‘We want to open pupils’ eyes as to what’s possible’: Park House School headteacher looks to the future two years on from damning Ofsted verdict

The headteacher of a Newbury school that had been subject to a damning Ofsted inspection says it has been moving forward, and helping students make progress – something evidenced by this year’s exam results.

James King joined Park House two years ago, coming to the school from Holmleigh Park High School in Gloucester.

Put into special measures after a poor Ofsted report in June 2022, the report found Park House required improvement in two areas of inspection and inadequate in three.

Since then, it joined the Greenshaw Learning Trust and put a rapid action plan in place to improve all areas, including bringing Mr King in as its head.

“The quality of what was going on in the classroom was not where it needed to be; behaviour and expectations of students were really low,” Mr King recalls.

“We set about making sure we turn that around, which in a school of circa 1,000 students isn’t easy and can’t happen overnight – you’ve got to shift the culture.

“That has essentially been our journey, settling the school, getting a calm environment and being somewhere where students can learn and make progress.

“The performances of the students have been first class.”

He continues: “We haven’t changed the student body, we just raised the expectations of what they should do.

“They have met those expectations and exceeded them. We’re really pleased with the direction of travel.”

Recent exam results bear this out. Grades are up significantly over the previous year.

At GCSE, the percentage of students achieving a grade 5+ in English and maths moved from 52 per cent to 65 per cent and the average grade increased to 4.6.

In the A-levels, 35 per cent of all grades obtained by pupils were A or A*, while more than half were at least a B grade or higher.

Mr King says he wanted to build up the school’s life, including extracurricular activities such as Duke of Edinburgh awards, and sporting fixtures, something that appeals to him as he is a rugby man.

“I’d been looking for a while for a headship. It was about finding the right fit and Park House was for me,” he says, adding that some of his philosophy carries over from sport.

“It gives [pupils] the tools to be visible, have a presence and be a leader.

“One of the principles we’ve been applying has been ‘will it make the boat go faster?’. This goes back to Steve Redgrave and the coxless fours.

“To make sure they perform, you only do things that are going to improve what you’re doing.

“So, everything we do is driven by asking will it be better for students, lead to better outcomes and more opportunities.”

Coming to Park House, he admits feeling nervous as it is his first headship, with a new team and new students.

“In the summer term, I came and had a good look, speaking to staff, students and parents,” he recalls.

“I spent a lot of time over the summer holidays preparing and drawing up a school improvement plan.

“What I found was that we had a parent body, a student body and a staff body keen to see the school return to its former glory.

“It has always been a good school, held in high regard.

“For it to slip as rapidly as it did into special measures shocked a lot of people in how bad it had gotten.

“But everyone was on board with the right things to change.”

Mr King praises the support from the governors, who he says have “a wealth of experience”.

“We have a fantastic governing body that has a balance of challenge and accountability with support as well, making sure we are doing the right things,” he adds.

Two years into his headship, have there been any moments when he’s looked around the school and thought things were coming together?

Unsurprisingly, for the rugby-playing head, one highlight was a sports day. But not for athleticism.

“The students are letting their hair down a little bit, and they are in their [school] houses,” Mr King says.

“They’re really celebrating and supporting each other in such a positive way.

“There is such a good culture here, it’s really visible and you can really feel it.”

Other moments include seeing students setting up gaming clubs for games such as Dungeons and Dragons.

“I’ve been in schools in the past where students playing that would get a really tough time from others, but here they feel comfortable enough to express themselves and play what they want to play.

“That’s the key thing; students feeling comfortable and safe.”

He praises the school’s performing arts department, particularly their dance teacher.

“We had a dance show at the Arlington Arts, and it was breathtaking … you genuinely feel like you’re in the West End, the quality was that high,” he recalls.

“The students are so well supported they are able to perform superbly.”

Over the summer, Mr King was refining his school improvement plan, building on his initial stint in charge, with an aim of building on what he says is a positive attitude within the corridors of the Andover Road school.

“One of my phrases that I used at open evenings and similar is that I want students to leave this school with a choice of what they do next,” he says.

“They choose their universities, their careers, the courses they go to.

“They don’t just go to ones they end up with off the back of their grades, but they do well enough through what we provide.

“The plan for this year is to open their eyes a little bit more to what exists out there, what those opportunities look like.”

He envisages this as seeing students lower down the school visiting top universities and aspiring to go there, as well as driving the quality of the school’s teaching as high as possible.

“This has always been a school with a Progress 8 score hovering around zero, which means students achieved in line with other students of similar ability across the country,” Mr King says.

“There is so much potential here that we can drive that higher.”

With the journeys that both Mr King and Park House have been on, does he think his student teacher counterpart could have imagined this is where he’d be now?

“No,” he says. “It’s always been that at every stage I thought ‘this is as far as I want to go’.

“I loved being a PE teacher, then I loved being a head of PE.

“Then you get the yearning for a fresh challenge.

“Having been a deputy head, you have a feeling of ‘can I do the top job? Can I run a school and be responsible for the decisions that have to be made?’, ‘can I lead it successfully?’

“That feeling you can means it becomes quite exciting.

“Park House is a really good fit for me, in terms of the needs of the school, its history and it stood for. It’s more than just what goes on in the classroom.”

To showcase the way in which the school has changed, it will hold an open evening on Wednesday, September 18, from 6pm.

Mr King will give presentations at 6pm, 7pm and 8pm. Full details are at www.parkhouseschool.org

For those who can’t make it, he said: “You’re welcome to have a look around the school.

“Just remember the first line of that Ofsted report said this is a school in turmoil – one of the worst first lines I’ve ever read.

“Come in and get a feel for what we’re about. See a transition, the culture of the school.

“We always welcome visitors with open arms, come and see what we’ve done.”