A secondary school is out of ‘special measures’ after inspectors said behaviour, teaching and results were on the up.

Among innovations credited with boosting standards at Wheatley Park School is a system of giving shopping vouchers and trips to pupils who do well, but punishing them within hours of misbehaving.

Now the 1,071-pupil school, in Wheatley, has set a target for 70 per cent of its 16-year-olds to get five A* to C grades at GCSE, including English and maths, by next year, up from 59 per cent in 2010.

In 2009, standards watchdog Ofsted said the school was not giving an acceptable standard of education, needed to tackle misbehaviour and boost the achievement of the least engaged students.

After inspectors returned, they now say Wheatley Park has made “a great deal of improvement” and had good prospects of getting even better. It said the school was now “rightly gaining the confidence of students”.

Headteacher Kate Curtis said: “We had to very ruthlessly prioritise the key issues we wanted to improve on.

“We now have a very strong focus on planning lessons to meet the needs of every child. We are making them interesting, absorbing, challenging and active.”

She added: “Behaviour was something we worked hard on, and the students were very much with us on that.”

Staff meet daily after school to agree on punishments for all students who broke school rules during the day.

Ms Curtis said: “Nothing is allowed to drift and students know their parents will be involved.”

Meanwhile, pupils who behave and do well in lessons earn points, which can be tracked online by parents, through which youngsters can earn shopping vouchers and trips out. On Wednesday, ice cream vans were invited into the school as pupils celebrated its success.

Head boy Callum Horn, 16, said: “Everyone is really happy, the facilities are a lot better and people are excited to be at the school.”