Oakgrove School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

This is a good school Leaders' relentless determination is tangible.

They know their school extremely well, tackling any dips in performance promptly and rigorously. As a result, an ethos of high ambition is evident throughout, with pupils and staff rising to the challenge. The trust, supported by local governors, uses its knowledge and expertise very well.

It holds leaders scrupulously to account for the impact of their work. Consequently, standards are high across the school. Pupils' welfare is a high priority.

Meticulous safeguarding arrangements are used effectively by staff. As a result, pupils are safe and extremely well cared for. Pupils reach ...above-average levels of attainment across all phases of the school.

The broad and inspiring curriculum meets their academic and pastoral needs equally well. Consequently, they are prepared very well for their future. Teaching is good across the school.

Structures and resources help pupils to learn well. Useful training develops adults' teaching and leadership skills successfully. Improvement work is rightly focused on ensuring that teaching challenges pupils consistently to think deeply about the relevance of their learning.

Additional funding is used appropriately. Disadvantaged pupils make above-average progress. Pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) make good progress, at least in line with their peers in school.

Pupils' personal development is excellent. Highly effective careers education and guidance enable pupils to make appropriate and ambitious decisions about their next steps at the end of Years 11 and 13. Attendance and behaviour are excellent.

Absence rates are consistently below the national average, including for vulnerable groups. Pupils demonstrate courtesy and respect, supported by effective school routines. Children get off to a good start in the early years.

Adults provide carefully for their needs, ensuring that they are safe and have diverse opportunities to learn. Children attain well. Sixth-form provision is good.

Students value and benefit from the wider experiences that complement their subject-specific learning. Current students' progress is better than in the past because of leaders' recent actions. Leaders are ambitious to ensure that, for different groups, pupils' progress becomes consistently as impressive as their attainment.

Information about this school

Oakgrove is a very large academy for pupils aged three to 19. It opened in 2011, when the predecessor school converted to become an academy. The primary phase of the school, which includes a nursery for pupils aged three and above, opened in September 2016 and is situated a short walk from the secondary school campus.

The school has grown rapidly since it was last inspected. As well as the new primary phase, each year group in the secondary phase, except in Year 11, now has 300 pupils. The sixth form is also increasing in size.

The school is significantly oversubscribed for entry to both the primary and secondary phases for September 2019. The school is part of the Kingsbridge Educational Trust, which incorporates three other schools in Milton Keynes. The trust has responsibility for the school's governance, much of which it delegates to a local governing body.

The school also includes the Innovate Teaching School partnership. Just over half of the pupils are of White British origin. An above-average number of minority ethnic groups are represented in the school.

More pupils are believed to speak English as an additional language than is the case nationally. There is a breakfast and after-school club based at the primary school that provides wrap-around care for primary-aged pupils. A very small number of pupils in the secondary phase attend The Bridge Academy, which is an alternative provision run by the local authority for pupils with behavioural or medical needs.

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