How is your child doing?

Reporting and assessment

All pupils receive a school report at some point during each school year. This gives details of their progress in all National Curriculum subjects and religious education. Each school makes its own arrangements for you to discuss the report with your child's teachers.

Teachers continually assess children's progress in all subjects. When pupils are 7, 11 and 14 teachers must assess their achievements in English, Mathematics and Science on the eight-level National Curriculum scale. At these stages there are also external statutory tests in English, Mathematics and Science. These primary school assessment results and secondary school assessment results will be included in reports, together with school and national information.

Most pupils receive a record of achievement when they leave school. This document will contain examples and evidence of a wider range of achievements than exam results. Pupils can show it at job or college interviews.

Public examinations at Key Stage 4

Schools enter their pupils for public examinations at Key Stage 4 after assessing their performance in each subject and consulting parents. The school pays the exam fee if the head teacher supports the pupil's entry. If your child does not complete the course, you will have to repay the fee unless there are special circumstances.

Publishing information on school performance

Schools must publish certain information about their pupils' performance in external tests and public exams. This information will be included in the school prospectus or published as a separate document. The Department for Education and Skills (DfES) publishes national details of KS2, KS3 and KS4 results for schools in Nottinghamshire. This information is available on the DfES website: www.dfes.gov.uk.

Exam results alone cannot give a complete picture of the quality of education a school provides. There are many other factors which you need to bear in mind including recent Ofsted school inspection reports. You should consider each school's results in the context of the school's environment and the value the school has added to levels of pupil achievement.

School effectiveness and improvement

Under the code of practice which governs relations between us and schools, we are responsible for monitoring schools' targets and performance. This means that we are aware of the effectiveness of each school and do what is necessary to improve both the Local Authority as a whole and individual schools.