OAKFIELD PRIMARY STILL ‘REQUIRES IMPROVEMENT’ SOME 10 YEARS AFTER LAST GOOD RATING

Oakfield Primary School in Ryde still requires improvement more than 10 years after it was last rated as ‘good’ by Ofsted. His Majesty’s Inspectorate paid a 2-day visit to the school – located on the site of the former Bishop Lovett Middle – last month. Inspectors found that the quality of education, leadership and management all ‘require improvement’. However, it has been deemed that behaviour and attitudes, personal development and early years provision are all good. This was exactly the same at the last inspection in January 2020, showing no change in almost 4 years. Oakfield Primary School was last deemed to be ‘good’ in September 2013, before slumping to ‘requires improvement’ in 2017. It was deemed to still require improvement 3 years later in 2020 and again now in October 2023. At this latest inspection, Ofsted found that Oakfield is a ‘happy and supportive’ school where pupils truly understand the values of love, trust, honesty and hope. In the early years, relationships between adults and children are warm and caring. The school is said to aspire for all pupils to receive high-quality education, but the school’s ambition for all 236 pupils to achieve well is not yet realised in full. Currently, too many pupils do not achieve as well as they should and there is still work to do to ensure that pupils learn well enough so they are ready for the next stage in their education. In a few subjects, the knowledge that pupils need to learn is not identified precisely enough which means that teachers have limited guidance about what to teach, and pupils therefore do not build their knowledge as carefully as they could. Teachers’ subject knowledge is reported to be variable. Where it is strongest, teachers provide work that enables pupils to deepen their understanding. However, too often, the activities teachers design do not enable pupils to learn well. Teachers do not routinely check for gaps in pupils’ understanding and address these before moving on to new content. Ofsted inspectors found that many older pupils repeatedly make basic errors in punctuation and spelling, which prevents their written work from improving swiftly enough. In many subjects, subject leadership is at an early stage of development. The school has not yet provided new subject leaders with sufficient time or training to lead their subjects effectively. Ofsted is expected to visit the school again before April 2026.