High Park School

Overview

High Park School has taken effective action to maintain the standards identified at the previous inspection. The school provides a "highly supportive and inclusive environment" where pupils feel safe and happy, benefiting from specialist resources and therapies. Leaders and the trust are actively supporting the school’s journey of improvement, ensuring pupils are well prepared for their next steps in education and life.

Strengths

• Staff provide "patient and caring support," understanding pupils’ needs well and adapting lessons to suit individual abilities and special educational needs.
• The school supports pupils’ personal development "exceptionally well," offering opportunities that build independence, social skills, and emotional well-being.
• Pupils demonstrate "excellent behaviour" in a typically calm and orderly environment, with staff swiftly intervening if pupils become unsettled.
• Attendance has "notably improved" due to strengthened systems that make positive attendance a shared responsibility between the school and parents.
• Pupils develop strong communication skills through targeted phonics interventions and regular reading, with staff expertly supporting language development.

Areas to improve

• Strengthen the design of the curriculum in some subject areas and pathways to ensure it is more aspirational and better prepares pupils for formal qualifications and their next stage of learning.
• Ensure curriculum activities and classroom resources consistently support knowledge development, as some currently distract pupils’ attention from the intended learning.

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective.