Ateres Girls High School

Overview

The report describes a calm, orderly school with a strong Jewish ethos where pupils are polite, friendly, and show respect. While the quality of education and behaviour are rated as good, the school’s provision for personal development and leadership requires improvement. Crucially, the report states that the school "does not meet the independent school standards" due to failures in teaching about protected characteristics.

Strengths

• Pupils exhibit "positive attitudes to their learning" and achieve well in GCSE examinations.
• The curriculum is broadly established with "well sequenced" content in most subjects, helping pupils build knowledge in depth.
• Staff have "secure subject knowledge" and effectively support pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities.
• The school prioritises reading, providing extra support for fluency and comprehension, which develops pupils’ "love for reading".
• Attendance levels are "very high", reflecting the community’s value on education and pupils’ enjoyment of school life.

Areas to improve

• The school must teach pupils about sexual orientation and gender reassignment in a manner that meets statutory guidance, as it currently does not provide appropriate knowledge of these protected characteristics.
• Personal development provision is not coherently organised; the school must ensure pupils receive a "logically sequenced, appropriate body of knowledge" regarding relationships to prepare them for life in modern Britain.
• In some subjects, the curriculum is not organised coherently enough; the school should provide teachers with training in curriculum design and pedagogy to secure deep and coherent knowledge across all subjects.

Safeguarding

The report states that "the arrangements for safeguarding are effective."