The Great Education Struggle - Don't Be a Jumper

My letter in YEP on Tuesday [Our Education Struggle]. Not printed are the bits in italics.

Nicky Morgan, for no good reason is the government education secretary, using her position to carry out the wishes of the people who prop her up, not knowingly saying anything that demonstrates educational knowledge, makes sweeping statements and then says "The evidence speaks for itself".

She declared (and you never saw Michael Gove's lips move) that all schools are to become academies. Well, the jury is firmly back in: that academisation depresses educational standards and causes great instability. Because a number of educationally successful Tory councils objected to the pointless shake up of their status quo, Ms Morgan has retreated from this position.

Nonetheless a number of headteachers and school governors (whose position should be only as critical friends and not as policy makers, by the way)  have taken it upon themselves to do Ms Morgan's dirty work for her, jumping before being pushed in the desperate hope that they will secure a better type of academisation. But the government has neither time nor capacity to micro manage each of these self-inflicted privatisations. Academisation is immoral and destabilising to the school, to the local area - however the jumpers try to make it not so. Once the school is out of the system, and they leave local authority support [not control!], and they are seen as fair game for the privateers.

We, teachers, headteachers, governors, parents, students shouldn’t do the government’s dirty work for them, but fight every non-educational initiative all the way. Gove and Morgan will soon be history. When our grandchildren ask “What did you do in the Great Education Struggle [for a decent education, rich with the Arts and freedoms of choice]?” let’s say “We did not roll over!”

Every school that leaves the local authority’s family means one less music teacher, one less educational psychologist, one less bereavement counsellor, one less SEN advisor, and all the rest that we take so casually for granted.

Victoria Jaquiss

Education campaigner, teacher, ex-governor

Academies, the dismantling of our state education system?

My guest blog for John Baron in Leeds Guardian in 2010. And things have only got worse.

Opinion: Academies, the dismantling of our state education system?

Guest blogger and Leeds schools campaigner Victoria Jaquiss looks at the increasing role academies play in education and asks: Are teachers the new miners?

Pupils protest at Primrose High School in March. The school could be closed and turned into an academy Photograph: John Baron/guardian.co.uk

[It was, soon after]

 

Friday 18 June 2010 11.30 BSTLast modified on Friday 31 October 201420.54 GMT

Chapter One: What is an Academy and how does it manifest itself?

An academy is a school, with a pretentious title. Full-stop.

No, make that a comma. It's a school, with a pretentious title, and with a bit more money to play around with than other schools.

Academies aren't really anything. They have no vision or educational philosophy. This makes fighting the introduction of academies into the educational world like fighting jelly.

The previous ("Labour") government thought they would like to replace "failing" schools with academies. So just in the neighbourhoods where children were most vulnerable, and most in need of some extra social work and care and understanding, now they have boot camps, blazers and ties, the loss of previous identity (ie its name), the loss of its headteacher, and the loss of staff escaping a system they don't approve of.

They are force-fed extra GCSEs and BTECS (two GCSEs for one exam) – and so blatantly playing the system that nobody outside education really believes they're doing it.

The new Conservative administration has decided that the "outstanding" schools can opt out of local authority control, and become academies. And opt out of national curriculum, by which they have just been judged to be outstanding. So that's their raison d'etre gone then. Or their raison d'outstanding.

And shame on the new Lib-Dems in government for going along with academies.

In the space of three or four years academies have gone from being a punishment for the "worst performing" schools to being a reward for the best performing ones.

Chapter Two: How is an Academy an improvement on a school?

Well, it's not. A year or so ago, Price-Waterhouse-Cooper (Marxist-consultants-not) concluded that, on balance and on average, academies made no difference to overall standards, and where particular institutions have improved on their immediate predecessors it is usually down to a change in intake.

This is down to a process improbably called "fair-banding" in which academy heads are allowed to select their intake to create a social and intellectual mix, which may result in local children being denied a place at their nearest school.

