Richmond Borough Schools Chat 5

[BayJay2]

Welcome! This is the latest in a series of threads about Richmond schools, which was first triggered by the council's publication of its Education White Paper in February 2011.

Please do join in the chat. There’s a bunch of us who’ve been following the thread for a long time, and we sometimes get a bit forensic, but new contributions are always welcome, and if it’s something that’s been covered before we can always direct you to that part of the thread.

We generally talk about local education policy, the impact of national policy, the performance of the borough’s schools, and admissions-related issues. We began by talking about Secondaries, but tend to talk a lot about primaries too, so the title of the thread has evolved this time to take that into account.

If you have a few hours to spare and want to catch up on 2 years of local education history, then below are the links to the old threads. We have to keep starting new threads because each only hold 1000 posts. The first two threads run in parallel, as one was started on the national Mumsnet site, and another on the local one:

1a) New Secondaries for Richmond Borough?: Mumsnet Secondary Education (Feb 2011 – Nov 2011)
1b) New Secondary schools for Richmond!: Mumsnet Local (Feb 2011 – Nov 2011)

1. New Secondary Schools for Richmond 2: Mumsnet Local (Nov 2011 – May 2012)

1. New Secondary Schools for Richmond 3: Mumsnet Local (May 2012 – Nov 2012)

1. New Secondary Schools for Richmond 4: Mumsnet Local (Nov 2012 – Oct 2013)

1. This thread: Richmond Borough Schools Chat 5: Mumsnet Local (Oct 2013 - ????)

Finally, to find out how to add links, as well as smilies and emphasis, see these Mumsnet guidelines.

It looks like they have a head who has worked mainly in the private sector - she just spent two years as head of a prep school in Fulham prior to which she was at the lower school at White Lodge, the ballet school. Hope she is getting some support to get her up to speed with the requirements of the state system.

But they appear to have a site (if not a building), whereas the East Twickenham free school's preferred site at Ryde House was bought by Lidl.

Where is the site muminlondon2? I can't see any reference to a site on the website.

No, that's odd isn't it? I remember your link to the council's new educational sites consultation which pointed to St Clare Business Park, Holly Road, Hampton Hill as a site suitable for primary school (page 4). Ryde House in East Twickenham is also in there.

However, there's an agenda item for the last Kingston admissions forum meeting which mentions Richmond - point 6, 'the EFA have acquired a site to enable Twickenham Primary to open in September 2015' whereas 'No site is yet confirmed for Richmond Bridge Primary, which is also due to open in September 2015, but the EFA are considering a range of options on either side of Richmond Bridge' [ - expensive territory?!]

So whether that means the Hampton Hill site has been secured but the Ryde House one is in doubt, I don't know. Maybe there are other sites we have not heard of.

Things can only go in the plan if they're not confidential, so anything that is still commercially sensitive won't yet be in there.

O right I hadn't thought about it going in Hampton Hill - assumed that site was for expansion of HH juniors which is just over the road. Not very big for a whole school. So Lidl have taken the site Richmond Bridge Primary wanted have they. How Un community minded. I have noticed that Richmond stick sites in these consultations without the owners consenting sometimes.

Bit out of date but saw this thread and though I'd post what I know about the head teacher matter at Thomson House. The initial head did not have her contract renewed and the follow up principal was only ever interim to recruit a new head. This has been done, very successfully, and the interim remains as a consultant.
Hopefully the DfE will be updated by now but the initial results coming out are very good.

Well, you might be right lottie that the HH site was for expansion not a new school and a different site (commercially sensitive) has just been bought. But they ought to announce the location soon because the admissions criteria is distance from the school.

What results for Thomson House? Have they had an Ofsted? It's too early for SATs - unless you mean the phonics test?

I see they have another 'headmistress'. Do they still use this word a lot in the private sector?

Picking up on an older conversation RuTC have announced that this year's International Baccalaureate course will be the last as it will be cut due to funding problems. Very sad as it is a great course and will now result in less choice for local students. In fact anecdotally I am already hearing of current Y11s struggling to find their desired combination of A levels at the new sixth forms. I know the council claims the sixth forms were requested by parents but the sheer scale and impact seems inappropriate at a time when places at earlier stage are in such shortage.

Have just seen that the % A*-C results will be published on Thursday, so those local schools who have been ducking and diving around that will have to come clean, so there will be at least some measure of comparability for this year.

Since rumbles posted news about the new head at Thomson House primary school, I went to check the website again. It does look more professional now that newsletters are actually published publicly, although I can't see an archive for the first 31.

