Children’s services are excellent for second year running
Thursday December 15, 2011
A high achieving year for Hammersmith & Fulham Council’s children’s services has been rounded off with an excellent Ofsted assessment - for the second year running.
The news follows an outstanding year for children’s services, where safeguarding and looked after children services were judged to be amongst the strongest in the country by national inspectors. Meanwhile 22 of the borough’s schools - including all special schools and the Bridge Academy pupil referral unit - are now classed as ‘outstanding’ from their most recent inspections..
‘Performs excellently’ is the best possible rating a children’s services department can achieve and ‘outstanding’ is the highest accolade a school can receive from Ofsted.
H&F’s neighbouring tri-borough local authorities, Westminster and Kensington and Chelsea councils, are both also rated by Ofsted as ‘performing excellently’.
Cabinet member for children’s services, Cllr Helen Binmore, said: “Being assessed as ‘performing excellently’ for the second year running is a credit to the hard work and dedication of the team, and underlines this borough’s commitment to providing the best possible start in life for our children.
“Through our tri-borough arrangements we are working with other top performing councils, pooling resources, expertise and experience to make our children’s services even better. We are committed to protecting front line services and delivering the best outcomes in the most cost effective way”
In a letter to Andrew Christie, tri-borough director of children’s services, Ofsted divisional manager Juliet Winstanley, writes: “Children’s services in the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham perform excellently. This performance has been sustained from 2010 to 2011. The large majority of services, settings and institutions inspected by Ofsted are good or outstanding.”
The inspection report also points out that ‘attainment for key vulnerable groups is well above average’ and ‘progress has been made in the key areas for further development from 2010 in that most gaps have closed well’.
It also says: “All secondary schools in the borough are good or outstanding, and much better than elsewhere. Young people from low-income families do very well, as do those with special educational needs and those from minority ethnic groups.”
This year’s GCSE results were the borough’s best ever with 71 per cent of pupils achieving five or more A*-C grades, including English and maths. H&F also had the highest proportion of young people achieving the English Baccalaureate in London.
