Gateshead school sends complaint to Ofsted over downgrade - The Jewish Chronicle

An independent Charedi girls’ secondary school in Gateshead has complained to Ofsted that it was downgraded after some of the original inspectors’ positive findings were overturned.

The Ateres High School, which has 252 pupils aged from 11 to 16, has been ranked good for the quality of its education and outstanding for pupils’ behaviour and attitudes.

But it nevertheless received a lower “requires improvement” grade overall from Ofsted mainly because of shortcomings in relationships and sex education (RSE).

Although the school was inspected in July, it took five months until the report was finally published by the inspectorate — an unusually long delay.

In an angry response sent to the inspection service, Ateres deputy headteacher Rabbi Samuel Rosenthal denounced the “unacceptable” report and accused Ofsted of “instransigence” and “a dogmatic approach”.

In feedback given by the inspection team of two shortly after their visit, Mr Rosenthal quoted them as saying “It was such a good experience — how could you possibly say this school is not ‘Good’?”

According to Ofsted’s published report, pupils did “not have the opportunity to explore the features of stable and healthy same-sex relationships”.

It also stated: “Teachers do not discuss vocabulary such as sexual harassment and sexual violence, so that pupils can understand what these mean and why these actions are always unacceptable.”

The report was otherwise largely complimentary, noting “exemplary” attitudes among its “articulate” pupils who read well and “who truly want to learn”, with “glowing” feedback from parents. The curriculum was “well-planned” although not implemented as successfully in some subjects as in others.

But Rabbi Rosenthal complained that the inspectors’ verdict of “good” for personal development had been later downgraded to “requires improvement” by Ofsted’s Quality Assurance team. “The changes made during the Quality Assurance process tangibly show an effort to discredit and delegitimise our school,” he wrote to Ofsted.

He called for the changes made by the QA team to be removed and the original report by the lead inspector to be reinstated.

Rabbi Rosenthal told Ofsted that the school’s sex education curriculum “covers sexual harassment and violence in detail, using explicit sexual terminology”.

According to national guidelines, parents can opt for their children not to take sex education, although relationships education is compulsory.

In relationships education, he said, “we use terminology such as ‘appropriate boundaries’, which achieves the same outcomes”.

Its relationship education curriculum communicates to students that “any forms of coercion, control, unwanted touch, abuse or exploitation are unacceptable”, he said.

Students who had not been withdrawn by their parents from sex education were “educated about LGBT… in great detail”, he explained.

But while the school might not explicitly refer to this outside the sex education curriculum, in general it “successfully strongly promotes respect and tolerance for all mankind regardless of lifestyle choice”, he said.

The visiting inspectors had agreed that Ateres complied with RSE requirements, he said.

Its sister schools, Gateshead Jewish Boarding School and Bnos Yisroel High School, had identical RSE programmes — and “both were deemed compliant with RSE at their recent inspections”, he pointed out.

“QA is meant to be a force for consistency — not for inconsistency,” he said.

Accusing the report of containing “so many inaccuracies,” he said “it suggests it has been adapted at the QA stage by someone who has had no experience with the inspection of our school, nor an appreciation or understanding of the values of the school’s community.”

Ofsted said it would not be commenting further.

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