Inspection of Meadow High School

Royal Lane, Hillingdon, Middlesex, Uxbridge, Middlesex UB8 3QU

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Inspection dates:	25 and 26 February 2025
The quality of education	Good
Behaviour and attitudes	Good
Personal development	Outstanding
Leadership and management	Good
Sixth-form provision	Outstanding
Previous inspection grade	Good

  

What is it like to attend this school?

Pupils are happy and enjoy learning. They arrive at school smiling and show their kindness when speaking with their friends and the staff welcoming them. Staff build warm, caring and trusting relationships with pupils and their parents and carers. Pupils feel safe knowing that staff look out for their best interests. 

The school has a mainly calm and purposeful atmosphere. Pupils behave well in classes and at social times. Staff deploy effective strategies to quickly help pupils who may become overly emotional or anxious to regain their composure and feel calm. 

The school has very high aspirations for pupils’ achievements, both in terms of their social and academic outcomes. Overall, pupils achieve well, and exceptionally so in the sixth form. 

The school provides pupils with extensive enrichment opportunities. For example, every week pupils choose from a wide range of options that help them to try new things and develop their talents and interests. These include arts and crafts, web design, dance and drama, dog walking and media studies. Working in these clubs with pupils from different classes helps with pupils’ social development and builds confidence. The sixth-form curriculum ensures that students leave the school exceptionally well prepared to take up their places as successful and upstanding citizens in modern Britain.  

 

What does the school do well and what does it need to do better?

Since the previous inspection, the school has revised the curriculum. The teaching of reading and supporting pupils’ communication skills are the school’s top priorities. Staff have the expertise to teach phonics effectively. Pupils practise their reading with books that match the sounds that they have learned. Pupils love hearing staff reading to them. They also enjoy accessing recordings online of staff reading books. Pupils who are not meeting the school’s aims for their reading receive bespoke support. As a result, pupils gain confidence and become increasingly fluent readers. The school also deploys a range of effective strategies to support pupils’ communication, including for those who need extra help. Across the curriculum, there is much emphasis on broadening pupils’ vocabulary. These approaches support pupils to access different subjects successfully. 

Across most subjects, the school has identified the knowledge that it wants pupils to know and by when. Staff have had training and gain the expertise to teach most subjects effectively. Teachers and therapists work closely together. They set pupils bespoke academic and therapeutic targets. Teaching and therapies are well tailored to meet individual needs. Staff ensure that pupils have plentiful opportunities to revise their learning. This helps pupils to retain knowledge and skills over time. Staff also keep a close eye on how well pupils are achieving the goals that the school has set for them. The teaching and therapy teams use the emerging information from their checks well to make any necessary adaptations for pupils. They address any misconceptions that pupils may have and also make required changes to the therapies. As a result, pupils’ overall achievement is strong. However, in a few subjects, curriculum thinking about what the school wants pupils to know and when, and how this should be taught, is not as secure. In these subjects, pupils do not regularly achieve as well as they could.

The sixth-form curriculum is thoroughly embedded. The post-16 provision is sharply focused on meeting students’ needs and interests. It aims to prepare them well for independence, adult living and work or training, and these aims are fully realised. The curriculum has an excellent vocational element. Students gain a range of work-place experiences, for instance in the school’s hairdressing salon and tuck shop. They also gain purposeful experience in a multitude of other settings. These include schools, libraries, construction sites, shops, care homes and garden centres. Additionally, some students attend a full-time supported internship in a hotel. These opportunities help students to identify, and gain experience in, the paths that they wish to follow in their adult lives. Students also achieve a wide range of vocational and academic accreditations and qualifications. The school’s careers provision is exceptionally strong. Students thus leave the school exceptionally well prepared for adulthood. 

Pupils are keen to learn and are attentive in class. The school’s new approaches to increasing attendance are proving to be very effective. Absence rates this academic year have reduced significantly. 

Pupils are taught about healthy relationships, consent and coercive behaviours. They attend several residential trips. Pupils develop their character through the different physical and other social-related activities. They also learn how to use a budget to plan their meals. Pupils have a strong voice in the school. For example, in response to a request from some pupils, the school formed its own Scouts and Explorer Scouts groups, which meet weekly. Pupils also have opportunities to contribute to the community. These include, for instance, litter picking as part of working towards the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award. These provisions make a excellent contribution to supporting pupils to be successful citizens in their adult lives. 

