Response to latest Ofsted Report January 2019

The management at Jamia Al-Hudaa would like to exercise our right and share our response to the latest Ofsted report.

We would firstly like to focus on the positives from the inspection in terms of further improvements that have been made since the last inspection. We are appreciative of the fact that the report recognises that the school is still ‘Good’ in two areas out of four. ‘Quality of teaching, learning and assessment’ along with ‘Outcomes for Pupils’.

We appreciate and respect the findings in the report, however, we feel the wording and language used in the report is disproportionate in light of the verbal judgements and feedback that we received during the inspection. The report does not do enough to maintain its balance in terms of the positives that were also noted and consistency in the majority of the standards that were found to be met.
We have taken on the aspects mentioned in the report and addressed the issues and hope to maintain the standards like we recently did when the school was graded as ‘Good’.

Below is the response to some of the main concerns raised in the report;

Safeguarding
Early in the academic year (September 2018), a concern was reported by an external agency to the local safeguarding board. We worked in partnership with them to investigate and also refresh staff training to overcome shortcomings and since then we are confident with the safeguarding practices in place. Furthermore, since the concerns (September 2018) there have been no new concerns raised and students have settled in well and understand the procedures in place when they need help or support.

Welfare, Health & Safety
The school resolved some of the major issues and concerns whilst the inspection was ongoing and despite many requests, the inspectors declined the opportunity to re-visit the areas of concern and insisted that they report on whatever they had noted during the first day of the inspection. We also mentioned to them that the school was in the process of recruiting more housekeeping staff and have managed to do so since the inspection.
The records for students that had left the school were a cause for concern and during the inspection steps were taken to address this and inspectors also appreciated the swift actions. Staff have since maintained this as procedural routine.

Personal Development
We feel that students who were questioned about safeguarding issues and other risks that they may face in their lives were new starters at the school (for approximately 2 ½ months). The school has a strategy in place for PSHE and external visits for each academic year (which was shared with the inspectors) and we are confident that by the end of the year every new student will be fully equipped in this aspect of personal development. The school also expressed grave concerns about these new students (who mainly come from other state schools) lacking awareness about these safeguarding issues and risks despite having studied at their previous schools for many years.

We will provide updates on our website so our school and wider community can be reassured of the policies & procedures in place.

On behalf of Raza Ul Haq
Principal

Independent School Inspection October 2017

Social Care Inspection 20 July 2018

Independent School Inspection January 2019