Glowing Ofsted report after extraordinary year at Northampton school

The Preston Hedges Trust school, which opened its doors in September 2021, was one of a number nationally which had to close its building last summer due to Government concerns over the building work of its contractors.

Despite being told this a week before the start of term last August, the trust, school and local community swung into action.

Alternative accommodation was secured at the Trust’s school at Pineham Barns, before work started to install state-of-the-art interim buildings on the Buckton site ensuring all children enjoyed the very best teaching and high-quality education throughout the period.

And now just 11 months later Ofsted has praised the way this emergency was handled and concluded that the school is ‘Good’, has quickly established a "caring and inclusive culture" where "pupils feel safe" and "enjoy positive relationships with each other and their staff and classrooms are calm and orderly".

Chief Executive of Preston Hedges Trust Paul Watson said: “What this school community has achieved since its opening in 2021 and what it has successfully faced up to over the past school year is nothing short of remarkable.

“The community has really pulled around the school and we are delighted that the result of this support together with the hard work and dedication of the staff and pupils has meant children’s education has continued to thrive.”

During the last year the school’s principal has been Sarah Straiton. She said: “We are delighted inspectors recognised the success in delivering a broad and ambitious curriculum based on ‘fun, creativity and achievement’ and how eager the children learn and play in what they describe as the interesting learning environments our staff have created for them.

“This year has been like no other but to end it with such recognition of the efforts to ensure all the children continued learning in a happy, fun and creative way is extremely rewarding and of huge testament to the staff, wider school community and the support from Preston Hedges Trust.

“Of course we extend huge thanks and gratitude to our sister school Pineham Barns which helped enormously by working with us and providing such superb accommodation for all our classes from the very start of the school year at such short notice before we were able to move back on to our home site.”

Returning substantive Principal Hannah Rogers said: “We are so proud of everything we have achieved as a young school community and are so pleased this has been recognised by inspectors.

“We are passionate and committed to making sure we have high expectations and aspirations for all our children including those with special educational needs and disabilities. It is so rewarding to see inspectors recognise that this passion and commitment is resulting in our pupils having positive attitudes to learning and that they work hard and achieve well. “

The full Ofsted report can be found here: https://bucktonschool.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/Buckton-Fields-Ofsted-Report.pdf