THE HEADTEACHER of an education centre for children who have been excluded from mainstream school hopes it will be taken out of “special measures” after its latest Ofsted report said the centre is making “reasonable progress”.

Inspectors from the education watchdog, Ofsted, visited the Ashwood Education Centre, in Ashwood Way, Basingstoke on March 11 and 12 to conduct a special measures inspection after it was placed under “special measures” in 2013.

They found that “teaching has improved” since the last monitoring inspection in November 2013 but concluded in the report that teaching levels still need to improve, adding: “School leaders can point to particular teachers who have significantly improved their performance, but some teaching is not improving rapidly enough”.

However, the report added that behaviour of pupils at the school had improved, adding: “Behaviour on both sites is generally calm and orderly. The students told me that they enjoy attending the school, even though some are very keen to return to their mainstream school.

“There are some particularly heartening success stories about students’ successful reintegration into mainstream schooling as a result of high-quality support and programmes of intervention.”

It added: “The number of exclusions and serious incidents has dropped. Students are usually punctual to lessons and settle down quickly to learn.

“There are still a few occasions when students disrupt each other’s learning by swearing or trading insults with each other. In most cases, this is managed effectively by teachers, who carry out the behaviour policy smoothly without interrupting learning.”

But the report praised headteacher, Graham Payne, adding: “The headteacher provides strong direction and an ambitious vision for the school, supported ably by his team of senior leaders”.

Headteacher Graham Payne, told The Gazette: “When we have the section 8 visit, the school is either making reasonable progress or it is not and I am glad to say we are making reasonable progress, so it is very positive.

“The next inspection is in June or July and we would have our fingers crossed we will come out of special measures but it needs to be done properly. We (the inspector and I) both agreed we will come out of special measures when we are ready and when it is best for the children.”