Weird.

Chapter Three: What is the point of becoming an academy?

So, if an academy is a meaningless concept with no academic rigour behind, that doesn't make any difference to overall "standards", what is the point of it?

There's no point.

Chapter Four: How can we stop the damage happening to our education system?

Irony and understatement are good weapons. And presentation of facts without spin.

I could write for years but you wouldn't read it. Here's a story.

In the autumn term 2009, Education Leeds presented City of Leeds School with three possible academy sponsors.

Each potential sponsor put its argument forward for why and how they should be allowed to run our school. Their arguments were all, in my opinion, laughable, and we the staff, saw all of them off. Our reward was to be threatened with closure, instead. That'll learn us!

Chapter Five: What are academies really about?

They are about the dismantling of our state education system. They are about destabilising and demoralising the work force, and, ultimately lowering the standards of teaching.

Teaching was once one of the most secure jobs in the UK. Many of us entered that profession, wanting to do something socially worthwhile, accepting relatively lower pay for our degrees in exchange for security and altruism.

You could only sack teachers if you close their school. You can't lower their pay, or change their working conditions in situ. I think you can see where this is all going. And I don't really know why.

Perhaps it's fear of the outspoken teachers, who didn't say "SATs, league tables, CRB checks for visiting authors – hmm, good idea". Fear of the teaching unions, fear that we will teach children to think for themselves, if they don't fill up our days with yet another new government initiative.

The teachers are just the new miners.

And I really am stopping now. Thank you, if you have been, for reading this guest blog.

Victoria Jaquiss writes her Leeds Schools Campaigner blog. She has actively opposed plans to turn Primrose high in Burmantofts and Parklands Girls in Seacroft into academies, as well as fighting against plans to close City of Leeds School in Woodhouse.

Inspectors take opposing view, Schools take the Blame for Poverty

In 1994 when I was Head Of Music at Foxwood School, the inspector (who stayed all week with me) and who was a music specialist, watched me teach the music listening course that myself and colleague, Mr Phillips had devised between us, and told me that we should publish it. The school passed its inspection but was closed 2 years later.


Foxwood tutor group early eighties


In in 2003, a couple of weeks into being Acting Head of Music at City of Leeds School, the Ofsted inspector told me that you should "never, my dear, talk over music". Well, in the initial stages of the course, sometimes you have to, and the fact that three students merited their own separate TA should have indicated something to this woman about how well we were controlling behaviour! And I published my book on teaching music* a couple of years later.

Ten years later - after two proposed mergers, one with Carr Manor, and one with St Michael's, after a proposal to make it a 14-19 vocational centre, after two attempts to academise, after federating it with Primrose,  then defederating it, but leaving the sixth form with Primrose, after proposing an outright closure and sending students all round the city, after chucking out the acting head, and then half the governing body (including myself) and imposing an IEB, the school finally succumbed to academisation this year.

 

City of Leeds previous logo

However, during this time, no inspections were actually failed! My own two younger children got 8 or 9 A-Cs each as a hard core of amazing staff kept the place ticking over. And they will keep on doing it, while academy bosses stuff the kids into purple-edged blazers paid for by the public money that once paid for Special Needs and Music services etc, etc, etc .

I make two points here:
1. faced with an identical listening course, two inspectors took a completely opposite view, and
2. the very existence of published inspections means that children from deprived areas will always have their schools scrutinised and attacked for all the wrong reasons . Until we attack poverty, and not the schools that try their best to support poor children, they will continue to suffer, as will, quite unbelievably, the staff who choose to work, and used to find their job satisfaction and their calling working in areas of deprivation.


* Including SEN in the Curriculum: Music, published David Fulton's, shortlisted for TES award

Who thinks they're better than anyone else? It's central for a reason.

