More encouraging news from local schools

In the latter part of last year, I visited six of the seven schools (all primary schools) in Darent Valley. At that time, High Firs had recently improved its Ofsted rating from 'Requires Improvement' to 'Good', while just before Christmas Shoreham Village School (which fell into Special Measures in late 2013) had a remarkably encouraging Ofsted monitoring report.

I also expressed the hope that Horton Kirby was on its way to achieving a 'Good' rating in its next Ofsted inspection. That inspection took place last month, and the school was indeed rated 'Good', with a strongly favourable Ofsted report. Congratulations are due to head teacher Glenn Pollard, governors, staff and pupils for a great result.

I recently visited the one local school that I had missed out in the autumn, St. Paul's Church of England Primary School in Swanley Village. The school, previously rated 'Good', fell to 'Requires Improvement' early last year and was under interim leadership last autumn. The new head, Anne Costidell, arrived at the start of the New Year; we met briefly at a KCC event to welcome new head teachers when she was days into the role, but it clearly made sense to leave a full visit until a little later. That took place at the end of last week, and both my conversation with the head and a tour of lively and bustling classrooms left me with a very favourable impression. There is good reason to believe that, in this local school too, we are seeing real progress.