A PRIMARY school in a leafy suburb of Glasgow has bounced back after being heavily criticised by school inspectors.
A report by Education Scotland in September had graded Bearsden Primary School, in East Dunbartonshire, "weak" for the curriculum and self-improvement.
However, a follow-up inspection has now concluded the school has made significant progress under the leadership of a new headteacher.
The report states: "Children are benefiting from the challenges set by staff through high expectations and taking greater responsibilities. Children can evaluate how well they are achieving and are expected to think about what they need to do to improve.
"They are actively involved in their learning and enjoy positive relationships with staff. High quality teaching approaches are now more consistent across the school.
"Across all stages in the school, we are pleased almost all children are now making strong progress overall. The increased expectations and improved planning for learning has led to very good progress in numeracy and literacy. Staff are now tracking the progress of all children very well and know what to expect children to achieve."
New headteacher Paul Meehan was also praised with the report stating: "The headteacher has successfully shared his vision for the school and his leadership
of change is supported by staff and parents. He has improved teamwork amongst staff, raised expectations and developed a positive school ethos."
The report comes some two years after Bearsden Primary was saved from closure after a campaign by parents.
The council had wanted to merge the school with nearby Castlehill Primary, but 95 per cent of families objected to the move, which was also opposed by celebrity former pupils Mark Knopfler, of rock group Dire Straits, and pop singer Darius Campbell.
The inspection report concluded: "As a result of the very good progress made by the school as outlined... we will make no further visits in connection with this inspection.
"As part of its arrangements for reporting to parents on the quality of education East Dunbartonshire Council will inform parents about the school’s progress."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel