The Court Special School

Highlights from Latest Inspection

The Court School is a special school maintained by Cardiff City Council.

The school supports primary aged pupils from four to 11 years old with social, emotional and behavioural difficulties. Most pupils have statements of special educational needs. The school aims to help pupils overcome their difficulties and where possible return to mainstream education.

Eight pupils returned to mainstream school in the last academic year. The school's motto is £Learning to learn together£. All pupils come from the city and county of Cardiff.

Currently there are 38 boys and no girls. A few pupils are looked after by the local authority. No pupils speak Welsh as their first language.

A few pupils are from ethnic minorit...y backgrounds. About 70% of pupils receive free school meals. This is well above the all Wales average.

Pupils are taught in five classes, which are broadly determined by need, ability level and age. One of these classes caters for pupils who also attend their mainstream schools. This class is called the Revolving Door.

The school was last inspected in 2008. The headteacher and deputy have both been in post since 2005. The school works with the local authority behaviour support system on a termly basis to organise the referral and admission of pupils to the £Revolving Door£ provision.

This is a joint programme with local primary and secondary school to return pupils to mainstream provision, supported by learning mentors. In this academic year, 18 out of 22 pupils in this class have returned to full-time mainstream provision. The 2013-2014 individual school budget per pupil for The Court School is £20,783, which compares to a national average of £19,179 for all special schools in Wales.

1 A report on The Court Special School June 2014