Been offered brand new free school or last choice

[Lazymama2]

We're not sure what to do as have been offered a place at a brand new school which is with walking distance but has not been 'fitted out' yet (buildings are there). There is very little concrete info on term dates, start and finish times, curriculum and obviously no past performance on which to base a decision. Also no older kids to look up to. Other school is our last choice and has improved from satisfactory to good. DH does not want Dd to go to this school and would prefer private. I, on the other hand, quite like idea of a brand new school.

Thoughts/ideas anyone?

PS please dont turn this into a debate of state vs. private as I believe every parent does what is best for thier child/family circumstances and im not for/against one or the other.

It has always been stated as 56 for this reception year, as admissions were separate from the PAN system. There were 42, not 40, children at the start of the school year. Even using your PAN of 60, that is 70% full. Many more children have joined since the start of the year, so I won't be surprised if it's over 90% full by the end of the year. Not bad for a school that doesn't have any siblings to bolster the numbers.

Odd then that Whitehall Park School made an official return of forty children to Islington Council -(which is publically available information, which is how I know) but as you have up to date information why not tell us what the correct number is?

I am intrigued to hear of all these extra children. Can you say where they have come from?

By the way, I think you are misunderstanding something about the role of the Planned Admission Number as, actually what you have written does not make sense. Some clarification needed.

I also note that your figure of 75 per cent full has now fallen to 70 per cent full. And I said 66 and two thirds percent full. Anyone like to propose a fourth figure just to add to the fun?

I hold with my calculation of 75% full, as that is what 42 children out of a total of admission number 56 is. This admission number of 56 for the 2014/2015 intake has been in the public domain since the school was first proposed. The starting number of 42 is publicly available thanks to an FOI request. I can't verify your number of 40. It may indeed be in the public domain, but it's not available online, even using the broadest search terms.

@Eireannach

The figure given in the admissions brochure is 60. Which is the usual number for a two form entry school. Is this wrong?

Also, to be quite honest I am not really very interested in your argument with nlondondad as to whether at the START of the year there were forty children as he says, or forty two children as you say. Its much more interesting that you say there are a lot more children now.

As you are a parent you must know the correct number now, so why not tell us?

And please dont tell me to put in a "Freedom Of Information" request.

Hi Pythagorous,

The PAN in 2015/16 is 60. The PAN for the first intake in 2014/15 was 56. The word from the playground is that currently there are only 3 places left. I was never any good at maths but I sure someone else can work out what percentage 53 out of 56 is?

Most of the new children seem to be ones that Islington couldn't find places for who were waiting for places to become available (islington admissions scandalously IMO neglected to mention WPS to these parents) then they found out there were places at WPS independently and were happy to have a school place for their children.

Some others are new to the area and a couple have moved from other schools because they preferred WPS.

@PythagorousPlannedIt

Uninterested as you may well be in the argument about the number of children at the "start of the year" this does seem to be the pertinent number in the argument above, resulting from @Nlondondad claiming WPS to be - "a school which this year was a third empty"

Anybody's individual interest here is independent of the fact that he has made a claim that is now being challenged as incorrect.

As a parent who has put down WPS on our schools application, it is important to know if the content of posts about the school are accurate.

So, before we get too distracted, we should make efforts to verify whether this claim of being "a third empty" is correct, or not.

Your being more interested in other matters, relevant as they no doubt are,
is a separate issue.

Actually , to be blunt Fox the reason why I was not so interested in whether Whitehall Park School had 42 rather than forty children at the start of the year, or indeed dont actually feel very excited by the discovery that although the published admission number is 60 this year, it was less last year, is that all this confusion about the numbers at WPS is entirely caused by the unwillingness of the Whitehall Park supporters to give accurate and timely information. You do not have this problem with Coleridge, or St Michaels, or Ashmount or...but I am sure you get my drift.

Friends of mine who are prospective parents are much more concerned that Whitehall Park School has, in their experience, not given them accurate information about the building program and how long it will be delayed.

They are also concerned that nlondondad's charge of deceptive behaviour on WPS's part go unanswered.

Given the tactics of WPS supporters on this thread, suggesting that I am causing "distraction" seems a bit rich.

About my friends.
They went to see WPS shortly before the deadline for application, they had the information in the Islington Admissions brochure.

They went together. They were impressed by and liked the teachers, but they were impressed by and liked teachers at other schools. They they asked about the building plans. Then it went pear shaped. My friends DP works in building. He basically asked di they really expect that the building would be ready in the autumn. They described the response as definite verging on frosty "of course it will be ready" Then the DP said but you havent applied for planning permission yet, Distinct frost and "thats only a technicality dont bother about that"

It left the DP actually rather angry. He felt prospective parents were being taken for fools. Then of course, after the closing date the "delay" is announced on the website. For what its worth he thinks that January 2016, the new date is hopelessly unrealistic.

