A SECONDARY school in one of Waltham Forest’s poorest areas has improved significantly, a watchdog has found.

Lammas School and Sports College was praised by Ofsted for the way it provides care, guidance and support to pupils, and work carried out to improve community cohesion.

Inspectors found pupils were well behaved and staff have improved the quality of teaching and learning.

Inspector Daniel Burton said: “The introduction of a condensed skills-based Key Stage 3 curriculum is beginning to have a clear impact in raising the attainment of younger students in English, mathematics and science, from often very low starting points.

“As a result of these improvements, attainment by the end of Year 11 has improved significantly since the last inspection and is now broadly average.”

The Seymour Road school was praised for helping pupils to adopt healthy lifestyles and contribute to the wider community.

Mr Burton was also impressed with the “excellent” teaching of art and physical education, saying teachers fully exploited pupils development by giving them responsibilty to direct their own learning.

But although there was excellent use of assessment, it was not seen consistently enough to secure outstanding progress in lessons.

Headteacher Shona Ramsay was praised for her new teaching and learning policy, which the inspector said reflects the ambition of staff to increase outstanding lessons.

Mrs Ramsay said: “As everyone in education knows, it can be really difficult to shine in the new Ofsted framework so we are delighted with this achievement.

We look forward to welcoming parents and children to our open evening and open month in the new term. Come and see what we do that makes us such a good school.”

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