New Secondaries for Richmond Borough?

[BayJay]

Richmond Council recently published a White Paper outlining plans for Secondary education in the borough (cabnet.richmond.gov.uk/mgConvert2PDF.aspx?ID=23719). They want new 6th forms in every school, and would need to decrease current Yr7 intakes to accomodate that. To offset those decreases they are talking about creating two new secondary schools. One of those new schools would be a Roman Catholic school.

The Roman Catholic community in the borough are currently disadvantaged by the "link" system (www.st-marys.richmond.sch.uk/Newsletter%20Link%20letter%20for%202011%20links%20(2).pdf). Because the Catholic primaries are not linked to any secondaries in the borough, their children tend to go to a combination of out-of-borough Catholic secondaries (which are mostly rated as Outstanding), grammar schools and private schools, though some of the girls do go to Waldegrave, which is not part of the link system. Note that there is no reason, in principle, why the Catholic Secondaries couldn't be linked to local community schools, but because many of their children have other options, they simply don't meet the "25% rule" required to form a link. (See an example set of transfer figures at www.st-james.richmond.sch.uk/Admin/Uploads/Docs/StJamesSchool_Parents_NewsLetter_270910.pdf).

This raises several questions in my mind:

1. Does the problem necessarily need to be solved by providing a Catholic Secondary, or are there alternative solutions that would benefit the community as a whole (e.g. reforming the link system)?
2. Does the majority of the Catholic community specifically want to be educated separately from the rest of us, or is it the case that, like everyone else, they simply want an outstanding education for their children, and find that the Catholic route is often the best way of achieving that?
3. If Catholics had more options for transferring to outstanding community schools locally (as many already do, to Waldegrave), would they choose those options over travelling to a single-faith school in a neighbouring borough?
4. I accept that there will always be very religious people who want to segregate themselves, but would I be right in asserting that there are also large numbers of Catholics who would be happy to attend community schools, provided that gave them the same level of academic excellence that can be found in many Catholic options?
5. If a new Catholic secondary school is created, it is likely to have an entrance policy that requires a priest's reference (as per the majority of existing Catholic schools). How do people feel about that?
6. If a state-funded Catholic School is created in the borough, would non-Catholic parents also like the option of sending their children there, provided they weren't barred by the admission system?

I'd be interested to hear your opinions!

According to paragraph 4 of the latest Admissions Forum minutes the impact of removing the link system is to be considered at the next meeting (June 15th).

Note also that those minutes say "there had been no responses to the [last admissions] consultation, probably because no changes had been proposed to the admission arrangements." Did anyone know there was a consultation about admissions in December/January? Details were published on the Council website, but I didn't see it publicised anywhere else. Are people generally aware that the policy is opened up for consultation every year? Do you think this should be publicised more widely? Even if the system doesn't change, the cohort of parents does, so perhaps more publicity is needed?

Oops, re-reading those minutes more carefully, I realised the review was going to take place at the September meeting not the June one.

Just to let you all know I'm having a meeting with my local councillor to discuss his views on new secondary/catholic secondary.

Did you know there is talk of a Free school too? 4-18 yrs. I'd think it won't help increase state places though, just mop up some who would go further away to private.

Just an update on the Richmond Free School. They have submitted their application to the DfE and are wanting to build their school on the Twickenham Sorting Office site opposite the station.

The council has just announced it has a site for the new Catholic school, in central Twickenham. See here for details.

Honestly I dont know if the Coalitions plans for schools make sense or not. They will certainly make a difference. GetKenny Logans wife on the job.

There are lots of interesting comments being posted about the Clifden Rd school site story on the RTT website. Apparently all that is being proposed so far is that the site should be bought for a school. The type of school is yet to be decided. Let's hope there is a full consultation on that.

Speaking of consultations... Anyone know when we can expect to hear the results of the sixth-form consultation that was done earlier this year?

Please sign this petition to the Council if you live in Richmond Borough & agree with it:

'We, the undersigned, petition the council to ensure that every state-funded school opening in the borough from now on is inclusive, so that no child can be denied a place in a good local school because of the religion or belief of their parents.'

It needs 1000 signatures to trigger a mini-debate at a council meeting this autumn, which will bring the issue to the attention of parents across the borough whose children will be affected by what is decided.

This is not about the merits or not of religious education: it is about what to do with this site, in a borough that needs to open two new community schools open to all by 2015 to keep up with rising numbers. No other sites for new schools have been found, or even suggested.

The petition has almost 600 signatures already. It is at:
www.richmond.gov.uk/home/council_government_and_democracy/petitions/online_petitions/epetitions.htm

There are lots of interesting comments on last week's Richmond and Twickenham Times article about the Richmond Inclusive Schools Campaign. It looks like the comments of one contributor (against the campaign) early in the thread were deleted by the moderator as they were pretty offensive, so if it reads a little strangely that is the reason.

The ePetition now has 940 signatures & so needs just 60 more by September 3 to make it onto the agenda for the September 13 meeting of full Council: if you know anyone who hasn't signed yet but is sympathetic to the cause please nag them to sign pronto!

