A school for children with Special Educational Needs (SEN) is celebrating maintaining its 'Good' rating following a three-day Ofsted inspection.

Arbour House School, on Glendinning Avenue in Weymouth, has maintained its ranking from a previous inspection in 2018.

Ofsted gives schools an overall rating of either outstanding, good, requires improvement or inadequate.

Inspectors graded the school ‘Good’ in all areas from the quality of the education provided through to leadership and management and early years provision.

The pupils who come to Arbour House are aged between six to 18 years old and have a range of complex needs, including SLD, MLD, ASD, ADHD and related difficulties.

The school says it offers a tailored and flexible approach and aims to ensure that pupils’ educational provision is as individualised and creative as possible to best meet their needs.

In describing what it is like to attend the school, the report said: "Arbour House provides a calm and nurturing environment for pupils to learn. Pupils are happy and safe. Staff know pupils and their families well. Many pupils arrive following poor experiences in education. The overwhelming majority of parents and carers appreciate the care and support the school provides for their children.

"Staff have high expectations of what pupils can achieve. Pupils develop trusting relationships with adults.

"Staff receive frequent training in how to support pupils with complex needs, including their social and emotional needs. As a result, staff understand how to develop pupils’ communication skills, which enables pupils to access more of the planned curriculum."

The report did point out one area the school could improve on, it said: "Many areas of the curriculum, such as English and art, have been well designed and implemented. However, leaders have not yet developed other areas of learning to the same level so that pupils learn as well as they could.

"Leaders need to ensure that knowledge develops systematically across all subjects so that all pupils know more and remember more over time in all subjects."

Julie Perks, Headteacher said: “I’m delighted that Ofsted have yet again rated Arbour House school as ‘Good’ in all areas. Arbour House is a very special school, where staff, pupils, parents and carers work closely together to create a strong, supportive environment for children to develop and make progress. I am incredibly proud of the hard work from both the school’s staff and pupils”

Nicki Stadames, Chair of Governors said: “This report demonstrates the child focussed approach taken at Arbour House, and how that approach inspires learning and development in really dynamic and creative ways. This results in pupils who are excited, engaged and positively challenged to gain success – testimony of the real difference that we see the whole school team making to the lives of the children that attend.”