THE GOVERNORS at Thurrock primary school have been blasted by education inspectors Ofsted for their lack of involvement in the life of the school.
Ofsted visited Deneholm primary in Culford Road, Grays in early December and were shocked to see the lack of involvement in the struggling schools progress.
They made special mention of community cohesion, an area which another government watchdog the Audit Commission marked Thurrock as one of the worst performers in the country.
Ofsted said: “The governors have not evaluated the impact of the school’s promotion of community cohesion.”
The education watchdogs went on to criticise the governors for not ensuring that standards and achievement were being upheld.
They said: “They have not been assiduous enough in seeing that school self-evaluation is kept up-to-date or that improvement planning is rigorously focused on standards and achievement.”
The governors have been advised that they will need to go on special training courses organised by the Local Education Authority.
Ofsted also went on to criticise the school in general detailing that “inconsistencies in teaching”; “lack of progress” and that “standards have drifted downwards”.
A Thurrock Council Spokeperson said: “Ofsted judged the school as satisfactory overall but as standards had not risen since the last Ofsted and some of issues raised at the last inspection had not been addressed. For that reason, they judged that the governing body had not been monitoring the school sufficiently and was inadequate at this time.
“The governing body has recognised the challenge and the Chair of Governors is working with Thurrock Council to address the issues raised by Ofsted such as setting targets and monitoring the school’s progress.”