The school and governing body want the best for each pupil. They have achieved a range of improvements since the previous inspection. The school considers and checks on staff’s well-being carefully. Leaders consider the impact on staff workload when making changes. Staff generally feel that workload requirements are reasonable.

 

Safeguarding

The arrangements for safeguarding are effective

What does the school need to do to improve?

(Information for the school and appropriate authority)

◼ In a few subjects, what the school wants pupils to know and its expectations for how curriculum content should be taught are not as clearly defined as they should be. This means that sometimes pupils do not routinely achieve their full potential with their learning. The school should ensure that it completes its work in refining the curriculum and its implementation so that pupils achieve highly across the subjects.

 

How can I feed back my views?

You can use Ofsted Parent View to give Ofsted your opinion on your child’s school, or to find out what other parents and carers think. We use information from Ofsted Parent View when deciding which schools to inspect, when to inspect them and as part of their inspection.

 

The Department for Education has further guidance on how to complain about a school.

 

Further information

You can search for published performance information about the school.

In the report, ‘disadvantaged pupils’ is used to mean pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND); pupils who meet the definition of children in need of help and protection; pupils receiving statutory local authority support from a social worker; and pupils who otherwise meet the criteria used for deciding the school’s pupil premium funding (this includes pupils claiming free school meals at any point in the last six years, looked after children (children in local authority care) and/or children who left care through adoption or another formal route).                                              

  

School details

Unique reference number	102462
Local authority	Hillingdon
Inspection number	10345811
Type of school	Special
School category	Community special
Age range of pupils	11 to 19
Gender of pupils	Mixed
Gender of pupils in sixth-form provision	Mixed
Number of pupils on the school roll	286
Of which, number on roll in the sixth form	82
Appropriate authority	The governing body
Chair of governing body	Richard Burton
Headteacher	Jenny Rigby
Website	www.meadowhighschool.org
Dates of previous inspection	7 and 8 November 2023, under section 8 of the Education Act 2005

 

Information about this school

• The school caters for pupils with moderate learning difficulties, autism, and speech, language and communication needs. All pupils have an education, health and care plan.  
• The school uses three alternative providers. One of these is unregistered, two are registered.
• The school runs an internship provision in conjunction with the local authority. This internship is based at The Marriott Hotel, Bath Road, Heathrow Airport, Hayes UB3 5AN.

  

 Information about this inspection

The inspectors carried out this graded inspection under section 5 of the Education Act

2005. During a graded inspection, we grade the school for each of our key judgements (quality of education; behaviour and attitudes; personal development; and leadership and management) and for any relevant provision judgement (early years and/or sixth form provision). Schools receiving a graded inspection from September 2024 will not be given an overall effectiveness grade.

• Inspections are a point-in-time evaluation about the quality of a school’s education provision.
• Inspectors discussed any continued impact of the pandemic with the school and have taken that into account in their evaluation of the school.
• Inspectors carried out deep dives in these subjects: reading and communication, personal, social, health and economic education, together with relationships and sex education, physical education and music. For each deep dive, inspectors held discussions about the curriculum, visited a sample of lessons, spoke to teachers, spoke to some pupils about their learning and looked at samples of pupils’ work. Inspectors also considered other subjects as part of the inspection.
• Inspectors spoke with the headteacher and other senior leaders. They spoke with the chair of the governing body and other governors. They also spoke with a representative of the local authority. 
• To evaluate the effectiveness of safeguarding, the inspectors: reviewed the single central record; took account of the views of leaders, staff and pupils; and considered the extent to which the school has created an open and positive culture around safeguarding that puts pupils’ interests first.
• Inspectors reviewed a range of documentation, including looking at records of pupils’ behaviour. Inspectors also had formal meetings with groups of staff, including a group of therapists, and with groups of pupils.
• Inspectors took account of the responses to the Ofsted Parent View survey. They considered the responses to the staff and pupil surveys.

 

Inspection team

David Radomsky, lead inspector	His Majesty’s Inspector
Nell Nicholson	Ofsted Inspector
Janice Howkins	Ofsted Inspector

       

 

The Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted) regulates and inspects to achieve excellence in the care of children and young people, and in education and skills for learners of all ages. It regulates and inspects childcare and children’s social care, and inspects the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass), schools, colleges, initial teacher training, further education and skills, adult and community learning, and education and training in prisons and other secure establishments. It assesses council children’s services, and inspects services for children looked after, safeguarding and child protection.

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