A STUDLEY nursery has received a damning "inadequate" rating by Ofsted.

An inspector from the official body found that leadership and management at Bright Kids at Studley is inadequate and that the nursery does not have suitable arrangements in place to meet a number of legal requirements.

The report, published last week, said teaching is not consistently good enough because staff do not always engage with children well and staff are not effectively deployed and therefore, children's safety and well-being is compromised.

Children's safety is compromised because risk assessments do not identify all hazards that children are exposed to or how these are minimised.

The report also mention a numb er of other damning factors such as children do not learn what is acceptable behaviour, observations and assessments of children's progress are not carried out regularly, and packed lunches are not always healthy.

It did however say that children are happy and settled and go to staff for cuddles and reassurance when required.

Tricia Wellings, owner of Bright Kids, said that she will be appealing against the rating.

"Our complaint is about the inspection report itself and the judgements made in respect to the safety of the children," she said.

"We feel it has sensationalised the safety aspects – which are in some cases misreported and factually incorrect.

"We acknowledge that there is room for improvement in our learning and development, brought about more from the new Evaluation Schedule introduced by Ofsted in November 2013, which has raised the bar somewhat, rather than us not providing valuable learning for the children.

"I am of course disappointed with the report but we are working hard to ensure the next inspection will have us turned around to become the outstanding provision we know we can be."

Ms Wellings added that a meeting was recently held where the report was explained and that parents were thoroughly supportive.

The nursery, which operates from a detached house and cares for 45 children, will be monitored and inspected again within six months of the date of this inspection.