It is surely an indication of just how desperate the situation is at Bradford Cathedral Community College that Ofsted inspectors should consider it worth commenting, as evidence of improvements, that "in the main" children now remove their personal-stereo earpieces at the start of a lesson.

That, along with a suggestion that management systems, behaviour and attitudes are getting better, appears to be the sum total of good news from this deeply troubled school.

The bad news, though, remains spectacularly bad: lessons dismissed as unsatisfactory or poor, unacceptable pupil behaviour, assaults on teachers commonplace, high levels of truancy - so high in some cases, in fact, that in one Year 8 class two out of three pupils were missing.

It is hardly surprising, then, that the school's GCSE results last year were the worst in Bradford and the fourth worst in the country. The pupils who want to learn - and there might well be many of them, given the chance - are being failed badly by a system which has allowed the disruptive element to set the agenda and get away with it.

To be fair, the inspection was instigated last December, before the appointment of consultant head teacher David Kershaw, and it took place in the early days of his regime. And it did detect modest signs of improvements in discipline.

It is to be hoped that Mr Kershaw and his team can build on those beginnings, transform the culture of the college and turn the place around before time runs out for the school. We wish them luck to go with their professional expertise. All the signs are that they will need it.