A leading school governor has praised a senior government inspector for helping his school to move forward.

But Graham Smith, chair of governors at Kirkburton Middle School for the past seven years, has criticised Ofsted’s ‘narrow focus’.

The school was given a rating of ‘3-Requires Improvement’ in May, and an HMI inspector Adrian Guy was appointed to help it improve.

Mr Smith said: “The HMI inspector has been a positive thing, senior inspector Adrian Guy has been really good.

“These people have experience and skills which we don’t have.

“He is focussing on what Ofsted is wanting from the school, but it is very much about how he can help us get there.

“It has been a tremendous step forward.”

However, Mr Smith was highly critical of Ofsted’s remit.

He said: “Ofsted inspectors have become very, very narrow, they are not looking at education in the broader sense.

“There are a lot of strengths of a number of schools which are not being highlighted.

“The inspectors didn’t look at our sports or interview anyone connected with Special Education Needs (SEN) at all.

“They look at data before they come into a school and this colours their judgement.

“It all seems to be driven by results now.”

His comments follow those of Lepton headteacher Lynn Lawson, whose school was recently twice rated as Good by the Church of England, but which Ofsted placed into Special Measures.

She spoke of the “trail of devastation” left behind by the inspectors who, she claimed, were primarily interested in one set of maths results being slightly below the national average.

Headteacher Gary Johnson added: “We were all very disappointed with the Ofsted judgement, but we have tried to approach it as positively as we can in order to improve.

“We understand where Ofsted is coming from in holding teachers to account, and we are monitoring middle leaders more and acting on recommendations.”

In his recently published monitoring report on Kirkburton, Mr Guy praises leaders and governors for the actions they have taken to improve the school.

These include Mr Smith and Mr Johnson attending a one-day Ofsted seminar ‘Getting to Good’ with 20 other schools in York last month, and increased their monitoring systems on teachers’ and pupils’ progress.

The school has just provisionally received record SATS results:

Level 4+ reading has risen 13%, 10% above the provisional national average

Level 4+ writing has risen 9% to equal the national average

Level 4+ maths has risen 6% to equal the national average

In the new spelling and grammar test (not taken into account by Ofsted), Kirkburton pupils are 11% above the national average.

The headteacher believes the school will be ready for re-inspection by July/September 2014 – the earliest possible date Ofsted allows.

Mr Smith added: “We are already looking forward to the new school year.

“We will embrace what needs to happen, but most importantly, we will continue to develop the whole child”.