Richmond Borough Schools Chat 8

[muminlondon2]

This thread follows on from Richmond Borough Schools Chat 7.

News and opinions on all the changes to schools in Richmond borough.

Interesting to compare A-level results in traditional grammar school areas with Richmond's comprehensives (as it's topical). The Dover Grammar School for Girls boasts of being 'in the top 10 overall performers for Kent Grammar Schools' and having the best ever results this year.

A*-B grades - 71.6% DGGS, 75% Waldegrave
A* grades - 14.1 % DGGS, 15% Waldegrave
5 Oxbridge places achieved at DGGS - same for Waldegrave.

Would 'house price selection' cancel out academic selection completely at this stage? Or is there better teaching at Waldegrave?

I think Waldegrave is less house price selective than some think, and surely less so than Teddington. Not that I've actually studied data, just seen how far/what directions the various uniforms go at the end of the day.

Kent grammar schools very middle class anyway, but their non-selective counterparts are particularly socially and religiously segregated.

It's fascinating. I wish someone, somewhere would just do a massive, massive spreadsheet with every bit of data that might be relevant in it, and do a "calculate" to see that difference each little variation makes. I'd be interested especially in outcomes of areas where there is a relatively isolated grammar without a defined catchment (e.g. Tiffin) compared to areas where everyone has to sit the test and you either make it or don't. Personally I am glad my DC are all safely in secondary already.

There's an up-to-date piece by Full Fact showing how grammar schools with catchment areas worsen segregation and even lower attainment overall. Chris Cook did some research on this for the FT and it links to his charts. Pupils in secondary moderns have fewer opportunities to do single sciences, etc.

Richmond residents (parents) are overall three times as likely to be educated to degree level compared to Dover. That may explain why our comprehensives still have a lot of high achievers despite a large private sector. The grammar system seems to lead to complacency in provincial towns - I checked A-level subjects for Kent grammars and the numbers doing Latin, Music, languages or other such subjects are minuscule. A surprising number of U-grades too. So while they have much greater opportunities, they don't seem to make the most of them.

I can't see how such changes are going to get past the Commons let alone the Lords as there is lot of disquiet among Conservatives MPs. Gove may also join in a rebellion (his former adviser Sam Freedman is against new selection - how can that work with an academised system of autonomous schools?).

Sheila Fisher; In medicine ‘patterns of care’ studies do just that; thgey were pioneered in the US: healthcaredelivery.cancer.gov/poc/ . Patterns of Maternity Care in English NHS Hospitals 2011/12 is a UK example.

Such studies may show associations between variables and outcome which are highly suggestive of cause and effect but they cannot provide proof because of the presence of uncontrolled confounding factors.

For that a large, well-designed and well-controlled random prospective study is needed, which is often impossible or unethical to set up. See: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confounding#Decreasing_the_potential_for_confounding

Thank you both.

Just to say that in this first year of A-levels the geographical intake of the various sixth forms in local schools was not the same as that of the main schools so looking at the postcode or the surrounding house prices will not necessarily be so relevant. Definitely lots of intelligent parents in the state system although not all middle-class. I'm very happy to live somewhere with good comprehensives well supported by intelligent parents and have never paid for tutoring or considered selective or private schooling. When I think of the cohort of children I've seen growing up together from reception to Year 11 I shudder at the thought of them being divided up at age 11 - there are many late bloomers and children who are good at Maths and Science but not at English and languages and vice versa - what on earth would be the point of putting them in separate schools? One boy who was near the bottom at primary is now in the top sets for Maths and Science (but still hopeless at writing!).

A totally different subject. With the current guidelines for applications to Waldegrave. If DD2 is in Y11 when I apply for DD3 to go to Waldegrave, would the sibling link apply? The current guidance seems ambiguous, as it says the link applies to siblings in Y7 - Y11. Does this mean the year that sib 2 is in at the time of the application, or the year she will be in when DD3 would start in Y7?

It usually means the year the elder one is in when they younger starts Y7.
In a school where they allow Y12s and Year 13s (where there is no geographical limit) some paretns are canny enough to move the elder to that 6th form to ensure the younger siblings ( miles away!) get places so schools prob won't accommodate this 9 unless they are desperate to fill 6th form places and possibly a few the Richmond ones will be this year.

Yes this is what I thought.

New secondary admissions brochure now up on the Richmond upon Thames council website, including details of the new Richmond upon Thames School, along with 2015 allocation maps (initial allocations only). It looks like there is a lot more interest in Grey Court from the Fulwell/North Teddington area in terms of successful applications (although previous maps only showed first preference, so perhaps the trend was there before: those putting it second after Teddington still have a distance advantage over North Sheen or Kew pupils). There is also an increase in the numbers putting Turing House as at least one of the preferences.

Twickenham Academy and Hampton High (a renamed Hampton Academy) both have new websites.

