The 20 North East schools stripped of their outstanding Ofsted status - with one rated inadequate; 20 outstanding schools in the North East that were re-inspected last year with 14 re-assessed as good, five as requiring improvement and one as inadequate.
Byline: Lisa Hutchinson
Twenty schools in the North East lost their outstanding Ofsted rating last year - with one now inadequate.
Schools rated outstanding are exempt from routineOfsted inspections.
However, theschools regulator can inspect those where there are concerns about performance.
Ofsted's chief inspector has called for the exemption to be scrapped, amid concerns some schools have been exempt for so long that parents can no longer have confidence in their outstanding grade.
There were20 outstanding schools in the North Eastthat were re-inspected last year, with 14 re-assessed as good, five as requiring improvement, and one as inadequate.
The Hermitage Academy in Durham was assessed as outstanding for overall effectiveness in October 2007, but downgraded to inadequate with serious weaknesses when it was re-inspected in October last year.
However, the previous inspection pre-dates the school's conversion to an academy.
The schools that went from outstanding to requires improvement are:
Gateshead
Joseph Swan Academy to become Grace College under Emmanuel Schools Foundation academy takeover
Durham
However, the previous inspections for Saint Bede's Catholic VA Primary School and Sacred Heart Secondary Catholic Voluntary Academy were before the schools converted to academies.
The schools that went from outstanding to good are:
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Crawcrook
Rowlands Gill,
Killingworth
North Tyneside
Hexham
Northumberland
St John's School & Sixth Form College - A Catholic Academy, St Margaret Clitherows RC Primary School, and Yarm Primary School have all converted to academies in recent years.
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In the 2018/19 school year, Ofsted inspected 305 outstanding primary and secondary schools.
This represents 8% of all exempt schools and is more than double the number inspected during the 2017/18 academic year.
Given most of these inspections are carried out because the school's performance appears to be declining, Ofsted said it is not surprising for a large proportion to lose the top grading.
However, only 49 of 305 (16%) exempt schools inspected in 2018/19 remained outstanding, compared to 49 of 150 (33%) such schools inspected in 2017/18.
Ofsted's chief inspector Amanda Spielman said: "The figures are not particularly surprising, but they should still set alarm...
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