New Secondary Schools for Richmond 4

[BayJay2]

Welcome. This is the fourth (or perhaps fifth) in a series of threads about Richmond Secondary Schools.

The discussion was originally triggered by Richmond council's publication of its Education White Paper in February 2011. It started with two parallel threads here and here.

In November 2011 the most active of the original two threads reached 1000 messages (the maximum allowed) so we continued the conversation here.

That thread filled up in May 2012, and was continued here.

It's now November 2012, and once again we're at the start of a new thread ....

Muminlondon, the academies have each reduced their PAN to accommodate their sixth forms. You can see the timing of that on the council's forecasts. Hampton reduces from 210 to 180 in 2013. RPA reduces from 220 to 180 in 2014. Twickenham Academy reduced from 210 to 180 in 2012.

Also, Grey Court had a temporary increase from 200 to 240 in 2012, but that won't become a permanent expansion, again becasue of its sixth form.

BayJay, that's what I thought, so why are there higher figures in the 2013 admissions brochure? Because the 100 free school places never materialised for 2013? Christ's numbers are 150 as expected but HA and TA have 210 and 200 places advertised.

Also, RPA/Shene has had 215-220 capacity for years that has never been filled. Is it a moveable feast to meet statutory requirements or is there a funding benefit for the schools to do this?

Hmmm, you're right. My instinct would be to assume its just a mistake. They may have used the previous year's brochure as a template and not updated the numbers.

Possibly. But the Grey Court figure would then have been picked out of thin air and I think TA's number is still different from last year.

"Is it a moveable feast to meet statutory requirements or is there a funding benefit for the schools to do this? "

They're academies now so they have control over their own PAN. However, they did have consultations.

I don't know about RPA, but TA didn't receive any objections to reducing their admissions.

"the Grey Court figure would then have been picked out of thin air"
PANs are normally multiples of 30, so if somebody was editing Grey Court's PAN from 240 down to 200 they could have easily made an error. I'm not sure what the logic is for it being 200, though I'm guessing its just that they have 8 forms with 25 children in each. Anyone know?

If it's an error I think it's very sloppy proofreading on the part of the council but I shall be watching to see how they calculate spare capacity after allocations!

But interesting to consider how big a 'form' or tutor group is. I think it is 25 in a lot of schools, e.g. Orleans Park? Some GCSE classes are much smaller than that. I guess funding has to comprise a fixed grant based on potential capacity as well as an amount per pupil - schools have certainly been in deficit for being undersubscribed but you can't suddenly sack a French teacher mid-term or turn the heating off because of a dip in Y7 admissions, or high mobility in Y10 after a bad crop of results. Or can you? That would be my main objection to new schools causing instability in neighbouring schools, because it would punish pupils.

"but you can't suddenly sack a French teacher mid-term or turn the heating off because of a dip in Y7 admissions"
No, I agree, but at least with small academy chains, backed by corporates, like Kunskapskollan there can be some absorption of that fluctuation. I'm guessing Kunskapskollan do channel funds into the Learning school Trust, in the same way that Education London channel funds (and pro-bono effort) into Russell Education Trust. Its in their interests to do so in order to make sure their schools perform at a standard that's inline with their vision. Groups that dip their toe into the academy sector do so so with their eyes open and do have to accept some risk.

No info on academies income in performance tables. I think David Cameron promised to publish it so that is a big omission. But your post does make me nervous about what would happen if Waldegrave, Orleans Park, Teddington or Grey Court suddenly suffered a dip in numbers and therefore funding. I'm sure Gove's answer is a swift take-over by a chain but what is the DfE's liability if the dip was entirely due to sudden overcapacity rather than a bad Ofsted or results? How long can a school operate in a deficit? And anyway, what if the chains themselves had a bad year?

Sorry, I don't expect an answer ftom you BayJay but these are all unknowns.

