DARTMOUTH Academy requires special measures after being slated by education inspectors for being an inadequate school.

A damning report by Ofsted has found the school is failing to give its pupils an acceptable standard of education and leadership must be improved.

The school must take rigorous and rapid action to drive up pupil achievement, improve teaching so that it is at least good, and implement a sharply focused action plan to address its weaknesses.

Pupils’ behaviour must also improve, as must procedures for recording the number of times pupils have needed to be restrained.

By failing to keep a proper log of incidents, the welfare of pupils was potentially at risk, say inspectors.

Their report, published on Tues­day, criticised the leadership, quality of teaching and pupils progress at the academy. Achievement is particularly weak in the sixth form and for disadvantaged pupils; the curriculum is poorly planned; pupils’ disruptive behaviour sometimes gets in the way of learning and overall requires improvement; and leaders do not check students’ progress carefully enough, they found. The challenge provided by governors has also been insufficient to halt the academy’s decline, they say.

Their findings follow an inspection at the end of September, with the academy then under the new leadership of acting principal Tina Graham.

The inspectors say that since the previous inspection in October 2013, leaders have had too little impact on improving the academy.

More on this story in this week’s Dartmouth Chronicle