As the secondaries have their open days it will be interesting to see if they give progress 8 data. Even tho they are not compelled to report on it yet, it is available and would expect savvy parents to ask, and be unimpressed if schools refuse to reveal.

Not sure about any others, but Waldegrave announced theirs along with their GCSE results. (0.77)

Well done Waldegrave Sheila !
Would be interesting if the local paper were to ring around the local schools and present us with a list.
There would of course be excuses form the usual suspects, but would at least be more useful a starting point for parents to ask questions that a crude A-C measure which advantages those with a selective ( overt or covert) intake,

Orleans Park give this measure on their website along with the GCSE results.

So we have so far:
Orleans +0.26
Waldegrave +0.77

I haven't seen anything about this in the info I've had from Teddington and not sure where to look on the website. Isn't it something that only some schools opted into last year? Teddington haven't published their detailed GCSE results yet - they usually wait til all the appeals are out of the way. I gather there was a problem with Product Design this year.

They don't need to opt in - all schools have it as it is another metric that comes out of the data they all have. They may opt not to make it public as they are not compelled to until next year, and I expect hat some will prefer not to make public until the secondary choices are made - and parents may not be aware to ask.

O I thought from what I read that they didn't need to calculate it until this year. Teddington made a big thing of how much better its children with lower expectations did this year compared to previous years so perhaps not too bad a score, although they don't have too many of them - about 10% usually.

They will have definitely calculated - and they have software that does iit for them that, so is not an onerous or extra task - and the governors and/or academy bosses will insist on seeing it - the only question is whether they publish it, and they won't if it is negative, or neutral.
No co-incidence that those who have are both positive.
For those schools with new heads - eg TA, RPA, if the score is negative o low positive I would expect them to publish it so that they can show it as a baseline for when they started - if they expect things will improve under their leadership.

Some lively debate, and a lot of tedious attempts at point scoring, and raking over old coals, in the Council meeting last night on both the West Richmond MAT and the Turing site. Item 14 richmond.public-i.tv/core/portal/webcast_interactive/240911

£44m of government funds is the cost of the Kunskapsskolan experiment.

I am somewhat puzzled by the description of the residents around the Fullwell golf course by Councillor Samuels as being powerful and with deep pockets, they are certainly not as vocal or prone to leveraging their power / royal connections as those around the Imperial Sports Ground, and that nearly happened. Certainly not motivated to be so by the fate of the wasteland next to David Lloyd as opposed to the golf course. I was Impressed by Councillor Jaegar, unusual to see non confrontational good sense and sound fact, come from our Councillors......

Cllr Samuels didn't say actually refer to 'residents around the Fulwell Golf Course' but talked of 'a group of [powerful] people'.... since it was in connection with green belt status, perhaps that could have been the Campaign for the Protection of Rural England? Their members may be spread around London, maybe with some local members, but they would run campaigns whenever a planning issue comes up, like Twickenham Riverside.

Some interesting points about Kunskapsskolan - Cllr Knight was more convincing than Cllr Roberts but it is something the LibDems should acknowledge was a mistake. A post on the LSN blog site gives a lot of background about their business model which the LibDems should have investigated at the time.

mum The organised opposition that has arisen to the health club (then Amida, now David Lloyd) trying to close the golf course, or let walking paths become over grown, from time to time over the last ten or so years (not to build anything) was a local protest group, mostly neighbours, basically mobilised via notices put up on the course. The history is outlined in the comments here. www.richmondandtwickenhamtimes.co.uk/news/9595197.display/
Councillor Samuels and officers were scrabbling about trying to find the means to stop the Amida closing it off, not to stop building. The only development was that Councillor Samuels formally promised the group, who live in his ward that he would ensure the land remained open for public access. There was actually little orchestrated opposition to building on the adjacent land given it was MOL and so presumably could have been taken to judicial review etc. which is why the club was built in the first place fifteen years ago, and indeed it has succeeded with a successive planning application to extend. It suited the Council to have a business take over the running of the golf course so they allowed the Amida to be built there fifteen years ago, but I can see no reason, certainly not an imaginary group of well organised opponents with deep pockets to pay lawyers that were mobilised ten years ago, why they are so opposed to building a school on the neglected scrubland next to it.

I watched the Council meeting via that link (thanks for that) but felt none the wiser afterwards. I just can't quite understand why that land is more difficult than the MOL land in Whitton. Or why it is that "someone" can't pressure the EFA to explain why. There seems to be a lot of common sense arguments as to why Fulwell would be more sensible than Whitton for the school, but beyond "it was all so difficult and traumatic about that land years ago" there is no satisfactory answer given. It seems that therefore Whitton will be the site chosen, when no one wants it and all the residents / parents and any other interested party just has to put up with what is given. Or have I missed something?