"How long can a school operate in a deficit?"
I don't know about the transformational academies, but the guidelines for free school applications require groups to provide financial models for both 100% and 80% capacity, i.e. they have to be able to show that they can they can meet their objectives even if they're only 80% full. Of course, some of them have less than 80% in the first year or two until they prove themselves, but all new schools get a little extra money in the first few years to cover start-up dis-economies, so budgets do balance out (and if it looks like they won't the DfE can refuse to sign the funding agreement to let them open, as has been the case in a few high profile cases).

I have heard that the DfE is now encouraging converter academies like Waldegrave, OP, Teddington to join together into small federations to support each other, though I don't know anything about the potential financial benefits of that.

Muminlondon schools get funding based on no of pupils in all years and not capacity. They are supposed to maintain their expenses below their funding levels and are not allowed to go in RED. In addition some schools like our academies have recieved start up grant that provides them cover for 3 to 5 years. This is to recognise that a large portion of costs are fixed e.g you can't deliver half the curriculum or just mow half the lawn, just because you are half full. But over time the imperative is for schools to get full to effectively balance their books. All this requires rigorous and robust financial planning and proactive management. Not having the luxury of high fees and donations levels in private schools, state schools need to spend their funds very carefully. Their challenge is to direct as much spend as possible in value adding activties that enable them to over deliver for their pupils and community.

Thanks for those answers. I see the incentive for new schools but it is a worry for existing schools. What I do not want to see is Turing House and Kingston's free schools approved in the same year - because that could affect all of the Surrey side schools, and even Orleans Park iif Richmond preferences are split equally. On balance, I think Turing House has the strongest immediate case.

muminlondon - If you remember seeing the RISC paper on secondary school plans RISCsecondaryschoolplans (an update will be available in Q1 2013, Richmond has the lowest ratio of resident children at state secondaries (in and out of borough) versus those at state primaries of any London borough. In 2010 the figure was under 50%, compared to an average for the ten most prosperous boroughs of 60%. This is not because Richmond is especially prosperous or has an especially high proportion of children at state primaries.
There is pent up demand for high quality state secondary places. I believe that if existing and new schools offer outstanding education that meets or even exceeds the community expectations, there is enough supply of pupils. A 60% ratio would imply another 260 borough children seeking places in state secondaries. Even Council has agreed with this logic from RISC.
Tax payers deserve excellence in all the existing and new secondaries. In an oustanding environment, the independent sector should have more to fear and that could only increase the number of them who join the state sector through the free schools.

gmsing, I agree that the proportion in private schools is too high. But missing from the assumption is the high mobility and number of ex-pats in Richmond where many live in rented accommodation. For both schools in 2013, 100% of Barnes/Mortlake/Sheen pupils would need to go to RPA (=240, if you really think the 50% at Sheen Mount will switch from the private sector to RPA and all of Marshgate, Vineyard and Darell would need to take up the Grey Court places vacated by North Kingston pupils (=150). That leaves Christ's needing to attract 100% of Kew R, Holy Trinity and Queen's (also high in private school destinations). The case for Turing House assumes many more from Richmond will go to Orleans Park.

I happen to think Kingston's case is weaker now they have both a renewed Grey Court and Teddington as their choices. There may be a case for both schools by 2017 but not 2014. Unfortunately there is no clear site for Turing but an obvious one for Kingston.

BayJay in reply to my comment "the community could put more pressure on the national leaders of our academies to deliver changes that meet our needs"
You wrote In a sense that's what the community has been doing by not taking up the places I agree with you and it will help if parents provided feedback for rejecting the school to their management and Ofsted. National schools are not trying to understand their local community, instead they just start blaming them - elitism, preference for private schools etc. That is just like blaming customers for not choosing your product, instead of accepting that your product is just not good enough and the management needs to improve. gmsing - Whilst I ideologically disagree with RISC, they raised valid points on school places planning and accept the private to state secondary argument. The die hard fans of our excelelnt private schools, send their kids from age 4. Every pupil in Richmond's state primary is a potential pupil for our state secondary. Parents in this borough expect a very high standard and correctly so - they deserve outstanding education coming from our excellent primaries. Unfortunately from 2006-10, the Lib Dems messed with our secondaries, and that has lead to the lower conversion from primary to secondary.

