Ellowes Hall Sports College

Ellowes Hall School is a comprehensive secondary school with Specialist Sports College status, situated in Lower Gornal, Dudley, in the West Midlands. It is situated in the metropolitan borough of Dudley. It was opened in 1964 to replace a smaller secondary school at Redhall. Ellowes Hall is located on the large Stickley Estate of local authority and ex-local authority housing and its main feeder schools are Roberts Street Primary, Redhall Primary, Straits Primary and Milking Bank Primary School. The current headteacher is Mr Andrew Griffiths, a History teacher and former Deputy Headteacher. He was appointed headteacher in 2004.

The preamble to Ellowes' latest OfSTED report describes the school as: "an averaged sized secondary school with a small sixth form. It serves the quite insular community of Gornal in Dudley. Employment is the local area is average, though there are few people employed in highly skilled occupations, and there is no established tradition of local people gaining further or higher education qualifications. Young people are involved in a significant amount of anti-social behaviour in the local community outside school hours, and older people suffer from significant ill health. As part of a drive to combat these two problems the school has recently sought and gained recognition as a specialist Sports College. In another bid to raise' Gornal out of the lowest 10 per cent of wards in the country for education and skills, the governors have for many years maintained a fierce determination to offer access to sixth form education to as many local students as possible. Pupils’ attainment when they come to the school has been below average for four of the last five' years. Students move on to sixth form courses having achieved standards well below those normally required. The proportion of pupils entitled to free school means is average, and so is the proportion of pupils with special educational needs. The proportion of students from minority ethnic backgrounds,or who use English as an additional language is very low. Pupil mobility is low.

The report praises the new leadership team for addressing the dramatic decline in standards and deteriorating behaviour under the previous Head. Academic performance remains below the LEA and national averages, but shows marked improvement: in 2005, 41% of students obtained 5 or more good GCSEs (A*-C) compared with 32 and 33% in the previous two years. OfSTED criticized the Sixth Form provision as inadequate (against a national average of 278, Ellowes Sixth Form students achieved an average of 130 points in 2005).

The good leadership of the new Headteacher, OfSTED found, has won the support of the pupils and staff. The school's positive ethos is praised, and OfSTED reports that the school's successful pursuit of Sports College status has added to this. Teaching is "good"; overall education is "satisfactory", but Curriculum provision is "unsatisfactory".

The previous headteacher, Stephen Byatt, resigned from his post in 2004 after 5 years following controversy regarding staffing, complaints from parents, declining grades and increasingly poor student behaviour. He succeeded Mr Norman Smith, a popular local figure whose initials (NRS) are embossed on the school's main gates, who retired due to ill health.

External links

• Ellowes Hall School