The good times are back
Holloway school celebrates its latest Ofsted ranking after ‘five-year journey’
Friday, 20th January 2023 — By Charlotte Chambers
Alan Streeter with pupils at Beacon High
THE headteacher of a Holloway school told by Ofsted it required improvement six years ago is celebrating after its latest inspection put it in the “good” ranking.
“We know we’ve been good for quite some time. But Ofsted takes a while to catch up with reality, doesn’t it?” said Alan Streeter, speaking from his office at Beacon High in Hilldrop Road.
The school didn’t have the chance to change its status earlier because of an absence of inspections during Covid.
Mr Streeter, 53, who has been at the school for five years but has a 33-year teaching career spread across London, was part of a team that changed its name to Beacon High from Holloway School in June 2019, one year after he joined.
“It’s been a five-year journey,” he said. “I came here in January 2018, the school had had a succession of heads in a short space of time. Each head brings their own ideas. And, of course, I was no different to that.
“It was just about establishing the school, what was good about the school, a direction for the school, in conjunction with the local authority and the governors. And just sticking to that plan.”
A short inspection in 2019 showed leadership was good – meaning the school was heading in the right direction – but it was not until last November that Ofsted inspectors were finally able to reinspect the school completely.
The report, published on Monday, praised the school for it’s “caring” approach and recognised how “high quality care” had led to “polite and considerate pupils”. It also highlighted how “leaders have high expectations of all pupils” and places “the needs of pupils with special educational needs and/or disabilities [SEND] at the heart of the school’s work”.
He said: “Education makes a difference to young people, their futures their lives, and that is, I suppose, my moral compass. I’ve worked in Enfield, in Tower Hamlets, in Hammersmith, and then here, and in all those schools there in areas of high deprivation, with young people who may not always have the advantages that other areas or schools in London might have. So that’s a personal choice and this school fitted that model.”
A palaeontology enthusiast, he gained his teacher training qualification from Cambridge after being the first in his family to go to university.
