Fears for school's future as emergency meeting is called

St Aidan’s Church of England Academy, in Darlington, was set up in 2007 to replace the town's failing Eastbourne Comprehensive School and is now housed in a £16m campus.

But the academy, which is co-sponsored by the Diocese of Durham, has struggled and now, following a damning Ofsted report, officials believe something must be done to stop the rot.

Last night the Diocese of Durham said it had called in a nationally-recognised expert to help turn the academy around and would set up a task force to oversee the process.

The town's Labour MP, Jenny Chapman, organised a summit after Ofsted criticised the academy in three key areas - behaviour and safety of pupils, quality of teaching and achievement of pupils.

In the fourth category of leadership and management, Ofsted said St Aidan’s “requires improvement”.

The critical report has fuelled speculation over the future of the Hundens Lane school, which has 597 pupils aged 11 to 16.

Mrs Chapman told The Northern Echo: “Enough is enough. St Aidan’s pupils deserve better. Darlington will not tolerate persistent underperformance in education and the young people who are at school now, and who are likely to attend in the future, deserve the very best education.”

The emergency meeting is set for Thursday, November 20, at Darlington Town Hall and will be attended by Mrs Chapman, Darlington Borough Council’s chief executive Ada Burns and Councillor Cyndi Hughes, Cabinet Member of Children and Young People.

Although the council has no control over the self-governing academy, Mrs Chapman is inviting the principal of St Aidan’s, Catherine McCoy and chairman of governors Reverand Canon Sheila Bamber from the Diocese of Durham to the meeting.

The MP has also invited the recently appointed Department for Education Schools Commissioner for the North, Janet Renou, who is based in Darlington. However, it is understood she will not be able to attend.

Ofsted found “too few students achieved the minimum expectations for attainment and progress set by the government.”

But it did state that the principal, supported by the governors, is “leading academy improvements strongly” and has taken “decisive action” to deal with teaching weaknesses.

Mrs Chapman said: “The Diocese must take responsibility and all avenues should be explored. All those involved in education in Darlington, including the diocese, the local authority and head teachers need to formulate a plan B because this one isn’t working. We need to find our way forward. To do nothing is not an option.

“There are ways of working with the other heads and local authority. A few years ago the future of DSMS was being questioned and they have had a serious transformation there.

“We have turned schools around in the past in Darlington.The Darlington School of Mathematics and Science is making rapid improvements but we have not seen the same transformation at St Aidan’s despite years of support and state-of-the- art facilities.”

The Venerable Stuart Bain, chair of the diocesan board of education for the Diocese of Durham said: "We recognise the seriousness of the situation and that there must be rapid improvement. We are in the process of preparing a robust statement of action as the co-sponsors of the school.

The sponsors have asked the Principal of Whitburn Church of England Academy an outstanding Church of England school in the diocese, and who is recognised as a national leader of education, to support and challenge the senior leaders and governors at St Aidan’s to ensure that rapid progress is made.

The Ofsted report said: “Following a period of significant staffing change, the Diocese of Durham, Church of England and independent sponsors have brokered appropriate support to help improve the quality of teaching.

“We have discussed our plans for improvement with the appropriate bodies, who are in agreement with our proposals. As part of this we have instigated a monitoring group that will drive forward the necessary improvements."