A HEAD teacher has defended a prominent Andover secondary school after recently receiving another poor Ofsted report.

Head teacher of John Hanson Community School, Ian Coombs, has hit back at the report stating that in 2015 the school “produced the best GCSE results the town has ever seen”.

The school received a mixed Ofsted report where its overall effectiveness was rated “requires improvement” – the same as the last inspection.

Mr Coombs said: “While the Ofsted team identify two key areas for action, I am delighted that overall the inspectors could see that the school is well led and recognised that there is a drive and determination to overcome the staffing difficulties to do the best for the young people.

“Our results last summer, demonstrate that we can teach and support students to have excellent outcomes that help them to successfully move on to the next phase of their education.

“The outgoing Year 11 and current Year 10 are on track to produce similarly strong results.

“They also praised the opportunities students have to participate in creative and performing arts, sports and science clubs.

“The school was commended for the way students are prepared for adult life and have good knowledge about how to keep safe and healthy.

“Schools always look to improve and the Ofsted team highlight two areas to work on.

“The first is about bringing about improvements in those areas where there have been significant staff absences and the good news there is the school is fully staffed for September.

“There is also the need to complete work on assessment at Key Stage 3 by ensuring that students fully understand and can say what they need to do to make progress in their lessons.

“Since the government removed National Curriculum levels a couple of years ago the school has been developing a new system for assessing student progress.

“By October half-term the school will have acted on the Ofsted points.”

The Ofsted report said the school achieved a “good” in effectiveness of leadership and management, and personal development, behaviour and welfare.

It praised the head teacher and staff for focusing on the safety of their students.

The report states: “The curriculum meets the needs of the pupils and is becoming broader as staffing begins to stabilise”

It continued to say that attendance has improved.

The proportion of pupils who are persistently absent from school has halved and the percentage of pupils being excluded from school has more than halved.

However, quality of teaching, learning and assessment and outcomes for pupils were rated “requires improvement”.

The report said; “Outcomes for pupils require improvement because, although attainment at the end of Key Stage 4 is above average in English and mathematics and pupils’ progress is improving, pupils do not achieve as well in different subjects and year groups across the school.”

It explained that Year 11 results “were above the national average but progress from their relatively high starting points across their best eight subjects was broadly average”.