Summary

From 1 September 2005 Schools Causing Concern (SCC) are those that are judged by Ofsted to:

• require special measures or
• require significant improvement  

New Guidance

Revised statutory guidance for Schools Causing Concern was published on 16 May 2007.  It relates to the provisions in Part 4 of the Education and Inspections Act 2006 and explains the statutory powers and responsiblities and provides advice on how local authorities and schools might work together to prevent and address school failure.

Part 4 of the Act builds upon existing statutory powers and good practice by:

• Promoting earlier action to tackle school underperformance
• Ensuring that effective support and challenge is provided immediately when unacceptable standards are identified and
• Securing decisive action if a school in Special Measures fails to make sufficient improvement

The guidance is available to view or download from the link below.

Support for Schools Causing Concern 

In addition to regular visits from Ofsted, the School Challenge and Improvement Division (SCID) monitors schools causing concern and will provide challenge and support to local authorities.  Working through the Primary and Secondary National Strategies it ensures that satisfactory progress is being made in each school and that pupils are disadvantaged for the shortest possible time.  In some cases, a tailored intervention package is agreed, usually to strengthen the leadership of a school and to provide extra support for teaching and learning.  For serious cases there may be a fresh start, a collaborative restart (or a support federation) with a stronger school or the appointment of an Interim Executive Board. School Improvement Partnership Boards have been set up in some local authorities to oversee school improvement in one or more schools. In some cases a failing school may be replaced by an academy. 

Primary & Secondary National Strategies

The support SCID provides to schools and local authorities complements the work of the Strategies and many of their programmes may be suitable for schools causing concern.  For more details on the Strategies, please follow the links below to their web sites.    

Achievements  

Government policies to tackle school failure have been steadily successful. Since 1997, over 1,400 schools, which required special measures, have been successfully turned round and a further 200 have been closed. 51 schools closed have been given a Fresh Start with a new school opening on the same site.

At the end of the 1997/98 academic year there were 515 schools in special measures but this figure had fallen to 254 at the end of the spring term 2008.

Downloads

2007 Statutory Guidance for Schools Causing Concern in Word ( 494 Kb)

2007 Statutory Guidance for Schools Causing Concern in PDF ( 385 Kb)

Related Links

Primary National Strategy

Secondary (formerly Key Stage 3) National Strategy 

Updated 17 May 2008

Published 01 February 2004