New Secondary Schools for Richmond 2

[BayJay]

I'm starting this new thread because the other one of the same name has filled up.

Faith schools are popular, wanted and will be fought for
Seenbutnotheard, they don't need to be fought for. Provided they're academies or free schools, then they're actually easier to create than ever before. It is only the VA option that is being made more difficult.

BayJay I can see they have a role but it talks mainly about funding and overseeing building contracts and not much about searching for sites or negotiating with landowners so I am wondering how effective they are at this - and if they have enough staff these days to get to grips with difficult situations!?

Lottie, the free school programme is the government's flagship education policy. As far as I'm aware there is no question mark over the effectiveness of the process for acquiring sites.

This link from Accord includes some admirable (in my view) quotes from the chaplain of Christs School in Richmond.... accordcoalition.org.uk/2012/02/11/accord-coalition-at-the-church-of-england-general-synod/.

This is the key passage of the RISC letter dated 6th Feb 2012 to Gillian Norton (Council Chief Executive) and Nick Whitfield (Director of Education and Children?s Services):

? . . The Education Act 2011 inserted a new section 6A into the Education and Inspections Act 2006, which provides that, ?if a local authority think a new school needs to be established in their area, they must seek proposals for the establishment of an Academy?; it was brought into force by The Education Act (Commencement No.2 and Transitional and Savings Provisions) Order 2012 which was made on 12 January 2012.

Article 3 of the Order brings into force section 6A on 1 February 2012.

Article 4 contains transitional provisions. Paragraph (b) provides that, despite the coming into force of section 6A, that section shall not have effect in relation to a case where ?proposals have been published ... by any persons under section 10(1) or (2) of the EIA 2006 (publication of proposals with consent of the Secretary of State) before 1st February 2012?. .

The Diocese did not publish Statutory Proposals before 1 February 2012. Therefore the transitional provision does not apply . .

We therefore request your confirmation that -
- The current process will end immediately.
- The Council will ensure that any subsequent actions and processes are fully in line with the section 6A and all other relevant legislation and the general law relating to consultation by local authorities.?

The Council consultation continues - for the present at any rate. It is planned to finish on March 16.

BayJay - Thanks for the link of Accord Coalition at the CoE Synod. Excellent comments overall. I especiallly love ?You can only love your neighbour if you know your neighbour in person?

As Twickerati writes Council needs to urgently tell everyone the situation immediately twickerati.wordpress.com/2012/02/12/risc-richmond-catholic-school-plan/#more-5672

Regarding that link to Accord - keeping the faith criteria down to 10% is fair where there is no alternative choice for local children other than a church school. Faith schools don't appeal to everyone though - their 'historic mission' of being sole educator of the poor was relevant when all other schools were fee-paying. Christ's (rightly) didn't link up formally with Marshgate next door but is at least a local option. I'm still interested in why so few St Mary's and St Stephen's families have chosen it on faith grounds. What admissions criteria do these CofE primaries have?

Have a look at Admissions criteria for Church of England c primary schools in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames:

St Mary?s CE Primary
Children in public care
Siblings
Children for whom St Mary?s is the nearest school and who have an exceptional medical need
Sixteen foundation places for children living within local parishes with one or both parents regularly worshipping at St Mary the Virgin, Twickenham or another Christian church
Distance to Amyand Park Road site
Note: Category 3 ? parishes of All Hallows, Holy Trinity,St Mary the Virgin, St Stephen?s

St Stephen?s CE Junior (Year 3 onwards)
Children in public care
Siblings
Attendance at Orleans Infant School
Regular attendance at St Stephen?s church
Distance

Thanks for that - St Mary's is just over 25% faith places then, a bit less than I thought. St Stephen's will have to change its criteria when Orleans takes on Y3 and above. I would imagine Orleans as an all-through primary will be popular, especially if it doesn't have to establish a link with Orleans Park.

Orleans Infants - soon to be Primary - is and will remain one of the most over-subscribed schools in the land. I have heard nothing about the planned policy for St Stephen's: the church has a large young middle class evangelical congregation but I do not know how many of them live locally.

The school is voluntary-maintained not voluntary-aided. There will certainly be a considerable row locally if it does not opt for an an inclusive admissions policy. It is on a cramped site next to the main road A316 so it is much much less desirable than Orleans but there are more than enough children nearby to fill it up.

I live 3 houses up from the church on the main road but I have never been inside. I have seen them doing the happy-clappy stuff in the street but only once in 40 years. I do not know how many if any of the St Mary's pupils get in on the faith test.