Two things struck me: one is how much money they are raising from parents (must be approx £150 per child last year - £7,200) for the School Fund, which may even be separate from the Friends of Thomson House School and a certain amount of corporate fundraising. They also received a massive grant of £50,000 recently from a charitable trust (compared with £10,000 donated to a school in Africa). The odd £200 is raised for a Macmillan cake sale, but I can't help but think it is a shame that schools in less wealthy parts of the borough are not receiving that sort of cash, even with the extra funding they might get through the pupil premium.

It would be interesting to see the proportion of SEN or disadvantaged pupils at Thomson House, but those statistics haven't been compiled yet. Any early 'results' could only be interpreted in that context.

Secondly. they do seem to be getting a lot of support from the borough: Matthew Paul is a governor, and they have a borough school improvement partner helping them to prepare for their first Ofsted inspection, due this year. This suggests that although they may have got off to a shaky start with their initial recruitment and original governing body, they must have benefited from the support of the local authority since then.

Here are extracts from the planning officer’s report on the Haymarket site development, to be decided on October 22:

para 101, p 60: At primary level there are 29 schools within 2 miles of the site . . with 19 in Richmond and 10 in Hounslow. The ES identifies that all the Boroughs primary provision is oversubscribed. The approved development at Twickenham Station and former Twickenham Royal Mail Sorting Office, which generate up to 73 primary aged children, identified the need to generate a need for a new FE at one of the local schools. With the addition of this proposal this is considered to increase to 2.5 new forms of entry. As such, the ES has identified that there would be a moderate adverse impact upon primary school education as a result of the development.

At secondary level there are 16 secondary schools within 3 miles of the sites. 9 of these schools are within Richmond Borough. While the ES has identified stress in the supply of secondary school places this is less severe than primary places and within the ES the impact is considered to be minor adverse . . ‘

‘Proposal: Demolition of the existing buildings . . erection of part four/part five/part six/part seven storey building to provide 213 flats, erection of 6 three storey houses . . ‘

‘120 Conclusion . . The development of the site would mean the Haymarket Group (with approximately 1200 employees) relocating to offices elsewhere in the borough . . and the delivery of a ‘Tech- hub’ on the Richmond upon Thames College site in Twickenham . .

The provision of the ‘Tech-hub’ provides both specialist accommodation for the College and Haymarket and Haymarket have committed to sharing experience across sectors and provision of apprenticeships for students; the ‘Tech-hub’ also helps the College’s eligibility for LEP funding which includes a significant bid towards redevelopment costs. This enables the College to secure its future in new fit -for- purpose premises and releases land for the delivery of wider education objectives (creation of a secondary free school and special school) and residential.

Haymarket’s role is thus critical in the wider programme of bringing forward the redevelopment of the College site and the school provision within required timescale . .

I therefore recommend PERMISSION subject to condition, the completion of a Section 106 Agreement and no adverse direction from the GLA.’

They always just gloss over where these extra children are going to go don't they! I think I read that the "child yield" from Teddington Studios was 139 mostly primary school aged children. All the schools in Teddington are already full and fully expanded! Perhaps they could go to school in Ham as they are near the bridge.

LP: my apologies; here is the missing para re child nos.:

para 101, p 60: ‘The Council’s Planning Obligations Strategy (POS) SPD . . calculates that the development would house . . 49 children between 0-4 years, 53 children between 5-10 years, and 37 children between 11-15 years and with a child take up of 40 for primary school places and 17 for secondary school places.’

40 in toto = 6 places/year primary; 17 in toto = 3 places/year secondary.

Less than half of the 11-15 going to a state secondary school despite easily near enough to get into Teddington School ? I would have thought these flats would be prime territory for rentals to parents of 10 year olds!

LProsser indeed! (re flat rental) - that possibility is talked about a lot quite openly here at the other end of Sheen from Christs, as only realistic prospect is RPA which has been decidedly cagey about its results, which caused a lot of suspicion and cynicism.

MrsSalvo there may have been a lot of appeals on grades as they hit a new high this year. There were no free places anywhere else nearby this year but it might be worth applying to Kingston Academy for 2015 (two buses, boring commute, but pupils would do the same journey for Tiffin).

I can't see individual school results on the statistics website MrsSalvo - you may have to wait till January for those.

There are so many caveats and explanations about '2012/2013 methodology' versus '2013/2014 methodology' that it is impossible to compare results with previous years, or to compare state schools and private. While state schools have been subjected to a bewildering number of changes to make exams more difficult, and so-called 'independent' academies are not free of that tyranny, private schools continue to take what the government considers 'easier iGCSE' English exams, e.g. that include speaking and listening as part of the overall score.

Also, you have to compare sponsored academies with other similar schools (as they are likely to have a lower level of attainment and higher deprivation), and likewise the converter academies (some of which are grammars or selective religious schools). The gender gap has also increased, especially for Ebacc.