Thanks for bringing this petition to my notice. Have just signed and that brought signatures to 1067. More than enough to trigger the Council mini debate I hope.

The 'Inclusive Schools' petition opposing this plan will be submitted to Council on the 13th and briefly debated.

The latest news on the Catholic School debate is that the Richmond Inclusive Schools Campaign are inviting people down to York House from 5.30pm on Tuesday 13th Sept, to show their support ahead of the Council debate that will start at 7pm. It sounds like a child-friendly event with balloons and t-shirts and the like. I expect more details will be posted on their Facebook page or website over the coming days for anyone thinking of going along.

For anyone from LBRUT interested in this thread, note that there is also a parallel thread in Mumsnet Local that has been more active recently, so follow this link if you want to find it.

For info: the debate that has been triggered by the Richmond Inclusive School Campaign's petition is going to be broadcast live on the web tonight. Presumably there will also be an archive copy after the event.

I went to the protest with Inclusive School campainers just before the meeting on Tuesday and we did have a big turn out and certainly made ourselves heard...also took my two children into the gallery (thankfully they were very well behaved) and from what I could tell most of the people in the gallery were pro-inclusive and not many pro-catholic school which was interesting.

The gallery was effectively closed to the public from about 6pm because a number of families with children in Catholic primary school uniform arrived from 5pm onwards and filled it up. There were approximately 20 children in the gallery during the debate. They were mostly well behaved, though some of the younger ones were asleep and some of the older ones were playing on their game consoles. There was also a Catholic priest. The number of Inclusive School supporters that were able to get places in the gallery was in single figures, and they were all adults. However there were large numbers of families with children outside.

Azalia67, it sounds like you are talking about a different public gallery (perhaps the one where they were showing the live webcast).

As mentioned in my last post but one, there is another thread on this subject that has been more active lately, so check it out.

Hi
As a catholic parent I would support an inclusive school campaign if it were truly inclusive. This would me (for me anyway):

1. No discrimination on gender. Waldegrave Girls school made co-ed
2. No link system
3. Abolish current distance rules which create 'rich ghettos' whereby parents rent properties close to the school or buy. Maybe have a lottery system (like Brighton?) within a pre-defined radius?

Just my thoughts.

So dindongbell, I'm not quite sure that I quite get the point you are making. From what I have gathered, the Richmond Inclusive Schools campaign hasn't set the admission policies of existing schools within its target.

I'm very bemused by your "rich ghettos" statement. Have you looked around the Borough of Richmond lately? It's pretty uniformly affluent! Sure there is social housing; but it's fairly evenly dispersed. All a lottery could achieve would be to increase traffic, destroy community links and create uncertainty. Which would probably result in those wealthy Richmonders moving to the shires or going private. (This is what happened in the past, incidentally. The fact this isn't happening so much now is probably why Richmond secondaries are finally catching up with the quality of the primaries.)

Am I to take it that you actually only support catholic schools because they discriminate and are even more exclusively middle-class? At least that's honest, I suppose.

The reason people are so upset about the proposed Catholic secondary is because everyone knows that funds and sites are limited. The community (and CofE) primary schools all have bulge classes and are bursting at the seams. This is a challenge that isn't being shared by the RC primary schools. It doesn't take a great deal of imagination to realise that there could be a massive shortage of community secondary places in a few years' time. I'm quite sure you would prefer your daughter only has (say) 1.5 miles to travel to Clifden Road rather than 2.5 miles to Gumley House, but do you really think this "need" for convenience outweighs the need of all the non-Catholics to not be stuffed into portacabins like sardines?

LittleMrsMuppet sorry if I haven't made myself clear on where I stand. I thought I had stated what I think 'inclusive' means. At no point in my post did I indicate that I 'only support catholic schools because they discriminate and are even more exclusively middle-class'. I don't think that at all and it's quite presumtious on your part. My child's school has children from all walks or life and there are non-catholics who attend.

If Richmond Council give the go-ahead for a Catholic Secondary of course I would want my children to attend. If it doesn't happen so be it, that's life. I can see both sides of the argument.

I know that you didn't say that - it was mischief and conjecture on my part. It was in response to your rather strange argument for not backing the Richmond Inclusive Schools campaign. As in, it's all unfair anyway, so why should it matter if admissions criteria based of parental religious belief are fair or not.

Unless I have misunderstood your position. Are you backing the campaign but you just want it to go further than already stated? (Although Jeremy Rodell already mentioned that the link system unfairly discriminates in his speech to the council.)

LittleMrsMuppet - I am backing the Catholic school campaign because I would be a hypocrite not too! Like I said if Richmond Council wants to build a Catholic Secondary I don't personally have a problem (but yes I can understand why others do). I just think if Richmond Council do decide to make all new schools inclusive they have to go the whole hog and remove links, make single-sex schools co-ed etc. Who knows they might convert me then (no pun intended!).

Does the inclusive campaign go far enough for you? Would you want Waldegrave to be co-ed for example? I am genuinely interested in people opinions because we all have been let down by the neglect of Richmond Council with regards to Secondary provision.