A Greenwich school has been rated 'inadequate' following its most recent visit from Ofsted.

Hawksmoor School in Thamesmead had not had an official Ofsted inspection since 2012, when they were rated 'Outstanding', however their most recent inspection in February of this year tells a very different tale.

The mother of a child at the school contacted News Shopper last week and claimed the school had been "lying" to parents.

The parent, who wished to remain anonymous, claimed that Hawksmoor School on Bentham Road was in decline and that a number of parents wanted to take their children away.

A letter written to parents from the co-executive headteachers, Sarah Critchell and Lucy Timmons said: "We would like to take this opportunity to express our extreme disdain and disagreement with Ofsted’s judgement that this school is ‘Inadequate’.

"When we were approached to assume the executive headship a year ago, the school was inadequate in a number of areas."

The Ofsted report says that even though progress has been made since the co-executive headteachers were brought in, there are still major improvements, that still need to be made before they will be rated 'outstanding' again.

The report claims that leaders, managers and governors have not maintained the school’s overall effectiveness and that since the previous inspection, pupils’ outcomes have declined considerably.

It was also made clear that in 2018, pupils’ progress was below the national average and that the proportion of pupils in Year 6 who reached the expected standards in reading, writing and mathematics was below average.

Read the Ofsted report here.

The report says that to improve, there needs to be a broader and more balanced curriculum that allows the development of students of all ages, and that governors need to develop the skills to hold leaders to account.

It also states that to improve, pupils need to conduct themselves well and behave considerately throughout the day including at break times, meaning the teaching needs to engage the interest of pupils and motivate them to behave well.

Cllr David Gardner said: “The Ofsted report for Hawksmoor Primary School is obviously very disappointing for us all. It is clearly not the result that we, or the school, would have liked however and the Governors are appealing the decision.

"We are in close contact with the Department for Education and we are working with the school to develop an improvement plan to address the issues that have been raised in the report. We will be working with the Governing Body to provide support and focus on improving teaching and learning as quickly as possible.

"The Council places great importance on giving children the best opportunity to learn and achieve their full potential, in order to equip them for adulthood. The report is clear that the co-headteachers have the capacity to improve and we will be supporting them to make the necessary changes to ensure positive progress is made as soon as possible.”