Bickleigh on Exe Church of England Primary School

Strengths

• Safeguarding standards are met and the school has an open, positive safeguarding culture.
• Attendance is a strength, with effective systems, high expectations and rapid action to remove barriers.
• Behaviour and attitudes are strong, with calm, focused classrooms and rare bullying.
• Nurturing relationships and an inclusive Christian ethos create a welcoming community.
• Pupils achieve well overall and are prepared well for the next stage of education.
• The curriculum is ambitious and well sequenced, with clear key knowledge.
• Phonics teaching is effective and supports pupils in learning to read.
• Mathematics teaching builds fluency and problem-solving, including for pupils with SEND.
• Early years provision is strong, with high-quality interactions, clear routines and good parent links.
• Inclusion is effective, with early identification of needs and strong pastoral support.
• Leadership and governance are dedicated, well informed and supportive of staff development.
• Personal development is broad, with extracurricular clubs, pupil leadership roles and community engagement.

Areas for Improvement

• The curriculum is not yet consistently strong across all wider subjects and classes.
• Challenge for pupils working at greater depth is inconsistent, particularly in mathematics, reading, and grammar, spelling and punctuation.
• Individual SEND plans and school-based plans sometimes lack clarity and precision, and do not always fully specify support beyond core provision.
• Pupils' knowledge of the wider world, including religions beyond Christianity, is not secure or detailed enough.
• Some pupils do not fully recall the content of relationships education.
• Published outcomes for disadvantaged pupils are below national averages with large gaps, although cohorts are small and data is often suppressed.

• Primary Schools
• Secondary Schools