Whilst this OFSTED judgement is certainly very pleasing and justified, I am so much prouder of the transformational journey that the school has been on.
The school is without doubt, in my definition, an excellence school. (I am deliberately choosing the word excellence here, to separate my comments from the OFSTED judgement). It is excellent due to the passion, determination, inspiration and service that the staff within the school and trust have offered over the last few years. All children thrive in this school. The curriculum is inspirational and the school is led by an excellent team, both the SLT led very ably by Katy Burns and by leaders from across the trust.
I have been connected with Galmpton Church of England Primary School for nine years. Firstly as Executive Headteacher and then as Director of Education of the Academies of Character and Excellence which the school joined in 2017. Since I left my trust role, I was then invited back to become chair of governors. It has been such a pleasure to witness and play a part in this journey.
The school was at risk of an inadequate judgement when I first started working in the school. The staff had not been developed. Leaders did not have the opportunity to lead. There were poor systems in place for safeguarding, SEND, health and safety etc. The caretaker had been absent on long term sick, and there were bin bags of rubbish left strewn around the school. The curriculum was left to the individual teachers to plan without any coherence of consistency. Children were passive learners.
Complete transformation has taken place in the school. Over the years, members of staff have been developed, the curriculum has been designed and implemented collaboratively, leaders have been developed and empowered, the culture has changed to one of aspiration, determination and collective responsibility. The school has actively welcomed children with SEND and children who have struggled in other educational settings, including a number of children who had previously been excluded. The children have become active, reflective learners through a deliberate and sustained focus on character development and metacognition. Systems and processes have been strengthened to ensure that all children are safe and have their needs met appropriately.
We have long been influenced by the following quote from Aristotle: “Excellence is an art won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but we rather have those because we have acted rightly. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.”
Therefore, I don’t believe that excellence is about doing something very unique. It is about having the highest expectations and an utter consistency in implementation. It’s about being reflective and adaptive and continuing to tweak to transform your provision.
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