Shoreham Village School: after Ofsted

As is now widely known, Shoreham Village School was rated as requiring Special Measures by Ofsted in a report published last week. This followed an inspection soon after the start of term in September. After its previous inspection in 2010, the school had been rated Good, so this was a steep decline.

As can be seen from the report, Ofsted's criticisms were wide-ranging, though the school's Key Stage 1 and 2 results for 2013 had been encouraging.

I attended a meeting for parents at the school on Thursday evening, along with governors, KCC officers and the acting head teacher, Mrs Eileen Mumford of Kemsing School, who will now be working at Shoreham 3 days a week. There were many questions and concerns as to how this situation had arisen, but there was also considerable goodwill towards Mrs Mumford and the staff at the school, including those (such as the SENCO) from elsewhere in the local area who are assisting the school's recovery. Mrs Mumford's clear vision and commitment won a lot of support.

Both as local County Councillor for Darent Valley and as Cabinet Member for Education, I have a deep interest in seeing Shoreham achieve a rapid turnaround. We owe that to the children at the school, their families and the village. For Kent as a whole, we are seeing a positive trend in Ofsted inspection results, with more schools (now up to 70%) rated Good or Outstanding. Our rate of progress is now outstripping the national rate. However, while relatively small in number, there are still too many schools falling into a 'category of concern' - in plainer language, failing their Ofsted. KCC has a range of measures in hand to identify schools at risk of this, including boosting the local collaboration between schools that is now being brought to bear to support Shoreham.

The next stage for the school's recovery will be the development of an action plan, to be submitted to inspectors in the coming days. Longer term, the kind of local support (in which KCC has been closely involved) that has been given to the school offers a promising way to secure Shoreham's future.