Ebacc is the only measure that is close to last year's methodology apart from English...

But some Ebacc averages are:

State average: 22.5 achieved (36.1% entered)

School Type
Sponsored academies open 4 years: 9.7% achieved (30% entered)
Converter academies open 1 year: 25.1% achieved (40.1% entered)

Gender
BOYS: 17.9% achieved (31.7% entered)
GIRLS: 27.4% achieved (40.8% entered)

Richmond LA average: 37.8% achieved (54.6% entered)

RTT Online has (Oct 22): Special education first for Richmond school pupils: A school for young people with special needs will be taking post-16 students:

Clarendon School will provide 35 places for 16 to 18-year-olds with autism from September 2015 at the Gateway Centre, meaning students will no longer need to travel out of the borough for further education. As part of the expansion plans, the school will also manage the Newhouse Centre, which currently provides education to pupils referred from schools across the borough, who will be added to the school's roll . .

Since 2009, the number of statements for pupils with special needs has increased by 7.4 per cent, with 31 per cent of all pupils on the autistic spectrum. Under the expansion, 100 pupils aged seven to 16 will be taught at the school’s main site, 32 pupils aged 11 to 19 years old at the Gateway Centre and 23 children at the Newhouse Centre.

Another look at the national statistics (Table 8 of 'additional tables') show the widening gap between girls and boys in Ebacc passes.

Entries for English, Maths and science are comparable, although there's still a 10% gap between boys and girls passing a GCSE in all three areas, and the gap is as high as 15% for English. That will have a dramatic effect on schools where there are more boys than girls, and where there is a larger group of pupils on the C/D borderline. It would be fair to interpret results from individual Richmond schools in that context.

More boys than girls took a design and technology subject, PE, business studies or IT - NOT included in the Ebacc. In comparison, more girls than boys took languages (which are included), health and social care or drama, and twice as many took art/design.

Am I right in thinking that Twickenham Academy has a high % of boys due to having a shared catchment with Waldergrave? At one time Teddington School used to publish its results by gender so it could prove that girls did as well there as at Waldergrave but now they have completely different catchments I don't think think they do it.

Looks like the residential development on the Teddington Studios site got the green light:

teddingtontown.co.uk/2014/10/23/permission-granted-for-teddington-studios-redevelopment/

LP, all of the local mixed secondaries have more boys than girls, and it's not as simple as assuming static, overlapping catchments, because people move around, go private, and some girls prefer mixed schools. Here are the stats from the 2013 census:

Christ's 58%
Hampton Academy 52%
Twickenham Academy 57%
Richmond Park Academy 57%
Teddington School 61%
Orleans Park School 61%
Grey Court School 56%

For what it's worth, it's not just the state schools that are affected. The equivalent percentage for Radnor House is 73%!

Thanks Bay Jay. That's quite surprising as would have expected Twickenham Academy and Orleans Park to have far more boys as their catchments overlap the most with Waldegrave. Teddington is definitely almost 50/50 in younger years (year 9 downwards) as no overlap between the Waldegrave and Teddington catchments in last few years.

No surprise that Teddington Studios development got the green light in view of the link up with Egerton Road/their Lordships but it will have an impact on primaries (and other services) in Teddington/Hampton Wick in a few years. This is one of several new developments in Teddington, including one in Waldegrave Road and one in Kingston Road, and there are many applications and permitted developments going through which will convert offices to flats, including a large building next to Teddington Hospital called Livingstone House. I really don't understand where all these children are going to go to school.

LP, it's not really surprising if you look at how people actually behave.

Anyone who lives in Twickenham knows there's a trend for girls-only families to move into the Waldegrave catchment, and a trend for boys-only families to move into the Orleans Park or Teddington catchments. There's also a trend for families who have one of each to either live near Waldegrave and send their boy private, or move into the Orleans Park/Teddington catchments and send them both to the same school. I strongly suspect that a lot of those boys at Radnor House have a sister at Waldegrave.

The effect on Christs and Grey Court is likely due to Waldegrave's second catchment area combined with all-girls families moving into Twickenham.

The catchments for TA and HA are much wider than those for the other schools, so the Waldegrave effect has much less impact on them, though of course it does have some impact, and probably many of the more local boys at TA will have sisters at Waldegrave too.

I'm also seeing an effect in my DC's primary, which is near Waldegrave. Y6 is now close to a 2:1 girls to boys ratio, whereas it was a 50:50 mix lower down the school. The shift has been gradual, as families with boys have moved away and their places have been taken up by families with girls.

I don't know if the other local primaries are affected, or whether this is just an anomaly. I couldn't see any historical trend in the census stats but it may be something that's accelerated since the linked school policy was dropped.