surveys and figures

As parents and friends of the school will know, we do from time to time send out questionnaires, asking people what they think of us. These are very genuine, in that we need to know what people think so that we can identify those areas where we need to improve. We always publish the figures to Governors, but this is the first time we have made them more widely available. So, here are the results:

Learners

In the most recent Pupil Attitude Survey for which we have figures:

• 98% of our students said that they like school
• 100% of the students said that they work hard

There is now an up-dated version of this Survey, for which the figures are not yet available. As soon as they are I will publish them.

Parents

Again in the most recent survey we asked parents how they rate us overall. We were delighted with the results:

• 87% rate us as Very Good or Excellent

This does not mean that we rest on our laurels – far from it! But it does mean we are pleased that parents obviously value the work that we do.

Staff

From the January 2005 Investors in People re-assessment for staff, out of 25 returns:

• 24 agree strongly that: ’everyone is made to feel welcome’
• 21 agree strongly that: ’staff and students are treated as human beings, as well as occupants of a role’

Figures/Results

Like any school we have Value-Added figures, which give us an indication of how well we are doing. Figures of over 100 indicate performance that is better than expected, and our averages for 2006 are as follows:

In all but boys’ English the figures are well over 100, which is a remarkable achievement that not many schools can match. And even the figure for boys’ English represents good progress – and it will be even better this year because there were some factors last year which skewed the results slightly.

• 22 parents rated us as Excellent
• 12 parents rated us as Very Good
• 2 parents rated us as Good
• 2 parents rated us as Satisfactory
• 1 parent rated us as Unsatisfactory

Parents were particularly impressed that:

• "The school has a clear understanding of my child’s needs"(42 yes, 4 partly, 0 no)
• "My child is happy at school" (43 yes, 3 partly, 0 no)
• "I am pleased with the progress my child is making" (41 yes, 4 partly, 0 no)

The one parent who found us ’unsatisfactory’ was invited to discuss matters at Annual Review, but no substance could be found to the comment, and indeed she was pleased with her child’s progress.