calm atmosphere", and said that "pupils behave well" with "few recorded incidents of negative behaviour".

However, the inspectors determined that the school 'requires improvement' in 'quality of education' and 'leadership and management'.

Under the current inspection framework, the lowest rating given for any of the five categories is used as the overall rating.

Ofsted's report gave five areas for improvement:

1. Strategies for leaders, including governors, to monitor the school’s work lack attention to detail.
2. Leaders have not planned the learning precisely enough in all areas of the curriculum.
3. Pupils do not have sufficient opportunities to recall and build upon their previous learning.
4. The additional support for pupils with SEND and pupils who find reading and writing difficult is too varied, both in its frequency and quality.
5. The governing body has not ensured leaders are meeting all statutory requirements.

Over a decade had elapsed between inspections of the school. In 2011, routine inspections were stopped for 'outstanding' schools to enable Ofsted to focus on the worst-performing schools. The exemption from routine inspections only ended in November 2020, during the Covid pandemic.

READ MORE: Icknield Infant School requires improvement, Ofsted says

Since the school's previous inspection, Ofsted's inspection framework has changed and a number of schools across the country have been downgraded.

In November 2022, Ofsted said that it had downgraded more than 80 per cent of the previously 'outstanding' schools it had inspected in 2021/22.

The inspectorate has been criticised recently following the death of Ruth Perry, a headteacher who killed herself after being told that her school in Reading was to be rated 'inadequate'.

Amanda Spielman, Ofsted's chief inspector, recently told the BBC's Sunday with Laura Kuennsberg that she had no "reason to doubt" the inspection of Ruth Perry's school.

Ms Spielman has said that Ofsted are "making changes" in response to criticism, but that the single-line grading system will continue.

Roecroft Lower School were contacted for comment on this story.