The Bridge School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Summary of key findings for parents and pupils

This is a good school. The Bridge School provides a good standard of education for its pupils.

The new senior leadership team has re-invigorated the school and has rightly targeted the improvement of teaching and achievement as a key priority. Consequently, both are good. The executive headteacher and deputy headteacher are highly effective and well regarded.

They are leading the school forward with the full support of staff. Pupils' spiritual, moral, social and cultural development is promoted well and the richness and diversity of school life are celebrated with pride. Pupils enjoy lessons and have positive attitudes to learning.

Their behaviour is ...good and they are safe because they are well looked after. Senior leaders, including governors, have established strong teamwork amongst staff. As a result, all are working towards common goals to the benefit of pupils' education.

Staff work together well to provide lessons which engage pupils and help them to make good progress. Most pupils make good progress and some make outstanding progress. Pupils' progress is measured in very small steps, but represents good achievement for them.

Pupils' have clear objectives to achieve, their progress is carefully recorded and this is one of the contributory factors for their good achievement. It is not yet an outstanding school because : Not enough teaching is outstanding. The attendance for some pupils is too low and this negatively affects their progress, although there have been recent improvements.

The arrangements for the current leadership and management of the school are very effective but these are not permanent. The split-site accommodation does not meet the needs of pupils well.

Information about this school

The Bridge School was established following the amalgamation of two local primary special schools in September 2006 and is based on two sites, one in Sutton Coldfield and one in Erdington.

There are firm plans for the school to be re-located on one site. The school educates children with complex and multiple needs, including severe learning difficulties, profound and multiple learning difficulties and those diagnosed on the autistic spectrum disorder. The proportion of students for whom the school receives pupil premium funding (additional funding allocated by the government for certain groups of pupils, in this case, those who are known to be eligible for free school meals or who are looked after by the local authority) is above average.

The Sutton site includes a residential unit for six weekly boarding pupils, term time only, which was last inspected in July 2013 and was not part of this inspection. Pupils come from a wide catchment area across Birmingham and a large majority of pupils travel to school on local authority transport. The make-up of the school reflects the ethnically diverse population it serves.

The largest group of pupils are White British, but with significant numbers of Pakistani, and Bangladeshi pupils. The temporary executive headteacher is due to remain involved with the school until April 2014. The deputy headteacher took up her post in September 2013.

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