A successful headteacher, drafted in to help a school out of a crisis, has decided to stay there for good.

Jill Hudson was initially brought into Pegasus First School, Blackbird Leys, Oxford, as a temporary measure after the school was found to be failing by inspectors.

When Mrs Hudson, who was permanent head of Lewknor C of E School, took on the job it was intended that at the end of her two-term secondment she would return to her old village school.

But Mrs Hudson enjoyed her new role so much that she decided to apply for the headship and was subsequently offered the job.

That means her Labrador dog, Welly, who accompanies her to school, will be staying on in Blackbird Leys as well.

Mrs Hudson said: "My brief was to stabilise the school and get it in the right educational direction. But having got the school to a stage where it's pointing in the right direction, I want to take it there myself. "Because we were on the way to success, I did not feel I could leave it halfway through. I genuinely believe that it can be a really excellent school."

As the atmosphere was far from happy when she first arrived, Mrs Hudson decided to take her dog, Wellington, or Welly for short, in to make it friendlier.

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