Islay High School

Overview

Inspectors found that Islay High School fosters a "caring ethos" where young people feel "valued and included," supported by strong community links. The school demonstrates "good" performance in ensuring wellbeing and raising attainment, with students achieving well in National Qualifications, though leadership of change and learning, teaching, and assessment were evaluated as "satisfactory."

Strengths

• Senior leaders and staff collaborate to create an environment where "almost all young people feel valued and included."
• Students receive "useful, individualised feedback," particularly in S3 to S6, leading to strong attainment in National Qualifications.
• The student support team is "highly effective" in planning for learning and wellbeing, ensuring those needing additional support "achieve success."
• Young people are "keen to learn and achieve through Gaelic" across various contexts, supported by technology and community partnerships.

Areas to improve

• Staff should develop a "more consistent approach to checking the progress in school improvement" and review the S1–S3 curriculum to ensure full entitlement.
• Teachers need a "clear and shared understanding of the key features of high-quality learning, teaching and assessment" to plan more stimulating activities.
• The school must develop a "whole-school approach to support the wellbeing of all young people," including reviewing the personal and social education programme.
• Senior leaders should accelerate plans to improve Gaelic Learner and Medium Education to increase qualification awards.

Safeguarding

The report states that the school’s work in "Ensuring wellbeing, equality and inclusion" is evaluated as "good," with staff effectively supporting young people’s wellbeing needs.