The following Leeds schools have "expressed an interest" in dismantling the local educational psychology service, the SEN service, the school transport, the inspection and advice, the governor services - and a few other of our local central services in Leeds:

Boston Spa School Leeds
Bruntcliffe School Leeds
Farnley Park High School Leeds
Garforth Community College Leeds
Garforth Green Lane Primary School Leeds
Gledhow Primary School Leeds
Horsforth Specialist Science School Leeds
John Smeaton Community College Leeds
Meanwood Church of England Primary Leeds
Morley High School Leeds
Otley the Whartons Primary School Leeds
Rothwell Haigh Road School Leeds
St Margaret's Church of England Voluntary Controlled Primary SchLoeoel ds
West Oaks School and Technology College Leeds
Woodkirk High Specialist Science School Leeds
Woodlesford Primary School Leeds

If you teach or are a parent from one of these schools you might want to know this story:

There was a Sheffield school who decided to go it alone, go out of the state system. After a year they dismally failed the Ofsted, and the school was closed. This week, one of my friends was on interview with one of their ex-senior management teachers. He was desperate for the job [to pay the mortgage] that they were both going for. "But surely," my friend asked, "you'll get redeployed?", "No", he said, "When the school decide to go it alone, the local authority had to wash its hands of us, and when we failed, the council had no responsibility".

Ice berg - tip of - this is just one story. Does our public education system have to go into melt-down before the government comes to its senses? To the parents, governors and teachers of these schools I say this: when your schools accepts the 30 pieces of silver, and steps outside the system, what happens when they want to buy in NQT advice, or governor support, or a peripateic music teacher, or SEN support and the rest? [ie all the things they do now, but nobody really knows about] Answer is: they will have to pay over the odds, that is if these services have survived the lack of funds that your opt-out has created.

Don't be flattered into accepting the academy route. It's central for a reason. Teachers and their careers are not the enemy. They are the lifeline to our children's future.

Not really playing fair. Is this libel? Is this the death of democracy?

I've gone from being a hopeles digital immigrant to an reasonably competent website reader and user in five short weeks. So, after reading in the Online Guardian what Education was claiming about City of Leeds School, I checked for myself. And what did I find:

"City of Leeds [and Primrose High School] both face major challenges to improve teaching, attendance and behaviour standards and require urgent changes to meet the target."

Good Heavens, I said to myself. This is fiction. No wonder Ed and Vern are so keen to close it. It sounds like anarchy in the UK is alive and kicking and hanging out in Woodhouse and Hyde Park. I thought I'd check out the Ofsted report so I could publicly refute what really amounts to libel.

Hmmm, maybe not so digitally competent. Got fed up searching for the report. Take my word for it, check it out yourself, visit the school.

And I also read:

"Parklands Girls’ High School’s GCSE results have already exceeded the national target this year but due to a declining roll and difficult financial situation present a challenge for sustaining progress beyond 2011."

Now presented with this success, this would seem the natural response:

"Well done, Parklands, let's build upon this success. Now that your results are gone back up, the girls will soon come flocking back." Instead, Eddie Leo looks around for somewhere new to put the back of the net.

Then I read:

"Councillor Richard Harker, executive board member for education at Leeds City Council, said: “Public opinion is a vital part of the decision making process. We recognise that major changes for the three schools have been proposed and want to fully engage with everyone connected to the schools to gather their opinions. This consultation will ensure that all views will be taken into consideration by the executive board before a final decision is made.”"

Well, Councillor, in the recent by-election the public just voted 100% keeping City of Leeds open. So now how vital is public opinion? Or will Education Leeds just move the goalposts, as they are trying to do with Parklands?

To sum up, when the Guardian Online looked for information about the proposed closures, they turned to a website which provided inaccurate information. This is hardly playing fair, and I would argue it could be seen as libel. And, if the closures go ahead, what is the future for democracy?

