Former North Cestrian Grammar School - Talk about scum with money!
As an old student, it is interesting to see the recent architectural improvements made to the school since I was a student here, however, I hope the main improvements made since becoming a free school will be the school’s culture and Hamlin Trust (Hamlin Centre and Learning Support Unit).
Many of the secondary schools in Altrincham are public and therefore exclusive, North Cestrian Grammar School was advertised to my family as being a small and nurturing environment which offered the safety of a Learning Support Unit, which with my Statement as a person with an invisible disability, would mean I could have a safety net to ensure a good school experience and decent education.
The reality turned out to be, NCGS was an elitist, backwards institution, where a strong culture of bullying and disability discrimination were practised daily, in both the classroom (by students) and playground by the majority of students in this small place, where the teachers never efficiently acknowledging or dealing with this problem.
At the time, many of the school governors seemed to be the parents of the school’s worst behaved and most vicious, spoilt, bullying students; with Ofsted kept away until becoming a free school, this environment was the normal for many, many years.
Also, many of the teaching assistants in the Hamlin were young and un-qualified to help students with special needs in the way that they needed, as in help in coping and managing their environments. (this only changed and improved as the school got closer to becoming a free school).
In my second year, I was bullied by my peers due to my disability. I began to increasingly become anxious, feeling unsafe outside of the controlled environments of the classroom, I would spend my breaks and lunchtimes hiding in the toilets until the next lesson or end of lunch. As a student with a SN statement, I asked the T.A’s if I could eat lunch in the Hamlin centre like the other SN students did, but I was turned away with ‘That’s not your privilege, so you shouldn’t even be asking’. They might as well have told 12-year-old me to f* off. Even with my parent’s intervention, the head of learning support and the T. A’s continued to refuse my access to learning support, whilst lying to my parents, pretending that I hadn't asked.
It was only after spending many months in the toilets, going without lunch daily, that when I became friends with a student who ate in the Hamlin, I was granted access (only so this student would be obedient).
I spent the majority of my time at NCGS being ostracized, ignored by teachers, physically assaulted, and bullied because of my disability.
The people who sent their kids to ncgs were scumbags with money, not all the money in the world could make their worthless, disgusting waste of life offspring decent, given phones and access to the internet at too young an age, and oh I forgot to mention, they loved to cyberbully as well!
After the T.A’s granted access to a student that actually bullied and intimidated me within the Hamlin Centre and under the teaching assistants’ noses, I had enough, and left the school in year 11 and had to take my exams at home, teaching myself at home for the year.
Luckily for me, my statement was actually used at college, I experienced a nurturing and safe environment where those with special needs would never be discriminated against, and I loved college, and thanks to college, I now go to University, studying a subject I’m passionate about.
I am writing this review so parents with disabled or autistic children looking for a good school to send their children to will know, that despite NCS having the reputation of a former ‘private grammar school’ in the suburbs, this was a guise, which allowed an outdated culture of elitism and supremacy to exist, which greatly impacted the experience and confidence of students with special needs.
I think the Hamlin centre suffered from incompetent management, which can easily be fixed; the concept is a good one if done right, and other schools should have learning support units.