Dartmouth Academy has been given an 'outstanding' report following a two-day Ofsted check-up before a full inspection next year.

Two senior inspectors visited the academy last month to carry out a monitoring inspection.

Inspectors stated children progressed quickly thanks to 'outstanding' teaching in its primary phase, that teaching practice had improved across the whole Academy, its 6th form was exceeding expectations and there was strong leadership at the school.

The academy leadership team was praised for their actions after disappointing Maths GCSE results last year.

The inspectors also praised the positive attitude of the students and the good relationship they had with the teaching staff.

There were also pointers for further improvement from the inspectors for the academy.

They said that while the best lessons observed were pacey sharp and differentiated, some teachers needed to have higher expectations of students, to adapt the pace of lessons to the needs of individual learners and, on occasions, give more structured feedback.

Academy principal Nick Hindmarsh said the report showed how much progress had been made and how much was still to come.

He said: 'We are pleased with the report.

'It shows we are improving as we should be, and that there is more work still to be done.

'Our mantra this year is "No excuses, No surprise", so we are particularly pleased that this report recognises the same strengths and weaknesses that we identified ourselves.

'The inspectors have praised how we monitor our teachers and students to help raise standards.

'We feel this report vindicates the decisions we have taken to improve education in Dartmouth and that all our hard work is now starting to bear fruit.

'We cannot stop now and will be working even harder to make Dartmouth Academy the school this wonderful town deserves.'

The full report is available on the Ofsted website http://www.ofsted">www.ofsted. gov.uk.