The leadership team has maintained the good quality of education in the school since the last inspection. You and your leadership team have an accurate knowledge of the school’s strengths and the areas that need improvement. Together, you and your leaders have taken effective action to ensure that the school has gone from strength to strength. Your accurate selfevaluation is building the school’s capacity for further improvement. You and your leaders have continued to inspire pupils by ensuring your curriculum is engaging and well taught. You make effective use of the diverse experiences of pupils from around the world to learn from and about one another, creating a harmonious school community. Pupils who are new to the school, often speaking English as an additional language, are warmly welcomed. This ensures that they thrive and make good progress. As one parent commented on Parent View, the Ofsted online questionnaire, ‘The ethos of the school encourages a love of learning and creates a cohesive, international community.’ This was one view typical of others. You place a strong emphasis on pupils taking risks in learning to improve their outcomes, both socially and academically. Teachers plan topics that make full use of the outdoors and develop pupils’ awareness of environmental issues. At the heart of pupils’ learning is the Newnham code: ‘be kind, be respectful, be a thinker, never give up’. The pupils I talked to were positive about the challenges presented by their work. Mistakes are welcome and seen as an opportunity to build confidence and resilience. This approach makes an effective contribution to developing well-rounded individuals who are ready for the next stage in their learning and development. Staff are proud to work at Newnham Croft. They are committed to helping pupils do well. Parents are overwhelmingly positive about the school and words such as ‘inspire’, ‘flourish’ and ‘thrive’ summed up many of the sentiments expressed on Parent View. Governors use their detailed information to offer you and your leaders good support. Governors are committed and ambitious for the school’s success. They have a very clear understanding of the school’s priorities for improvement. They work strategically to focus their monitoring activities. Governors check that they have the skills and knowledge to carry out their roles effectively by evaluating their own impact. They provide effective challenge to hold leaders to account for ensuring that the school improves. The previous inspection asked leaders to raise achievement in writing. Standards have risen. The proportion of pupils working at the expected standards at both key stage 1 and key stage 2 improved between 2016 and 2017. In the 2017 national assessments, the proportions of pupils who attained the greater depth were above the national average. However, the progress of middle-attaining pupils was lower when compared to other groups of pupils. This formed one of the areas of focus for this inspection and is expanded upon in the ‘Inspection findings’ section of this letter. I found the work undertaken by leaders is improving pupils’ progress in writing. A second area you were asked to improve was to ensure that pupils’ achievement was monitored in subjects other than English, mathematics and science. You introduced a systematic approach and provided training for the staff. Subject leaders make effective use of this whole-school strategy. They have a secure knowledge of pupils’ progress because they understand how to collate information and evaluate their assessments. Consequently, pupils are making significant gains in subjects across the curriculum. Safeguarding is effective. Leaders and governors have ensured that arrangements for safeguarding are fit for purpose. Staff receive appropriate training so they understand how to keep pupils safe. You provide regular updates to keep staff informed and ensure that there is a high vigilance of safeguarding. Records are well maintained and identify actions taken to address concerns. The governor with responsibility for safeguarding makes regular checks of the procedures regarding the suitability of staff to work with children. Pupils understand about keeping themselves safe and your staff teach pupils to keep themselves safe when online. You provide parents with useful information about the dangers of the internet. Pupils said that they feel safe in school. They are confident that adults will do all that they can to ensure their welfare and well-being. Parents agree that their children are safe at school and well cared for.