MORE than a third of teaching staff at a Basingstoke secondary school will be starting new jobs in September.

Brighton Hill Community School was visited by Ofsted for a monitoring visit in June, and a letter sent to headteacher Charlie Currie, published by the education watchdog in July, said: “Senior leaders and governors are taking effective action to tackle the areas requiring improvement identified at the recent section 5 inspection.”

As previously reported in The Gazette, the school in Brighton Way was graded as “requires improvement” following a full inspection in April.

The school was also in the news after a blunder which left Year 11 pupils having to return to school to complete coursework in the middle of taking their GCSE exams.

Her Majesty’s Inspector Diana Choulerton, who visited the school for a monitoring inspection, asked the school to take further action, including ensuring that any teacher required to teach outside of their subject area receives the training and support needed to do the job well.

The inspector reported that in September, more than a third of teaching staff will be new, including a new head of science and design and technology.

A further nine teachers will also have taken up post by that time and only one vacancy for a science teacher will remain.

The letter to Mr Currie said: “You have successfully recruited teachers and are ensuring that your significantly changed group of staff receive suitable training from the start.”

However, she added that staff “spoke about the extra anxiety faced when they have to teach subjects in which they had no expertise. The training and support received to manage this was reported as being variable. It is important that you address this.”

The inspector said that governors continue to hold the headteacher to account, but added: “The chair of governors is clear that the biggest barrier to making sure teaching and achievement are consistently good is staff turnover. Rightly, she is determined to satisfy herself that everything has been done to hold on to teachers.”