Lisneal College

Overview

This Sustaining Improvement Inspection evaluated Lisneal College’s capacity for self-evaluation and development planning during a period of industrial action. While the report highlights significant improvements in pupil outcomes and data usage, it concludes that the ETI is “unable to assure parents/carers... of the quality of education” due to limited cooperation from teaching staff.

Strengths

• The percentage of pupils attaining five or more GCSEs at grades A* to C has “improved significantly” and is now “well above the Northern Ireland average.”
• Outcomes in GCSE English have similarly improved, and post-16 results have been above the national average for two of the last three years.
• The school demonstrates an “improving capacity... to undertake self-evaluation leading to improvement,” including the targeted use of assessment data.
• Assessment data is used effectively to “raise the expectations of pupils and teachers” and identify necessary interventions to support progress.
• Pupils report that they “feel safe in school” and know who to contact regarding safety or well-being concerns.

Areas to improve

• Work is underway to “improve the security of access to the school building,” which “needs to be completed promptly to ensure access is fully controlled.”
• The ETI was unable to fully evaluate safeguarding arrangements or the overall quality of education due to the impact of industrial action.

Safeguarding

The school provided evidence of “satisfactory arrangements for safeguarding pupils” which reflect relevant guidance, though the ETI could not fully evaluate their outworking due to the industrial action.