YOU dealt badly with the recent item concerning Wheatley Park School being taken into special measures. The entire article must have spread dismay among all involved.

Such completely unwarranted sensationalism must have embittered all those involved in the school’s very existence. What must have been the reactions of the headteacher, the heads of department, the staff teaching the many different subjects to the different ages with very different abilities?

There was no reference to the mixed intake that the school has to cope with.

One difficult pupil bringing ineducable qualities into a class is bad enough for even an experienced teacher to have to endure, but when whole groups are accepted, what chance of success can there be?

Conversely, is the teacher to infer that among some 1,100 pupils there was complete dissatisfaction with the lessons taught, and among the many staff involved, no one could claim lessons were well-taught with a cheerful classroom atmosphere resulting in everyone’s enjoyment? I refuse to believe it.

As a former teacher of many years in the classroom, I accuse the Oxford Mail of palpable misrepresentation and inexcusable unfairness.

Lionel Horner, Eden Drive, Headington, Oxford