The abolition of the link system won't affect Orleans Primary - I'm not clear what point you are making here.

The point about Orleans is that as a primary it would have started off as an unlinked school in terms of Orleans Park, and the uncertainty would have driven some parents to move their children some time in KS2 to the local CofE schools to get into OP. There would have been an unfair advantage for the CofE schools which the council must have been aware of.

To link back to the Accord article, I appreciate the spirit of fairness, inclusivity etc. of the speakers but also assume that faith is the main appeal of a faith school. The CofE doesn't need to hang on to the role of provider unless there is clear demand.

muminlondon, under the new education act the preferred way of creating a new school is via the Free School route. Proving parental demand is part of the application process. It would be hard for the CofE to create a Secondary Free School in this borough because their experience at Christs shows that there isn't the demand for it.

There are 9 CofE primaries so why is there so little demand for a CofE secondary. Does anyone know where they go for secondary ? Are they all going to out of borough CofE schools or private or just joining the Richmond academies ? I wonder why they are not like the Catholics asking for continuity and consistency of their CofE education and saying if 1 in 4 out of primaries can be CofE primary, why cant 2 in 9 or 10 be a CofE secondary !

There are 9 CofE primaries so why is there so little demand for a CofE secondary

Jeev, there are 9 CofE primaries for valid historical reasons. They are very popular, but it's impossible to say whether they are popular for being CofE or for a host of other reasons, such as their locality, reputation, facilities, staff, size, uniform colour, etc etc. The fact is that people choose the school that they think will best suit their child. For some the faith element is paramount, and for others it is not. In my view all reasons are equally valid, so I don't subscribe to the notion that it is "hypocritical" for a non-religious person to choose a faith school. If they have to gain admission through false pretences then that is a problem; but it is as much a problem of the admissions system as of the family themselves.

Christs is oversubscribed, so there is plenty of demand for it. The foundation places have been undersubscibed recently, but there have been more than enough community applicants to fill them. The school is reacting to that situation by increasing the proportion of community places to 50:50 next year when they expand to 5 forms of entry. Perhaps in the future they will increase the community proportion further. Understandably, schools prefer gradual changes to their admissions rather than radical ones. However, many of the CofE's new schools are starting life with 100% community admissions.

p.s. Jeev, sorry, I forgot to answer to your question about where 'they' go for secondary; 'they' quite happily go to our excellent community secondaries and are as anxious as everybody else about the increasing oversubscription of those schools.

Christ's is a good school in a central location. It fills a gap both for Christians and the local community who feel comfortable in that ethos. 50% open admissions is fair and as you say, the CofE and its schools have had a privileged historical role in comparison with other faiths.

But I don't see the need for a new CofE (or other faith) school with 100% open admissions when it could be a community school - they have assemblies, hymns, nativities, etc. just the same.

But I don't see the need for a new CofE
Do you mean the one in Hampton? That's the only CofE school being proposed for the borough isn't it? The Free School process is demand-led so if they get enough people supporting the idea it stands a good chance. There is a shortage of primary school places in that area, so I suspect that if a parent group had put together an inclusive free school bid in the same area it would also have got an equivalent amount of support. However, nobody did that. According to the previous discussion in this thread the Maharishi Free School is also well supported at primary level (I wonder how many people are on both lists!).

That's an example, yes - these are bids that have got in early, the most organised groups, and it's Michael Gove who decides not a parent or council ballot. I was thinking of an article in the TES at Christmas about what could be seen as a expansionist policy by the CofE.

muminlondon - yes I agree it will be the most organised groups that benefit from the Free School legislation first.

To clarify Hampton church school is a 100% inclusive school. They could have gone for 50% faith places, but decided to offer a proposal to solve the a problem faced by the entire local community.
You can follow the discussion at www.facebook.com/search/results.php?q=hampton%20church%20school&init=quick&tas=0.9882837277110297#!/HamptonChurchSchool
I doubt many locals would have signed up to Maharishi school if this proposal would have come forward earlier. BayJay lets hope the Dfe does some due diligence and avoids double counting. How does Gove know what in such competitive cases which proposal better suits the local needs ?

Hampton discusion

parrich - yes you're right. I should have said "non-denominational" rather than "inclusive" in my 06:13 post. I agree that the Hampton Church school has an inclusive admissions policy.

Parrich, also, there's some info on how free school applications are assessed here.