I asked him to note down why, and I am using this note as I write:

"A major and contentious planning application as this is will take 12 weeks assuming it goes through first time, and often enough an application like this will not so further time. After the decision to grant planning permission is given there has to be a delay of essentially a month in case of a Judicial Review. Given that they now say the application cant go in until after May 7th then, depending when the planning committee meets, with one thing and another planning permission will not come through until September at the earliest. Given the further work needed to get a contractor and the delay before a contractor gets on site, I cant see work STARTING until January 2016.

He reckons that March 2017 is a more likely date, so thats at least three years of children in portocabins. He cannot believe that Bellevue do not know this.

@PythagorousPlannedIt

If your friends feel this way, it is quite obviously not the school for them. I must say, it certainly does bear little relation to our experience of visiting the school, where we found the staff we met, Laura, Harriet & Nicki, to be friendly, helpful and open. Accordingly (alongside other reasons), we chose to include WPS in our schools application. Presumably, your friends didn't.

But as your friends clearly feel so strongly about this, I think for all concerned, it might make for a more credible telling if they post their own thoughts and feelings themselves, because you posting their thoughts, and your retelling of their paraphrasing, of what an unidentified person (was it WPS staff? any names possibly?) said to them, makes this account all rather tenuous. On saying this however, I have absolutely no doubt that these friends of yours are people with some very real views of their own, and I would welcome their input into this discussion, should they wish to join in.

Likewise, you also raise much that we can discuss here, and I think we should try to address the issues you raise. But, at the risk of repeating myself, relevant & interesting as they are in themselves, they are still separate concerns from the issue at hand, and from the subject of my last post, this being nlondondad's claim about WPS being a "third empty"

I cannot emphasise enough how important it is to me, as a parent choosing school places for this September, that the information we receive here, and on similar threads is accurate & where possible, fact rather than fiction.
Because of the serious implications of this "third empty" claim, combined with the fact its accuracy has been called into question, it is no small matter that we should attempt to determine its accuracy. I am certain your friends would feel exactly the same way.

Finally, I see no evidence of anybody accusing you of "causing distraction" so there is no need to feel any affront. Nor, I imagine, would anyone think you are "causing distraction", in the wake of your recent double posting filled with a variety of concerns, again, at the risk of repetition, I feel these concerns should be addressed in due course.

What was actually said though, was this:

"So, before we get too distracted, we should make efforts to verify whether this claim of being "a third empty" is correct, or not."

& on that point.

Would @nlondondad like to maintain his claim that WPS is "a school which this year was a third empty"?

Certainly, having now looked at the figures, across a range of sources, this claim seems to be increasingly untenable, as there appear to be a general consensus, and wide recognition that the planned intake for the current 2014/15 academic year was, 56 places.

This figure of 56 has been given several times on this thread, both by parents with children at the school and even by nlondondad himself (on 21.04.14).
It was in the school's own literature and is the admissions figure given in articles about WPS in the local press.

There was no information relating to WPS in the [[http://www.islington.gov.uk/publicrecords/library/Education-and-skills/Information/Leaflets/2013-2014/(2013-08-28)-Primary-School-Admissions-Brochure.pdf 2013/14 Islington Primary School Admissions
Brochure]], which is the edition relevant to the current intake of pupils.
WPS is first mentioned in the [[http://www.islington.gov.uk/publicrecords/library/Children-and-families-services/Information/Advice-and-information/2014-2015/(2014-09-02)-Primary-School-Admissions-Brochure-(1).pdf
most recent edition]] relevant only to the forthcoming future intake next September.

This 56 places figure is even used by the anti-WPS blogger that nlondondad has been minded to post several links to, here on this thread.

• So, if this figure of 56 places for this year is correct, and it does seem to be.

• And, if the Freedom of information request, submitted by the same anti-WPS blogger, tells us that the pupils on roll at the start of the year was 42.

• it is not really clear then how a claim such as, WPS being "a third empty", can stand.

But, for the purposes of clarity and balance it would be very useful to hear nlondondad's position.

Isn't the problem that it feels like there is a lack of info/openness from the school on basic questions? That's what I find worrying about it.

@Fox

It seems that at a recent public meeting in Islington about the plans to build housing on the southside of the Ashmount site the Council representative stressed that, because Islington does not get to build its council housing until AFTER the new building for Whitehall Park School is put up they are keen for this to go ahead as soon as possible. They then said that they understood from Whitehall Park School that the planning application for the new school was not going to be put in, now until June. And as its a major planning application it takes 12 weeks to go through all the hoops. So they wont get planning until September. Yet WPS are still saying that they expect to move into the new building in January 2016.

I know Fox you said they were going to use some really fast method to build it but is it really credible that they can demolish the current building and build a new one in four months, and when one of those months is December?

