Moor Lane junior, south-west London, hit the headlines last week when all 15 teachers announced their resignations after the Office for Standards in Education’s findings clashed with those of a local authority inspector.

Some press reports claimed that the teachers had “abandoned” their 400 pupils, while chairman of governors John Heamon said the school had been “wrecked” by the resignations.

But staff this week said messages from ex-pupils, teachers and governors across the country had been overwhelmingly supportive.

They “deeply regretted” the likely effect of their decision on the school’s children. However, they had put in more effort than could reasonably be expected to turn the school around after OFSTED announced 14 months ago that it had serious weaknesses.

The school had been told only three weeks ago by Kingston-

upon-Thames council that it was doing well, only to learn from OFSTED that it had failed adequately to address problems identified in the original report.