Richmond Borough Schools Chat 6

[BayJay2]

Hello! This is the latest thread in a series originally triggered by Richmond Council's Education White Paper in Feb 2011. We chat about local education policy, the local impact of national policy, local school performance, and admissions-related issues.

Please do join in. 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.

If you have a few hours to spare and want to catch up on 4 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 run in parallel, as one was started on the national Mumsnet site, and the other locally:

1a) New Secondaries for Richmond Borough? (Feb 11 - Nov 11)
1b) New Secondary schools for Richmond! (Feb 11-Nov 11)

1. New Secondary Schools for Richmond 2 (Nov 11-May 12)
2. New Secondary Schools for Richmond 3 (May 12-Nov 12)
3. New Secondary Schools for Richmond 4 (Nov 12-Oct 13)

1. Richmond Borough Schools Chat 5 (Oct 13-Nov 14)
2. Richmond Borough Schools Chat 6 (Nov 14 - ????) : This thread!

I wonder how much they paid for their spot on p.18? So they were approved for one area where demand exceeds supply and move to another where there is no shortage. It's great for them because parents are blaming the council and criticism is deflected. Not Lidl, and not the EFA. Meanwhile the site in 'Deer Park' hasn't actually been secured and no funding agreement has been signed. But they're already talking about opening another school.

Checked again - 'Deer Park Primary' was definitely not the school approved, and as the RTT news piece suggests, is not the school those expressing an interest were expecting because it is not local. So the p.18 piece or any spin suggesting this has just been approved and could be additional to 'Richmond Bridge Primary' is misleading. Unless anyone has a newer link to Wave 8 approved schools?

It's the same school, it's just been renamed for it's new location.

I wonder if the Deer Park site is the Cannons health club or the old health service building in Kew Foot Road? I suppose, although no immediate shortage in that area, it isn't especially near any other state school eg. Darrell or Marshgate in terms of walk to school with children distances so it might be useful in freeing up places elsewhere. But if you take the view that limited public money supplied by Dept. of Education should be spent where it's most needed then it's not good.

The borough needs places overall though, and they will have to demonstrate good parental support in terms of numbers of applications before their funding agreement is signed.

But primary schools have very local catchments - smaller than secondaries - and parents complain about being allocated a place that is not within walking distance. It's a bad and wasteful allocation of resources to put a competing school in an area which has already got a PFI commitment (Kew Riverside) and permanent expansion (Darell) if a single one of those places is rejected in favour of this one. The council would not be able to allocate places in the free schools this year but catchments at Darell/KR may widen or places may not be filled which impacts other parents and school bodies. The original impact assessment would have placed it in an area of need so how can that now be valid? The system is diverting resources to schools that will compete aggressively with existing schools and recruit outside the LA admissions system. There is no justification for it to open in 2015 but if the EFA allows it, it would be political and for the school, profit-driven first-to-market motive.

And it's not just the Islington school that has caused local controversy over planning - so has the Berkshire school.

I think there is demand in that area as in 2014 it was nigh on impossible for anyone to be offered marshgate if they were not a sibling. There were families in the alberts and around the Church Road/Sheen road junction behind the station that were offered nothing initially or schools in Ham. I think it is a black hole aswell as what exists in E Twick sadly. I was wondering if the Rugby club was going as there is much space there. It's always confused me as there are 2 deer parks similarly named and I am never sure which is which.

Demand is different from need, which the council said could be met by existing schools. Darell school was expanded to meet need and should be supported. If this was a private school they could meet demand, once they establish themselves, but as a taxpayer-funded school they are wasting resources. Unlike Turing House they didn't even publish evidence of demand in terms of expressions of interest for the old location. This is the pattern for all their proposals.

The DFE is already in deep trouble over its finances. It is morally indefensible to rush to open schools without justification and transparency while other school budgets and services are being cut.

Muminlondon, I think TW9 2 is actually in North Richmond ward rather than Kew, so it is Area 6 in the plan rather than Area 7. In fact the plan acknowledges that the school fulfills a need in Area 6 : "The establishment of Richmond Bridge Primary within this area, rather than Area 5, would meet the short-to-medium-term need. There are no options for providing additional places at the existing schools except at St Elizabeth’s if the adjacent land could be acquired."

