Mason Moor Primary School achieves the IQM Centre of Excellence Award

September 14, 2026

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Mason Moor Primary School has achieved the IQM Centre of Excellence Award in recognition of their strong commitment to inclusion and equity. Inclusion at Mason Moor is central to the school’s ethos, with staff working hard to identify and remove barriers for pupils and striving to ensure equity for all pupils.

Inclusion at the heart of school life

The core values of ‘Nurture, Grow and Achieve’ are shared by all, with pupils saying ‘We are ready, respectful and safe’ every day. The school motto is to ‘be the best version of yourself’ and staff take the time to know and understand every child; celebrating their individuality and uniqueness; forming very positive relationships and helping every pupil to flourish in the widest possible sense.

Staff have a shared mantra of ‘do whatever it takes’ to support their pupils. Ensuring pupils feel that they belong; recognised as an individual and are supported to thrive is paramount and it is a shared responsibility. Staff at MM work hard to identify and remove any barriers for pupils and strive to ensure equity for all pupils.

Personalised provision for individual need

Any provision is closely matched to the individual, whether that be meeting a SEND need or ensuring more able pupils are challenged. As a school, MM seeks to identify any additional needs at the earliest opportunity and a well embedded and robust graduated approach and APDR cycle precisely maps provision. Ofsted, March 2026, reported that ‘Pupils receive support as soon as concerns arise’.

SEND pupils have access to a wide range of resources to support their learning, including resources to support language development like sound mats; word banks with visuals; word hexagons and break it down grids. Adaptive teaching; scaffolds; stem sentences; visuals; concrete resources and the use of technology, support language acquisition, understanding and enable pupils to achieve success.

Pre-teaching of vocabulary and individual visual timetables and workstations are used to support some pupils. MM run a wide range of interventions, including Blast 1 and Blast 2 in the EYFS to boost language and auditory skills and talking; Lego therapy; story groups and bucket groups. Staff are aware of reducing cognitive overload for pupils within classrooms and these personalised work-spaces lessen distractions for individual pupils.

Leadership and shared responsibility

Ofsted reported in March 2026 ‘Leaders operate seamlessly as a team, making well-considered decisions in pupils best interests’.

The EHT, HOS, SLT and governors share a passion and responsibility to do ‘whatever it takes’ to improve the life chances of all the pupils in their care and help them ‘be the best version of themselves’.

The HOS provides very strong daily leadership to the school, within a very collaborative, team approach. Staff at the school describe ‘the real team spirit’ and find SLT very approachable. ‘They are a real presence in the school. The children have to walk past them and they are held to account. They know all the children and the children know they are approachable’.

There is a collaborative, distributed, and shared accountability to ensuring inclusive practices and meeting individual need, so ‘All staff are leaders of inclusion’. Due to their location in the centre of the school, the HOS and SLT are highly accessible to the pupils and staff and continually in touch with what is going on throughout the school. The HOS said; ‘it helps give that community feel to the school’.

Building trust with families

Since leading the school, the EHT; HOS; SLT; governors and staff have worked hard to gain the trust of their parents and families; working proactively to strengthen these relationships. MM now benefits from relationships which are built on trust, openness and a shared responsibility.

Parents interviewed were unanimously very happy with the school. They felt listened to and supported. Comments included: ‘Things have massively improved. Miss B (HOS) has been amazing. She’s always been able to help’ and ‘You never feel judged. You can be yourself. They make you feel better’.

MM operates an open-door policy, which includes teachers making themselves accessible to parents at the beginning and end of each day, as the first point of contact for any concerns or needs. Senior leaders also make sure that they are highly visible to parents, by greeting them at the school gates and responding immediately when a parent wishes to speak with them.

Other communication with parents is also very good, including through half-termly newsletters; the use of Tapestry in the EYFS/The Ark/Pathways and for some learners in Y1, and social media. MM run a number of parent courses and workshops including a non-violent resistance (NVR) 10-week programme, to support understanding around behaviour, emotional regulation and child development and curriculum-based workshops, such as phonics; early reading and learning through play.

Find Out More About IQM

If your school is interested in achieving the IQM Inclusive School Award, contact the IQM team on 028 7127 7857 or email admin@iqmaward.com.

To find out more about IQM and request a free information pack, visit www.iqmaward.com.