Paces School was inspected by Ofsted on 14-15th May 2008, and the Inspector's Report published on 9th June 2008. The report has delighted everyone at Paces and is one in which every single member of the School's staff team should feel justifiably proud. Those of the team who have been with us since the start in 1996/7, who have "kept the faith" during those times when the odds seemed stacked against us, have cause to feel especially satisfied with the Inspector's commendations of the School and, by implication, of their years of exceptional dedication and creative hard work. Without effective leadership, little of real quality is truly achievable. "Quality" has been the one continuous watchword of Gabor Fellner's leadership as Head of Paces School. Hopefully, the dissemination of this report will serve only to enhance his reputation, and that of Paces School, well beyond Paces Campus.
Below, you can read extracts from the Report. If you care to, you can downlead the whole Report.
Before you do so, there is one plain-seeming sentence in the Report, easily overlooked, which represents a real triumph; one that connoisseurs of the history of conductive education in the UK and elsewhere might recognise as a milestone: "The curriculum provides a good balance of Conductive Education with the subjects of the National Curriculum in both the primary and secondary classes". I leave you to savour that sentence and to enjoy with us our sense of the real achievement of an objective we set out to reach all those years ago.
Congratulations to Gabor and to the staff team.
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Extracts
Evaluation of the school
Paces High Green School provides a good quality of education for its pupils. The curriculum and quality of teaching are good, and are helping the pupils to make good overall progress in both their educational learning and in their physical development. The pupils benefit from attending a school that emphasises their individual worth and contribution to all aspects of school life. Parents are fully supportive of the ethos of the school, appreciating greatly the work of the teachers and other specialist staff in helping their children to enjoy school, and achieve well in relation to their capabilities. The school has continued to make good progress since its previous inspection and meets almost all the regulations for independent schools.
Quality of education
The quality of the curriculum is good overall. The curriculum provides a good balance of Conductive Education with the subjects of the National Curriculum in both the primary and secondary classes, and a satisfactory link with the six areas of learning in the Foundation Stage class. .... Throughout the school, this integrated curricular approach is giving the pupils good coverage of a range of key literacy, numeracy and language skills appropriate to their abilities and needs. It is also supporting well their physical, social and emotional development.
The quality and effectiveness of teaching and assessment are good. All lessons are very carefully planned to include teaching tasks and clearly identified outcomes that ensure all pupils are suitably supported and challenged in all aspects of their physical, social and intellectual learning. Relationships between teachers, support assistants and the pupils are outstanding throughout the school. All adults show great sensitivity and awareness of the needs of the pupils, but are still demanding and encouraging of them to develop as much independence in their learning as possible; this includes their physical development.