Yes that area is in North Richmond ward but it's pretty nearly in Kew. Quite a long walk from any other primary though. If there are people in the Alberts/Church Road/Richmond station area who can't get places, the Kew Foot Road area would be quite easy walking distance for them. A bit of a parking/traffic nightmare as a very narrow road with narrow approach roads so you'd want parents who walk!

Presumably St Elizabeth's is Catholic so they won't let most of the children locally in even if it is expanded. Is the Catholic church paying for it to be rebuilt?

Kew Riverside - interesting that being a PFI school is now a constraint to expansion. Shows what a bad idea PFI was!

It's North Richmond - the other side of the railway tracks from Marshgate but includes Windham nursery which is very much the Darell community. No point speculating till we know, but it definitely won't resolve the East Twickenham problem.

I kept expecting the old police station to come up as a site, but maybe without outside space it is unsuitable. But closer to East Twickenham and that's where the need is, which used to be met by the Vineyard.

Quite honestly, I am furious that Deer Park Primary seems set to go ahead. My daughter goes to Darell, which is locally relatively unpopular (despite being absolutely fine as a school, having an Ofsted report on a par with Queen's and Kew Riverside and other local schools, and in addition being a genuinely nurturing and gentle and happy place - in fact it was actually my first choice). It's a good school. This will severely impact on Darell's ability to fill the places that it has been expanded for. The school will suffer if it has classes that aren't filled, both financially and in terms of being seen as a decent school to go to. Why aren't the council supporting Darell when none of the parent body really wanted the expansion anyway and it was forced on us? They could perfectly well have expanded Queen's and left us alone. There was a lot of talk about how expansion would bring new funds for the school etc but that's not going to happen if classes are not filled. The North Sheen and Kew areas have enough schools to fill demand and none of these schools are bad schools (they're just different from each other). It should be the council's responsibility to find a sensible local site for areas where demand outstrips supply. Giving over the previous site to Lidl or whatever seems utterly mad.

I suppose it is just about walking distance from St Margarets (along the A316) and really not far as the crow flies. But it really isn't addressing the actual problems and it's in a stupid place if the name is any reflection of its site.

I still feel that the council cannot choose or easily 'manage' free schools - certainly not the opportunistic profit-making types like BVET or GEMS. The EFA is responsible for securing sites and all the council can do is advise on planning and areas of need - and if they can get need and free school proposals to match, they cooperate rather than hinder. Press releases from councillors can be glib, however, and the RTT is such an utterly crap paper it makes them sound even glibber. The council DOES support its schools including seconding heads between schools, and it is working with open free schools to bring them up to scratch. I just don't trust profiteering companies in state education.

Yes muminlondon, I know your default position is "public sector good, private sector bad", as it is for very many people. However, free schools fall into the same middle ground as other types of academy - they've just got there by a different route - and each one has got there by its own unique route so they can't easily be lumped together as a category.

I've no doubt that the vast majority of people involved in planning and setting up free schools are doing so with good intentions and setting out to create their vision of an outstanding school in good faith. Some will succeed at that and others will fail - in fact it wouldn't surprise me if they do that in similar proportions to maintained schools. Parents need to have a critical eye and judge each one on its merits - just as they do with maintained schools.

BayJay2 you misrepresent my views slightly but you are right that 'free schools' cover a very broad category. It includes community groups or small parent groups like yours who have a stake not only in the education of their own children but are sensitive to the wider community. The Turing House website is regularly updated, with lots of information on the history of the proposal, the support and expressions of interest it has received, etc. I get why it is needed - to meet need, because boys' options are limited in Twickenham, and because there isn't a mixed school with a science focus on this side of the borough.

But as part of the broad category of free schools there is an ideological movement to bring in profit-making as as the next phase of the free school project. Because Bellevue Place schools have all been approved without a site, without evidence of parental involvement, under a different name from what eventually gets chosen. and in very quick succession, it fits in with a deliberate attempt to use the free school process to promote this ideology. The project management company Place Group is involved in projects with other for-profit companies like Mosaica Education.

This for-profit involvement is increasingly for primary schools, a very different phase from secondaries - catchments are and should be smaller than for secondaries, there is mixed ability teaching, no specialism, and very delicately nurtured links with local communities. That's why most primaries are still LA-maintained compared to secondaries. The pro-market argument of increased choice does not fit in with meeting basic need when primary budgets are so small and so easily impacted by so-called 'competition'.