Counting at the Town Hall

In early January 2010 Adele Beeson, Independent candidate for Hyde Park and Woodhouse, inner-city Leeds, officially confirmed that she was standing for Council. On February 18 2010, out of a count of 2200 voters she got 150 votes. Labour won with 1054 votes, and with rather more than five weeks experience and campaigning behind them. All the candidates declared their support for City of Leeds School, so we can also declare that 2,200 people, in fact 100% of voters, voted for City of Leeds School to stay open. Of course, this is just a way of spinning it, but I think it makes sense. And, for those who like to count things, something of a result, I would say, which They need to take heed of.

The Thomas a Becket of Schools and the Mother of All Parliaments

Just rereading the billets doux between our local education firm and comedy duo, Ed and Vern from the DCSF. Ed "thanks" them for their "dedicated support", and Vern is "grateful" for their plans to "accelerate the delivery of long term solutions." He goes on to note their "intention to close City of Leeds School" , and then welcomes "the immediate support that you propose for all the schools . . "

There's no support being offered here.it sounds more like the final solution to me! It's more like: Who will rid me of this turbulent school? And They've lost touch with reality. Interpreting facts to suit whatever.

In September Ed writes that he "particlularly pleased to see Parklands rise above the floor, " so well done there, Leeds. Oh no, it's January and Vern is happy to see Parklands become an academy. Looks like they're exceeding orders here, but it's going down well.

Back in September, having spotted that Intake has heroically achieved the magic percentage, Ed has to describe this as providing "a good platform for the new Academy", but really I don't think it needed this tragic turn of events - change and loss of teachers, change of uniform, loss of one of the most famous names in Leeds schools' history, living in a building site for the next couple of years, excluded from the central services.

So why, from a government, once so revered and respected, are two men sitting in an office, sending out letters, trying to make sure that they and their department are covered in glory, with their "ambitious programme to transform secondary school standards . . "?

And City of Leeds School stands in their way.

Leafletting

We have been leafletting again. If it's not dark or raining this is by no means an unpleasant experience. I have developed a dog-in-house-fingers-out-fast-response, taking no chances with barks and bites. Most people are either receptive or polite about our campaign. There's still the entrenched "No way would I send my child to City!", and they seem to be supported by the Education Leeds spokesperson who said as much on the Radio Leeds breakfast Show last Wednesday [10 February].

I must say I had heard the rumours, then I went in to City as a peri, changed my mind overnight and sent both my younger children there. This doesn't mean to say it was perfect, but it was more than good enough, and better than the school that I had sent my two older children to.

When I worked at Foxwood, I asked head teacher, Bob Spooner why local parents made such an effort to bus their their kids out to John Smeaton, Boston Spa and the like. He said they don't want their children to mix with the rough sons and daughters of the criminals classes. I would say to say to these anxious Woodhouse and Hyde Park parents something sanctimonious like the "sins of the father" and so on. But the fact is that our school is full of the children of aspirational African and Eastern European parents. We have an A* English=as=an=Addtional-Language Department to help them without their problems impacting on the education of the native English speakers. and children of supportive parents are more likely to come out with 9 A-Cs than a drug habit. And they'll save enough money on busfares to go on more holidays.

However, if the truth is too inconvenient, I would say to those who don't want to have their minds changed: If City of Leeds is closed, the truancy and crime rate in the local area will increase, as will calls on mental health services.

Shocking

Well, I was brought up to think that the War to End All wars would have ended all wars. Women had got the vote, and eventually it was okay for men to be gay as well. Children with Special Needs got Included. It could only get better. Sadly it didn't. Some idiot decide to count things and invented league tables. There was a brief pause when David Blunkett said Every Child Matters, which sounded good, but it didn't really, because they did make a magazine in Leeds called that, and then they said, Oh you'd expect a dip in results in the first year after a merger, an academisation or a closure. So, obviously the children that year didn't matter. So, really, it's more about bragging about how good the UK system is, than actually doing anything good. And actually, the dip is more likely to take a genration to get over rather than a year.

