Ofsted inspectors make U-turn on 'Trojan Horse' school, leak shows
Ofsted's first inspection of Park View academy – at the centre of the Trojan Horse allegations of an Islamist plot – cleared the school of allegations of discrimination and retained its "outstanding" rating, according to a leaked draft of the inspector's recommendations seen by the Guardian.
The results of that initial inspection were rejected just a few days later when Ofsted inspectors re-entered the school and overturned their initial findings, replacing a string of relatively minor recommendations with more severe criticism that could see it placed in special measures as early as next week.
The revelation is the latest twist in the so-called "Trojan Horse" saga, which has seen claims of Islamist plots to take over schools in Birmingham turn into a political row that has engulfed the education secretary, Michael Gove, Ofsted chief inspector, Sir Michael Wilshaw, Birmingham city council and Britain's former senior anti-terror policeman, recruited by Gove as a special education commissioner.
At the centre of the saga is Park View, a school rated by Ofsted as outstanding as recently as 2012 and praised by Wilshaw for its extraordinary exam success, despite having 60% of its pupils eligible for free school meals – three times the national average – in a deprived, heavily Muslim part of Birmingham.
http://www.theguardian.com/education/2014/may/30/ofsted-u-turn-trojan-horse-park-view-school-leak
