STAFF, pupils, parents and governors at St. John’s School in Bromsgrove are celebrating after receiving a superb Ofsted report.

The Church of England Middle School, in Watt Close, was inspected at the end of March.

Ian Middleton, the inspector who carried out the inspection stated: "There is a purposeful drive to ensure the school realises it’s potential to become outstanding, which is underpinned by the headteacher’s determination and vision."

Leadership at all levels was described as 'good' and he remarked on passionate leadership by the heads of subject.

Praise was given to the Christian ethos of the school and the direct links with St. John’s Church which was seen to contribute to pupils’ good spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. Pupils also said they felt safe and secure at school.

Children were seen to show great interest in their learning and had excellent knowledge of their current level of work and how to improve it. All teaching was graded good or better and a consistently good feature of teaching was teacher’s strong subject knowledge.

Pupil 'voice' was noted as a strength of the school and the Learning Council were interviewed extensively by the inspector. He described them as ‘exemplary’ and urged the school to develop their perceptive ideas about how to improve learning.

Delighted headteacher Wendy Taylor said this great achievement was the result of hard work and a real team effort from the staff, pupils and parents. She added: "We will definitely be striving for a judgement of 'outstanding' next time. We do have some work to do to achieve this which includes continuing our extensive refurbishment programme of the school environment and ensuring pupils’ achievement in writing matches that of their reading.

There are still a small number of places available at the school for the new Year 5 intake in September 2009.