@PythagorousPlannedIt

Are you referring to the Hillrise Ward Partnership meeting at Caxton House last Wednesday week? (25.02.15)

It is unclear from your post if you were actually present at the meeting, or relaying this information from some secondary source. But no matter, in your post you say:

"They [LBI] then said that they understood from Whitehall Park School that the planning application for the new school was not going to be put in, now until June"

Effectively, are you saying that a representative of Islington Council announced at a public meeting that WPS has told LBI that they will not even be submitting their planning application until June? Is this correct?

If so, are you able to say which "Council representative" is supposed to have said this?

Because according to WPS, they are putting in their application in the next week or so ("mid-March") and the actual decision will be made at the June Planning Committee meeting.

It was Councillor James Murray
" Executive Member for Housing & Development"

There is also a report from the meeting on the Whitehall Park Residents Association website.

The relevant sentence is:

"Building cannot start until the new school is built so it’s likely to be late 2017 before anything happens."

Which is, of course rather different from the "new school to be ready January 2016" line still being put forward by Whitehall Park School...

www.whpara.org.uk/ashmount-site.html

@nlondondad

You're back! Hello again. I wondered if you had any response to Foxmonaught's post of the 17th Feb that is trying to ascertain whether you knowingly lied about the number of children at WPS? Until we can establish the truth of this matter it does somewhat call into question the veracity of everything you have ever posted about the school.

@The NewBrown

On the 2nd of September you posted that Whitehall Park School had 50 children.

It seems that either this was incorrect or that a fifth of the children in the school have now left to go elsewhere. Which is it?

And while we are at it, do you really have to be so insulting in how you post?

@pythagoros

I just checked back and what I actually said was in response to a question as to whether the school had anywhere near its 56 capacity to which I responded "The last I heard it was around 50". As far as i recall that seemed to be the figure on the parental grapevine back then before the school had opened and I answered honestly according to the knowledge I had at the time. Slightly different from NLondonDad's situation of knowing the exact figures but reporting them incorrectly.

Please accept my sincerest apologies if I have ever offended you or anyone else on Mumsnet. This has never been my intention. I think my problem is probably that I am fundamentally a deeply unpleasant person and I struggle sometimes to mask this adequately when I post on the bastion of polite conversation that is Mumsnet.

@TheNewBrown

I would be very sorry if you modified your tone, as the way you post speaks such volumes.....

Your latest also clarifies that the reason why there is confusion about the number of pupils at Whitehall Park School is the barrage, or smokescreen of misinformation put up by both WPS and pro WPS posters on this thread.

It is perfectly obvious that the only reason for creating this confusion is to conceal something to the discredit of WPS, which in the context is most likely serious under enrolment.

A clue is given by the job ad newly placed on the website for an additional teacher for next year. Only one. (NQT preferred) if they expected to be anywhere fully enrolled next year they would have to recruit two.

Could it be they are about to drop to a pan of 30 part way through the process as the WPs sister school in Richmond "Deer Park School" has just done? (Waited to see how many applications they had, then halved their PAN)

That lack of transparency combined with the way in which people including prospective parents are treated when they ask perfectly reasonable questions about WPS on this thread is giving many people pause. I know because they PM me. And, Fox taking up your point made to pythag they are unwilling to post on this thread because they see the reception people get who ask questions in public. Sarcasm. Innuendo. But no useful information.

So they PM me and I tell them what I know, which, is so often little enough.

@nlondondad

I love how, with no trace of irony, you accuse WPS and its supporters of spreading misinformation in a post in which you both

A) fail to offer any defence against accusations that you have been caught deliberately misrepresenting the number of children at the school

B) put forward another of your wild conspiracy theories about the school, thus attempting to create further confusion and uncertainty.

At some point you are just going to have to accept that WPS is proving to be a popular and successful school and that neither current or prospective parents are paying any attention to your increasingly desperate (and seemingly dishonest) attempts to discredit the school.

The PAN for September remains 60 and the school is recruiting 2 teachers and 2 TA's.

This year no kids have left the school from the original intake in September and around 10 more have joined.

However much the naysayers don't want these to be the facts, i'm afraid they are. The school is doing just fine, thank you very much.

Strange how on numbers, Whitehall Park parents, as the relevant posters claim to be, are always vague. Even though they merely have to look around the classroom. "About ten children have joined" .... and of course no accurate report as to what this total amounts to.

My comment about the number of teachers being recruited was based on the notice on the WPS website when I posted.

But at least we have it confirmed that the PAN is sixty. Progress of a kind.

But still no application for planning permission for a building to teach them in.

A school with empty places cannot be called a "popular" school.

An interesting article in the Architects Journal about building standards in new schools...

Poll: Architects say new schools fail to make the grade

www.architectsjournal.co.uk/news/poll-architects-say-new-schools-fail-to-make-the-grade/8680837.article

Has anyone heard anything about the application for planning permission for Whitehall Park School?

Still no news about the planning application. Its getting tight if they are to make the June planning meeting.

Maybe they are waiting to see who wins the election.