A Merseyside school has been rated inadequate by Ofsted in a damning report.
Savio Salesian College in Bootle has continued to underperform as Ofsted revisited the school in September, despite it being reported how much teachers do for the pupils. In the damning report published this week, the "lack of clarity about the school's future, financial concerns and considerable turbulence in leadership and staff" have all contributed to pupils' underachieving.
The report also said that children at the school are "ill-equipped for the next stage of their education, employment or training". The report said: "Provision for pupils with SEND is weak. Many pupils with SEND do not receive the support that they need. Consequently, these pupils do not achieve well.
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"Leaders must ensure that staff are suitably trained so that they are able to adapt the delivery of the curriculum to meet the needs of pupils with SEND within their classes.
"Some teachers do not follow the school’s behaviour policy closely enough. Consequently, a small minority of pupils misbehave during lessons and social times. This hinders pupils’ learning.
"Leaders should ensure that staff apply the behaviour policy consistently so that pupils’ behaviour improves in lessons and around the school."
Despite the criticisms in the report, the school was praised for its safeguarding and how leaders at the school ensure that pupils have the "opportunity to learn about different cultures and religions". The report said: "Pupils learn the importance of respecting differences between people. They develop an age-appropriate understanding of relationships and sex education and health education.
"Pupils receive helpful careers guidance. They have opportunities to visit universities. This helps to raise their aspirations. The headteacher and his newly formed senior leadership team are providing much-needed stability.
"Despite the considerable turbulence in the school, staff feel that leaders are considerate of their workload."
The school, despite having a "bad rep", was praised for going above and beyond for students during the pandemic. One mum told the ECHO in January 2021: "The school comes with a bad rep and has done for a long time. It’s in what’s known to be a ‘bad area’, and I’m not speaking out of turn, I live there.
“But I’m of the understanding that if a kid is willing to work, they’ll do well wherever they are and I chose to send my daughter to Savio. Since she started, she's done nothing but thrive, especially in this last year of madness.
“Every member of staff has gone out of their way to make sure every kid has all they need.”
Tony Costello, Headteacher of Savio Salesian College, said: "While there are things for us to celebrate, it would be disingenuous of me to say that we didn’t know that this would be a challenging visit. As the inspectors note in the report: “A lack of clarity about the school’s future, financial concerns and considerable turbulence in leadership and staff have all hampered leaders’ progress in bringing about much-needed change.”
"That is why, rightly, the inspectors found that there are areas of our education provision that do not meet the high standards that you should expect and we aspire to consistently achieve. As a result, we were graded as being Inadequate for Quality of Education, which, because of the way that grades are determined, then means the Inspectors had no other choice but to give us the same grade for Leadership and Management. This then also determined the overall outcome.
"While we share our community's disappointment that the outcome is as it is, it is also important to stress that only tells part of the story. Let me start by saying that our students did themselves, and us, proud during the Inspection process. Personal Development was graded as Good, and the Behaviours and Attitudes of our young people was also praised. Inspectors noted that our students feel safe, behave well and enjoy having access to a range of exciting enrichment opportunities.
"Inspectors also note that the school has now addressed the “considerable turbulence” of the past and commented that there is much-needed stability in the senior leadership team. In addition, the last two months since the inspection have been a time of huge progress to build on the strengths that the inspectors noted.
"The school will shortly become part of the Pope Francis Catholic Multi-Academy Trust. This partnership gives us access to a high-quality school improvement team, further support and, crucially, a clear plan for our future. This includes investment in our school and our community. Crucially, this move brings the complete re-development of our school a big step closer.
"In short, we will now have the clarity, stability and resource that the school has missed. This change doesn’t mean, however, that we are overlooking this Ofsted report. Every comment made by the inspectors is being digested, discussed and reviewed – and we will be sharing our action plan with the community when we are able to do so.”
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