Special report: The ECHO investigate the turbulent situation at a Liverpool school with a famous association
04:00, 15 Jun 2025Updated 10:40, 16 Jun 2025
LIPA Primary and High School in Upper Duke Street
There was a very special moment at the Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts earlier this month. Crowds of young, excited students packed into the entrance of the Mount Street building, waiting with bated breath to meet two musical icons.
Pictures captured the moment that Paul McCartney, the institute’s lead patron and co-founder, arrived alongside his friend and fellow member of music royalty Bruce Springsteen. It was a huge treat for the aspiring performers who had gathered.
While these scenes of elation and excitement played out at the performing arts institute that was co-founded by Sir Paul back in 1996, just a few minutes walk away – at the school that bears the same name – there was a much less celebratory mood.
That’s because around the same time that Macca and The Boss were making the dreams of a group of young people come true, a team of Ofsted inspectors were arriving at the LIPA Primary and High School site in Upper Duke Street for an unscheduled inspection.
LIPA primary and high school opened in September 2014 in Upper Duke Street and while it shares a name with the original performing arts academy founded by Sir Paul, it is run entirely separately by the LIPA Multi-Academy Trust (MAT), which also includes a sixth form college.
Ofsted doesn’t routinely carry out what it calls ‘no notice’ inspections, in fact the watchdog states that this will only be done at schools where there are concerns about ‘rapidly declining standards’, safeguarding, leadership and governance issues or the breadth and balance of the curriculum.
While the results of that emergency inspection won’t be released for a while, those working at the school have told the ECHO of a chaotic, dysfunctional and at times dangerous situation at the school in which pupil behaviour is out of control, much of the senior leadership team is absent and staff morale is at all time low.
These issues have been building for some time. Last May, the school saw its Ofsted rating downgraded from ‘good’ to ‘requires improvement’ with inspectors raising concerns about pupils feeling unsafe due to the behaviour of other students in and around the school building.
According to staff members who spoke to us for this report, those issues have only got worse in the year since that inspection and feel Ofsted’s latest assessment could be even more withering. One staff member: “Despite the clear warnings from Ofsted and concerns raised by parents, the school has chosen to downplay these issues. As a result, the problems have only worsened.”
Outlining and giving examples of some of the behavioural issues of pupils at LIPA School, the teacher said: “A large cohort of students has accumulated an alarming number of negative behaviour points.
“In any well-functioning school, early interventions would have been deployed. Instead, these students act with impunity—coming and going as they please—and creating significant safeguarding breaches and disruption. They are often seen wandering the school for hours, barricading themselves in toilets, or skipping lessons entirely.”
The teacher cited specific examples of students hiding for hours in toilets, routinely ignoring instructions to return to lessons along with students swearing, screaming at and mocking the appearance of some staff members.
Others spoke of students throwing objects out of windows, hitting other pupils or passing members of the public, while there were reports of young children exiting out of fire escapes and into the busy city centre.
The staff member added: “Fights between students—including primary pupils—are now a regular occurrence. These altercations are spilling into the wider community and even causing feuds between parents. Some families have begun withdrawing their children, fearing for their safety.”
Teachers from LIPA Primary School on Upper Duke Street Liverpool strike, May 21 2025(Image: Wesley Holmes)
“Staff have also been directly threatened. Teachers are frequently sworn at, screamed at, and physically intimidated by students.”
On the subject of behaviour, a LIPA MAT spokesperson told the ECHO: “Pupil behaviour challenges extend across the education sector and are by no means unique. We work with stakeholders and experts including the local authority and School Improvement Liverpool, to implement and continually review our behaviour policy. We are also always looking to work closer with parents to provide relevant and appropriate support for all pupils.”
They added: “We have a robust behaviour policy in place, and we are working hard to ensure it is applied consistently. We have fully reviewed the policy and have invested in improved systems to support communication between the school and home to work closer with parents.” The trust also pointed out that a new assistant headteacher with a special focus on behaviour will be starting their post soon.
At the same time that these worrying behaviours are on show from pupils in the school, demoralised staff told us the leadership of the school is either absent or dysfunctional.
The ECHO understands that current headteacher Andrew Raven has been largely off work for most of this year. Only two members of the school’s five-strong senior leadership team are currently in work, leaving staff feeling unsupported during the extreme challenges they are facing.
One staff member said: “The senior leadership team (SLT) is either absent, disengaged, or wholly ineffective. Many members are frequently off-site or on prolonged absences, leaving the school effectively leaderless.
“In their absence, newly promoted SLT members—lacking sufficient experience—are left to manage complex strategic issues without guidance or support.”
Teachers said that crucial SLT responsibilities are therefore falling on non-teaching and junior staff members who do not have the experience or authority to make safe, informed decisions, such as dealing with gas leaks and extreme weather closures.
Responding, a spokesperson for LIPA MAT said: “There was an (external) gas leak and separately extreme weather closures earlier this year. Existing senior leadership, supported by our site manager and other operations experts, successfully followed our emergency response plans on both of these occasions.”
Another staff member who got in touch said: “Every problem we have stems from weak, incompetent or absent leadership. There is a culture of covering up in this Multi Academy Trust that stems from primary to 6th form. Staff are basically left to fend for themselves and in all my years teaching I have never seen such a dysfunctional school. My colleagues and I made this clear to the OFSTED Inspectors.”
On this issue, a spokesperson for the school said it has a strong SLT in place, with an acting headteacher boasting more than 12 years of senior leadership experience. They also stressed that the trust’s top team is being ‘boosted’, with a new Chief Executive Officer in post since June 9 and a new assistant headteacher (behaviour) due to start this month. The new CEO is Charles Bartholomew, who has been principal of the LIPA Sixth Form college since 2015.
It is fair to say he has a big job ahead of him in terms of picking up a demoralised and disgruntled workforce at the school.
“Staff morale is collapsing,” explained one teacher. “Teachers are forced to teach in rotating classrooms with vandalised furniture and damaged facilities. Many are regularly covering for absent colleagues while commuting between sites, reducing rest time and increasing exhaustion.”
Responding to these specific claims, a spokesperson for LIPA MAT said: “No permanent member of staff is expected to provide cover for colleagues. We have two cover staff in place currently to cover for absent staff. We have an estates team working across our site to address damages that are reported.”
When listening to the concerns and experiences of staff at the school, it is perhaps not surprising that the NASUWT union is currently engaged in a dispute with the school, which has already resulted in six days of strike action.
Announcing the strike action back in May, Bryan McConnell, National Executive Member for District 6, said: “We have been left with no option than to move to strike action as a result of the failure of the employer to address adverse management practices which are affecting the welfare of staff and their ability to do their job safely.
“Teachers feel as if their physical and mental wellbeing doesn’t matter to this employer, and that cannot go on.”
The ECHO understands that crunch talks took place between union leaders and school trust bosses this week, with the possibility of the action being escalated to 10-days of continuous walk-outs looming overhead.
There has, however, been some progress and a stay of execution.
In a joint statement, LIPA Multi-Academy Trust and the NASUWT said: “We held constructive discussions together on Wednesday, June 11.
“We all recognise the importance of addressing concerns raised by staff and resolving this dispute. We were pleased to make progress in these discussions, and plan to meet again soon to review the delivery of agreed actions.”
The statement added that the continuous strike action, which had been planned to start this week, has been suspended while those discussions continue. Further planned action could also be suspended depending on how the talks go.