It never fails to amuse me how much London parents will fight tooth or nail to argue about “the best” school and gossip about every little detail…in hopes of somehow winning the magic lottery when it comes to their DC’s education.
There are no “best” schools and even if a school was simply brilliant in every way when your child joined since they were four years old, schools change. Heads and staff leave and so do families.
Every family’s view of a school is subjective and prospective parents considering a school should do their research and talk to a wide variety of local parents about their experiences. What’s helpful about Mumsnet is that parents can express their honest opinions without fear of repercussions for their children. So for whatever it’s worth…take the write up below as you wish. Just don’t try to use the “You must be wrong because I disagree” counter-argument here because that type of a retort is rarely helpful to anyone.
If you look at the facts about COLPAI, it’s OFSTED “Outstanding” and that seems to matter to a lot of local area parents, who are mostly a mix of professionals and creatives that have hopes for their children to go to independent secondary schools with some sort of a bursary.
You can imagine what it mean, both good and not so good, to be in a parent cohort such as above. Competition is latent and everyone is somehow trying to curry favour with the school to help their child get ahead for the next stage of education. Is there a potential conflict that the very engaged Chair of the Board of Governors (COG) is also teaching French at the school AND she’s also the Safeguarding Lead for the Governors? And the mother of the Deputy Head? Confused already? Try to keep up!
On the surface, COLPAI does seems to be all about kindness and charity and Insta-ready new facilities, but it has its fair amount of discord and intrigue beyond the superficial.
Talk to the parents who have left for Lyceum, City Prep, Charterhouse, St Paul’s Cathedral School, and other local states like Prior Weston and Hugh Myddleton and you’ll hear again and again stories of repeated clashes with the Head, COG, who both seem to be highly defensive at the slightest whiff of dissent and will simply ignore or even make up rules(!) to keep parents’ concerns at bay. There are also numerous examples of the Deputy Head’s lack of experience (LGBTQ+ slide show video for Pride Month sent on Google Classroom during remote learning to KS1 children without notice to parents and with no live teacher guidance) and a dismissive “I know best” attitude at times by the Deputy Head towards not only parents but also individual children.
There’s also an undercurrent of intensive emotional pressure on the children at times to perform when it counts for the school. On standardised exams of course (the Head is an administrator who knows how to continuously tick all the checkboxes to keep up its official ratings), but also in front of numerous glittering “elite” of Governors who somehow managed to all show up at the school in the middle of the pandemic, unmasked, for photo ops with the State school children. Yet parents were not allowed to enter the school building to see their children’s work throughout that time. For some reason, it feels like the school and the children are beholden to generosity of the Governors, like charity cases from the almshouse.
This is a school run by a Head and somehow manoeuvred by a COG / teacher that is focused on achieving top marks for THE SCHOOL as its first Reception cohort is about to enter their year 6 before the 11+. Parents who raise any concerns for THE CHILDREN are often brushed aside or will find themselves being given an increasingly cold shoulder accentuated by occasional snide remarks to put them in their place, less the parents start to get ideas above their station.
Which makes it all the more puzzling why the school (likely with the backing of the Governors) decided to hire a SENCO, who was the former head of an Essex school and let go because of financial irregularities. (All news in the public domain so no secret. Police declined to press charges in the end.) Everyone deserves a second chance of course, but personal reviews from parents who’ve had interactions with the SENCO have largely not been positive. Quite the opposite it seems. Lots of whispers amongst parents of SEN children (both “gifted” and special needs children) about wanting to leave for other schools because they are unable to get support from a proper SENCO who is up to standard. Families have recently left as a result.
All this even before the lack of a playground, a school nurse, regular sports provisions, the public “shame without a name” approach about parents who run afoul of the school on one of its 65+ policy docs listed on its website, over communication about matters such a “home-school agreement” that requires children to do as they are asked “by any adult within school”, the younger children who are actually fearful of losing time from their precious two ten-minute play breaks a day if they don’t line up properly in the hallways, the laughably blatant favouritism by the senior leadership with some of the children and individual parents. It all stinks a bit of lack of experience and/or confidence on the part of Head and Deputy Head in knowing how to establish a successful school environment, while still allowing children to BE CHILDREN.
On the plus side, the active and well-organised PTA raises £6k-8k a year for whatever the school needs. (One year it was chairs for the new assembly hall.) Parents feel like they are continuously being asked to give donations at times, but most seem happy to give. So one way or another, parents will end up paying for the privilege of being allowed to attend a COLAT state primary like COLPAI.
There are also some really caring teachers and other staff members dotted about the school, but they are also careful to not step too much out of step with the Head and COG less they become targets of snide critiques or even harsh treatment themselves. The pressure on the staff is really palpable at times to deliver academic testing results and they are stretched to nearly breaking point. You can see it on their young faces, particularly as nearly all of the teaching staff are in their 20’s and early 30’s.
On the whole, the children at COLPAI are brilliantly well behaved. These are lovely children from caring families across a mix of social-economic backgrounds. The children are, however, in a highly pressurised and intense environment at COLPAI to do as they are told and not make a single step out of line. Literally.
So why should you choose COLPAI? Mainly because you don’t want to miss out on an “OFSTED Outstanding” school for your DC. You like the modern looking building design and aren’t fussed about the lack of real play space or much playtime while your DC’s are in school for 7 hours a day. You find Heads who subscribe to Katharine Birbalsingh‘s “neo-strict” approach from the Victorian era reassuringly retro and you feel certain you won’t ever feel gaslighted if you’re treated as an overreacting, overstepping, lower-class annoyance for daring to email and ask why your young child was kept in from playtime and made to complete a “reflection” form for not staying seated properly during lunchtime.
Clearly there’s still much to be lauded about COLPAI and its methods or else it would not be “OFSTED Outstanding” so quickly after being established. You can read about all those elements in the “official” OFSTED report.
If you do choose COLPAI, choose it with your eyes open, all the while knowing there really is no “best” school without tradeoffs.