Cumbria warned by Ofsted: there are too few good secondary schools

Ofsted's letter to the Chief Executive of Cumbria County Council said: 'There are too few good secondary schools in Cumbria and things are not improving.

'There is little evidence of an effective shared strategy improving the quality of education across the county. In my view, there is an urgent need for the Local Authority to provide greater challenge and support to its secondary schools and extend partnership working.'



Of Cumbria’s 37 secondary schools, 18 are academies and are independently run. The council is working with Cumbria Alliance of System Leaders to improve performance across schools. (From North West Evening Mail: http://www.nwemail.co.uk/news/cumbria-school-bosses-told-get-your-finger-out-1.1115997)


The proportion of inspected schools that were academies was low: (from the Ofsted letter) Ofsted inspected 17 secondary schools, one pupil referral unit and one sixth-form college. Fourteen of the inspections were conducted under section 5 of the Education Act 2006, two were special measures monitoring inspections and one was a monitoring visit to a school requiring improvement. Two of the schools inspected under section 5 were converter academies and one was a sponsored academy. The two schools that received special measures monitoring visits were sponsored academies. A sixth form college was also inspected under the learning and skills framework.