I have no problem with these private-equity backed chains competing with each other in the private sector, which I can't afford anyway. But at least there the parent is also the contracted customer. There are too many examples of poor value for money, risk to users and failure when profit is introduced to essential state services for it to work (taking a pragmatic view) even on economic grounds.

You are right that other parents in areas targeted by Bellevue Place are bewildered as to how the proposals got picked. Read the comment below the story announcing the school approved to open 'somewhere in Barnet':

'Not exactly a community initiative then. I thought the idea of Free Schools was that people could start up schools in their area in order to provide education of a ... What sort of education would that be anyway? ...

But this one was going to be in the Borough of Barnet, somewhere, and now they (who?) have decided it should be in Burnt Oak, so it's going to be Watling Park School. They haven't got a site for it yet (people living close to Watling Park might think about keeping an eye on the planning applications from now on!). ...'

"I have no problem with these private-equity backed chains competing with each other in the private sector, which I can't afford anyway. But at least there the parent is also the contracted customer. "

Well the politicians would say that to a greater extent than ever before the parent is the customer in maintained schools too, now that we have league tables, Ofsted dashboards, preference rankings, per-pupil funding, pupil premiums and the rest of it.

The problem is that it's simply not possible to give everyone choice without also having a generous proportion of slack in the system - i.e. more places than there are pupils.

Policy makers who think private education has a lot to teach the maintained sector need to imagine a world where, having paid your fee, your child was then allocated to a random poorly-performing private school of someone else's choosing. Then they then might begin to appreciate the problem.

Especially when parental demand in the private sector is very much driven towards schools with a long history of providing education as their overriding aim, rather than being businesses. Indeed some of the most popular (KGS, Latymer, Putney High locally) would still be state schools were it not for Shirley Williams. Some private investors like those who established Radnor understand that they have to meet that need and put education professionals at the front and head of their business. I don't necessarily think that private / business involvement is a problem (for obvious reasons), or that parent led Free Schools are the only route to excellence, there do seem to be some good sponsors out there. But why are GEMS and Belleview, with their overseas background / not particularly inspiring private sector involvement, and apparent lack of interest in the needs of local parents being allowed in when apparently all they are in it for is to exploit an opportunity? I would love someone from one of these schools to actually engage with some of the local scepticism and prove us wrong........

There's also a link with corporate social responsibility, and much blurring of lines between philanthropy and dependency on corporate finance.

Parents aren't customers in the state sector - they're users. Councils aren't truly commissioning either because the contracts are between DfE and trusts. But even in the private sector you are stuffed if the company pulls out suddenly or increases class sizes (like GEMS) mid-year, mid-GCSE or whatever. You'd have to ring up your local council. Even at the right entry point, in reality apart from in London you're not even 'choosing' between a Bellevue school or a GEMS school - Bellevue is very new and is buying up the schools GEMS and the like couldn't make money out of. Its branding probably works better because it doesn't have its name before every school - less of a problem with brand contamination. Bellevue is naming its schools very carefully to make them sound independent from each other and local.

Now that's staggering news - Richmond Council to merge with Wandsworth? How can you have education merged with Kingston, legal services merged with Merton then chief executive shared with Wandsworth? What a mess. Is Lord True insane? And this can be justified by... what? Cuts? To pay for a Catholic school we didn't need, and free primary schools where we don't need them? Free school meals given to families who can afford to pay for it? I'm really nonplussed by this. You can't go as far as this without democratic consent.

Don't forget we also have waste disposal merged with Hounslow, Hillingdon, Ealing, Brent and Harrow! I agree with all of you. We don't need the private sector to show the state sector what to do locally when we have all these outstanding schools. It's just a blatant attempt to start privatising the education sector. If these firms running identikit chains wanted to do something genuinely philanthropic they wouldn't be hanging round LB Richmond.

Wandsworth council has been very effective ( I lived on a road which was half Lambeth and half Wandsworth - when we had a freak snowstorm, W side cleared, L side chaos) so looking forward to seeing a well-run council .

So they could come up with innovative ways of employing pan-London snow cleaners - assuming they're paid the living wage But who would we be paying to be in charge and which elected representatives would they be accountable to?

I've just followed up that corporate social responsibility link BayJay2 and it made me laugh. GEMS's philanthropic arm there praising global companies for spending CSR budgets on education. And GEMS has just the scheme for companies - low-cost because companys' volunteers are involved but not no-cost. In the same week, GEMS can use its PR budget to promote company partnerships with companies (like Microsoft) it has praised in its 'research'.