Paul Grant only realised what he had let himself in for when he found himself parked in a minibus in the middle of a playing field, waiting to catch children who were trying to escape from school.

It was 1997, and Mr Grant, then 39, had just become the head teacher at Robert Clack School in Dagenham, East London. His appointment was a last-ditch effort to rescue the failing school, which was facing closure.

“Fortunes were very low. There had just been a borough-wide inspection and inspectors had taken a very dim view. They said that if the school did not make serious changes it would be put on special measures,” he says.

Mr Grant had been a teacher in the 2,000-strong comprehensive for seven years. He paints a picture of appalling behaviour: “constant disruption, tumult in the corridors, children smoking openly, pupils setting fire to the school. Really grim things - gang culture.”

The high truancy rate and rapid staff turnover contributed to desperately poor results: only 16 per cent of pupils achieved five GCSEs at A* to C.

Last month, Ofsted, the inspections body, named Robert Clack as one of 12 former “sink” schools that had been turned around to achieve excellent results against the odds. Some 82 per cent of pupils now achieve five A* to C grades at GCSE; A-level students win places at Oxbridge.

Inspectors credited the schools with defying the link between poverty and poor outcomes.

The London Borough of Barking and Dagenham is undeniably deprived. Forty per cent of children in the school have special needs and 40 per cent receive free school meals, a widely used indicator of poverty. Set in the middle of a housing estate, tower blocks bear down on the school like a fortress.

But Mr Grant says he never accepted that against this backdrop of poverty children are destined to do badly. The eldest of seven children from a working class family in Liverpool, he grew up in an area with similarly poor expectations - but learnt that education could offer a way out.

His first step as head teacher was to introduce a tough, transparent code for punishing bad behaviour and a pupil referral unit for unmanageable children. He suspended 300 pupils in his first week. “I didn't have much time - I had to turn the situation around quickly. It was slipping into the abyss,” he says.

While teachers welcomed a new hard line on discipline, parents were outraged. Mr Grant insisted on meeting every single one in a series of irate meetings in which he was repeatedly verbally abused and threatened. “People questioned my leadership. They painted me as extreme, almost tyrannical.” When parents refused to meet him, citing shifts or childcare issues, he arranged meetings for 6am or 11pm.

Changing behaviour was a gradual process, Mr Grant says. He doesn't give up easily. He lost count of the hours spent driving around the community picking up truants and meeting local shopkeepers and police. He travelled on school buses to gauge pupils' behaviour and followed up each complaint personally.

“I was prepared to be humiliated,” he says, “prepared for people to ridicule me - and they did. People used to say, 'Are you the head of 'Robert Crap'? You're wasting your time. The school's a joke, mate. You're a joke.'”

Some aspects of the school were a joke, he agreed. “We needed to improve our teaching and professionalism. In that situation morale collapses - standards had dropped. To be fair to [the teachers], if you've got constant disruption and you're not being backed, how do you deal with it?”

Not all the teachers were happy with a new “culture of accountability”. About 20 left in the first six months. But most chose to improve. “It is to their credit that many completely reinvented themselves,” he says.

Mr Grant clearly understands the importance of PR. “It's crucial to tell the narrative, to outline what had happened and what was going to happen. I reported regularly to the governors, staff and local authority and spoke to children every day in assembly.” He made instantly visible changes, introducing a new, smart uniform and weekly assemblies where pupils were handed out prizes for achievements.

He also invited in the editor of the local newspaper, the Barking & Dagenham Post. “For years the paper had been full of stories of bank robbers who were former pupils, damaging stories that fed a sense of helplessness about the direction of the school.” He persuaded the paper to embark on a campaign of talking up the school. “It was magnificent,” he says.

Now, the story almost tells itself. Robert Clack used to take children from across London to make up the numbers. Now most students are local - the school receives about 2,000 applications for 300 places each year.

Discipline is still cast iron, but the lunchtime atmosphere is one of controlled exuberance, with teachers stationed around the school. He emphasises that this is to prevent bad behaviour, not because of it. “We don't want a vacuum to grow where staff are the enemy,” he explains. From the friendliness with which pupils greet him in the corridor, it seems they are anything but.

Roll call

Eleven other outstanding specialist schools commended by Ofsted:

1. Greenwood Dale School, a technology and arts college in Nottingham

2. Harton Technology College, a technology, languages and applied learning school in South Tyneside

3. Lampton School, a humanities college in Hounslow

4. Middleton Technology School, a technology and applied learning school in Rochdale

5. Morpeth School, an arts college in Tower Hamlets

6. Plashet School, a science college in Newham

7. Rushey Mead School, a sports and science college in Leicester

8. Seven Kings High School, a science, technology and language college in Redbridge

9. Wood Green High School, a sport, mathematics and computing college in Sandwell

10. Bartley Green School, a technology and sports college in Birmingham

11. Challney High School for Boys and Community College, a science and maths college in Luton

www.Ofsted.gov.uk/publications/080240

Times Recommends

• Lies and cover-up at MG Rover exposed by report
• High oil prices push manufacturing costs up
• Primark founder steps down as chief executive