Jewish secondary school wins Ofsted legal battle over incorrect downgrade

King David High School Manchester has won its legal battle with Ofsted after the inspectorate incorrectly issued it with a downgrade.

The school was inspected in May 2015 and rated Outstanding, but it was downgraded in June to Inadequate over concerns about the separation of girls and boys in classes for more religious students.

Following a challenge, Ofsted said it had “taken the very unusual step of giving consent to the quashing of the most recent inspection report” on the school.

“We have agreed with the school that, given the school’s particular arrangements, it was not open to us to conclude that there was unlawful direct discrimination on grounds of either sex or religion and belief, when comparing a pupil in either of the single-sex streams with a pupil in the main stream,” it said.

“Quashing the report will allow us to re-inspect the school at an appropriate time, looking again at how it manages the separation of pupils by sex and assessing the education it provides against our new inspection framework.”