A SCHOOL, which two years ago was failing, has turned itself around to win the praise of education inspectors.

Tavistock College is celebrating after Ofsted inspectors paid tribute to the 'rapid improvement' the college has made.

Principal Helen Salmon said the college had been given a clean bill of health for the first time in ten years and the report, which judged the school 'good' in every one of the Ofsted categories, would be used as a platform to make the college outstanding.

Tavistock College was placed into 'special measures' in January 2010 and remained there until December 2011.

After a visit last month in which inspectors witnessed 54 lessons, they rated the achievement of pupils, quality of teaching, behaviour and safety of pupils and leadership and management all good.

They said the college was improving rapidly because of the unswerving commitment and determination of the principal, who had created very strong senior and middle leadership teams which helped to share her uncompromising vision for the college.

The capacity to further improve this school was strong, said the report.

Mrs Salmon said the key to school improvement was the quality of teaching, which the report said had 'risen significantly over the last two years' — and also how well the school met the needs of every pupil.

There was praise too for the attitude of the students, who were respectful and courteous.

They responded well to the the college ethos and their behaviour was good.

The effectiveness of support for students with behavioural needs was exemplary, said the inspectors.

Lead inspector Jacqueline Goodall said the governing body had become resilient in its quest to restore confidence in this school within the community.

It had accelerated improvement in teaching and learning by recruiting only the strongest leaders and teachers.

Governors knew the college strengths and remaining areas for development very well and held the principal to account for improvement, she said.

Relationships between the college and parents were now stronger and liaison with the families of more vulnerable students had been particularly effective.

'The school's analysis and the response to the Parent View online survey show that the majority of parents and carers agree that the college is providing a safe and effective education,' said Ms Goodall.

'One parent or carer remarked on the "real and remarkable changes" in the college; another valued the "creativity, care and inspirational teaching".'

The report said that college leaders had improved teaching in subjects where students had not been taught well, so that they now made good progress in mathematics particularly, and in science, history and information and communication techn-ology.

The achievement of students in Key Stage Three was in line with expectation and inspired confidence in their ability to realise their potential as they moved up through the college.

Students made very good progress in most courses in the sixth form and achieved particularly well in psychology, history and law.

Recommendations to further improve the school included ensuring that the most able students were regularly given more complex tasks that challenged them to achieve the highest grades, extending the most effective teaching skills already used in the college, and supporting students' ability to learn on their own, so they became less reliant on teachers.

The principal joined the school in September 2010 initially on secondment, and later took over as head in January 2011.

She said her primary aim had been to get the college to the level it was at now.

She praised the hard work of staff who had 'gone through the mill a bit' to get to this point and said she was very proud of the students.

'The students are now taking pride in the school — that is something they did not have three or four years ago,' she said.

'They are getting a better deal now and they really want to learn.

'I think we can take pride from this achievement but the thing that pleases me most about this report is that it talks about the capacity to improve further.

'It's a platform to work from, we have got the basics right, now we can really go for it and make the college outstanding.'

GCSE results are continuing to improve and Mrs Salmon said the staff and students had reacted really positively to the high expectations which the college had now set.

She said the college was a key part of the community and community involvement in the school had increased dramatically.

She now hoped that pupil numbers, which had dropped by 200 over the last three years because people had lost faith in the school, would now start to increase.

Chair of Governors Alan Jones said: 'Our aim has always been to make people proud of our school again.

'It is a great community and it deserves a great school.'

Full details of the Ofsted report will be published on the college website tomorrow (Friday).

The successful report follows celebrations at the school in October, when its inspirational head of Japanese, Crispin Chambers, was named secondary school teacher of the year.