What I found so shocking about the consultation meetings was that a group of five, presumably intelligent people, and we can only presume people with some sort of educational background, would put aside their integrity and their common sense and put forward an idea that your average Year Six pupil would see right through. Close a school, split friends up and send them to other schools that they have not chosen, right in the middle of their high school career, because a year group doesn't get the average grades that some blokes in Whitehall set, when 55% of that year group did not start their City of Leeds, or Primrose School career in Year Seven. When we also inherit the kids the pupils they exclude from other schools; And when the presumed intelligent people open their mouths to the press and slag us off in quite an unprofessional way.

And the blokes [Ed and Vernon] in Whitehall have never visited the school; they don't really understand, they don't answer the letters we send; they're only interested in their reputations, in averages and so-called "standards" and not in individual children.

And it was Year Six pupil, Luke, who said - it was the last comment from the audience that he wanted to come to City of Leeds but that he wouldn't if they said they were going to close the school. And they have been saying that for about seven years. And lots of people who had wanted to come, in the end changed their minds. Not, unpopular, Education Leeds, until you made it so.

These consultations

This week I attended the public "consultation" meetings for City of Leeds School and Primrose High School. Now I have no ambitions to be a politician. After a long day at work, and, given the choice of sitting on my sofa blanking out to "Desperate Housewives" or "University Challenge", well these TV programmes would surely win over an evening spent in a school hall somewhere near where I live. But, for the foreseeable future, and also, for the last ten years, relaxing has not featured in my life. My sensible life/work balance came to an end with the end of Foxwood School in 1996.

Well, these consultations:

The local paper said there were over 400 people at the City of Leeds - well over, more like 600, I would say. The Leeds Silver Steel Sparrows, in betwween Schools Prom dates at the Royal Albert Hall and Leeds Town Hall played; there were refreshments and colourful and informative displays of the school's strengths. Letter of support from our councillors and all candidates for council for the by-election coming up next week. Letters of support from MPs Greg Mulholland [meaning he is breaking ranks with Leeds Lib Dem/Tory coalition which has sanctioned this guastly school sacrifice]and Hilary Benn [meaning that Mr Benn is breaking ranks with his cabinet colleagues]. Hundeds of us were wearing the badges, and some us have even got the t-shirts.

It was more like a party atmosphere than a school closure proposal. This would have been because staff, pupils, parents and local residents had been out leafletting the neighbourhood in order to ensure that evryone knew about it. By contrast the consultation at Primrose was a more sombre affair, even though parents had been out leafletting the previous week. It was hardly helped by there being noone on the door for latecomers.

Leader of the Council, Richard Brett, arrived at ten past seven. I got there at twenty past. I spent the next twenty minutes texting "Let me In" to all the people that I knew at the meeting. Mr Brett lost heart at five to eight, and then minutes later the caretaker happened to come past and let me in. Later I opined that that if they, Education Leeds, couldn't organise a public consultation meeting . . . you may guess the rest.

City of Leeds School

This blog has been set up to provide accurate information about the campaign to keep City of Leeds School open, successful, still at the heart of its community and including as it does, children bussing themselves over from all over Leeds and flying in from all over Africa and Europe.

My background is that I worked for 16 happy years at Foxwood School, Leeds [led by Bob Spooner:heateacher of genuine vision and genius], and only left because they closed that amazing place. The despair that I shared with other staff, and with parents and children from Secroft and Gipton was almost unimaginable.

Next I sent my youngest children to Royal Park School [led by Rita Samuel, renowned throughout Leeds for innovation and high standards], and even became a governor and after-school teacher there. I only stopped working there when it was closed. Years of despair followed, bumping into ex-pupils all round Headingley, Burley and Kirkstall, who couldn't understand why they had been separated from their friends and favourite teachers, and why they had to go so far to school now.

My personal interest is that these same two children of mine went on to City of Leeds, and left, both with 8 or 9 A-C GCSEs, including several As and Bs. Living in the area, I had heard the rumours about the school, but a when I started to do the odd music lesson there, I realised it was Foxwood all over again: great school, terrible reputation.