STAFF and students at a Burnley high school are celebrating an ‘exceptional’ start to the academic year.

Hameldon Community College’s headteacher said pupils had seen ‘great success’ in their GCSE results, with 100 per cent gaining at least one quali-fication.

Gill Broom added that there had been a 20 per cent improvement in students attaining five A* to C grades including English and maths.

The school, which has now formally applied to become an academy, was said to be ‘inadequate’ with ‘serious weaknesses’, when inspec-tors from Ofsted visited in October last year. But a recent inspection has found attainment was rising.

Miss Broom said: “This is a really positive start for 2014. Both our reports and Ofsted letter show that as a small, family-orientated school, our students really appreciate the individual and personalised learning, support and care they receive.

“Our detailed and robust plans for this academic year will enable us to build further on this excellent foundation.”

Ofsted inspector Terry Holland said in a letter to the Coal Clough Lane school, the headteacher, with the support of key senior staff, provided a ‘very strong’ leadership enabling leaders throughout the school to grow in confidence and to press forward with their improve-ment programme.

He said: “As a result, it is clear students are making better progress than at the time of the section five inspe-ction.

“The greater emphasis on individual student’s progress has helped teachers to sharpen their focus on the performance of different groups of students, parti-cularly those requiring specific support for their learning and behaviour, and those who are the most able.

“As a result, the perform-ance of both these groups has begun to improve since the previous inspection.”

But he added the progress of the most able students and potential high attainers still needed further improvement.

Mr Holland said: “Teaching is improving but the school is aware the performance of some staff is still too variable.”