"there is no clear site for Turing but an obvious one for Kingston"

That's not part of the decision-making process. If the preferred site falls through then another site will be found, and now that there is a significant budget for building new free schools (as opposed to a reliance on identifying existing buildings for conversion), the options may be wider.

mmptsa Shene School had already started to go downhill when we moved to Sheen in 1988. Whilst the surrounding Primary Schools continually improved and became oversubscribed successive administrations, Conservative as well as Libdem, were guilty of allowing a school which should have always been similarly outstanding to fail. The negligent educational strategies go back a lot further than 2006.

BayJay, I'm glad the site isn't the determining factor and while it's logistically difficult without

(whoops, that went too early!)

... without one, I think the first wave was rather gung ho with a lot of new free schools in Suffolk in empty sites when the council was in the middle of a reorganisation and trying to shut down middle schools. So there has been a lot of criticism of half empty schools there. I hope lessons have been learned at the DfE. (At the same time, Gove wants to make 1,000 staff redundant and is still not transparent about information from impact assessments to emails so I'm nervous.)

"I hope lessons have been learned at the DfE"
Well the DfE are accountable to the Audit Commission, so lessons do get learnt. The free school programme was radical, and introduced quickly (in order to make an impact within a lifetime of the parliament), but I think its evolved quickly too. It'll be interesting to see how it evolves in the future, and how history will look back on it!

Muminlondon - interesting point on high mobility and expats. I do not have data but that is same for a lot of prosperous London boroughs especially the inner city ones like Kensington, Fulham, Battersea etc. I also see a number of expats choosing private schools like Swedish,American and French schools that gives them better continuity when they return to their home countries.(In some school fees are paid for in some juicy expat packages!!).

"it will help if parents provided feedback for rejecting the school to their management and Ofsted"
I would say its the job of the LA to have their ear to the ground on that. The opinions have been flowing freely for a number of years, but weren't being heard. In fact, that's how I got involved in this whole issue in the first place .... by trying to find ways of getting the council to listen to local parents.

Bayjay in your experience what is the best way to get results. Unfortunately the council and politicians have failed us and cannot be trusted. The academies are anyway outside LA control and not bothered about the community.

"in your experience what is the best way to get results"
In my experience, the best way to get results is to stay positive and focus on what you can do rather than being cynical and complaining that "the council and politicians have failed us and cannot be trusted". Ultimately, everyone wants the same thing - great schools for all. Some people just need to be persuaded of the best way to achieve that, and it takes time and diplomacy. I'm not a fan of adversarial politics as a means of making things happen. When I went to Zac Goldsmith's first meeting about the North Kingston school crisis I was impressed at how politicians from both sides were pulling together to find a solution, and I'd like to see more of that.

Bayjay I think the opinions of parents have been known to the Council and our politicians for decades. When I was appealing to get a place in one of the three primary schools within less than a mile of my house in Sheen in 1995, the letter to your MP, Councillors, Head of Education and anyone else you could think of were an accepted part of the rigmarole, as were the standard pat letters you received back. The content of the Facebook group page that arose as a result of the Hampton black hole in the last couple of years was terribly familiar, it was just we did it by word of mouth. And after you had gone through the process, parents were already moving or going private because they had got the message loud and clear that they could not have confidence in state education at that end of the borough, and that word of mouth culture directed itself to where to move to, how to get into out of borough or private schools and of course the tutoring industry.

It is as you said earlier a parental culture that has enabled the Council to pursue an educational strategy that did not put meeting parental needs (parents of "ordinary" children anyway) anywhere near the top of their aims. That culture was very clearly manifested in Nick Whitfield's presentation to Cabinet on the Clifden Road site.

That is why I so wholeheartedly support Turing House, because it is putting the needs of the community where they belong, at the head of it's aims.