Proposed Michaela Community School in Tooting

[gazzalw]

Does anyone have any further information on this? Was handed a flier about this with details of two parents' info evenings coming up very soon.....

It seems to offer a good option for a small secondary school - those in charge seem to have very good credentials but would be useful to know more.....

It seems as if it is proposing to be open for September 2012 so how come it wasn't flagged up an an option for current Year 6s?

The police presence thing is surprising, I agree, and they seem to be standard outside all secondaries - I've seen them on various occasions at Dunraven, Charter, St Francis Xavier and Wilson's.

I think they're community support officers rather than full police officers, but agree it's a depressing sign of the times.

What did the Michaela school have to say about sport? I can't see how they will be able to cater for sport if they set up at Trident.

Yes, this year there was movement at Graveney on the waiting list but it was all within the original distance accepted. I know because I rang frequently up to beginning of September to find out if it had stretched as far as us (we needed 39 metres more). Ds1 got in on the test but we were desperate to be within the distance so his siblings would be in. Unfortunately I am now about to start the whole process again with ds2!

Madgirl, hello from the old days of nursery and indeed on here (we identified each other at a nursery farm outing!). I'm here again because of the school because ironically we have just set up an office at Trident. Fabulous timing! Surely you will be fine on distance for Graveney? It seems to stretch a few metres every year. Good luck anyway.

Oh, Madgirl, I am not in the least bit offended - it's the way things are - people need / want the school that is right for THEM - some people rave about CG (the people I know there have arts-orientated kids), some don't like it at all and are hoping for it not to be the default fallback. We're in catchment (barring some freak circumstance) for a school which is wildly over-subscribed, and with a Head who really impressed me, and yet one family in the road have put every other school in the vicinity down except that one. Including a top choice of a school I wouldnt be especially happy with. It's not a thing anyone should take personally, people make thier own choices for them, and it isn't a value judgemnent on anyone else's decisions.

oh, and I agree about police presence - I think many schools work closely with the community police as a preventative, 'police making relationships with young people' sort of way. I don't think it necessarily signals a dreadful problem within the school.

irisjohnson hello! we would have been in last year and the one before but all it takes is a few more siblings and nappy valley families renting a maisonette on welham road for the distance to stretch out another 100 metres!

The siblings of renters cause a sort of spiralling 'compound interest' effect, because each flat that is rented for a year produces a new applicant and subsequent siblings...

At least Graveney are stopping siblings of out of catchment selective places, I think? Will that take the pressure off?

Blu you're right it has enlarged the catchment by about 150 metres (!) however the recession has meant a lot of people renting/buying on top of the school to get their first child in. siblings of children who were admitted on distance get in, regardless of where first child lives when siblings apply.

It's mad. People who live 700m away will be renting to be within 200m, next!
And every time the school publishes the last catchement reach, the renters will rent even closer...

Hello Blu! Personally I don't see why there is any reason to have a sibling policy for secondary schools in London! It just makes all this renting mularky and 'cheating' commonplace.....

I'm guessing there are one or Two Tooting-ites on this thread - hello to you, and good luck!

My guess is that the new school tied to Nappy Valley schools is going to reduce the renting-in-Graveney catchment quite substantially.

On the up-side, we moved here from ... another part of London, where EB would be considered a heaven-sent school. so it is relative. I'm constantly astounded how few schools here have a serious police presence, with a lot of police vans at lunch and home time.

Oops have to go.

Sorry: immobile hamster emergency situation there.

at hamster. I hope hamster calm is restored.

I agree re a no siblings policy in London. It makes no sense. Unless your only two children are twins parents will always have at least a year when they are at different schools anyway - when the older one goes to secondary. And so many other variables - selective / single sex etc. However, it's easy for me to say, I have one child and I can well imagine parents wanting to be spared the secondary transfer for a second time!

animula - what is the newnappy-valley school? I have known of people renting from Clapham, Brixton and Streatham. Though why go to all that expense fom Steatham rather than go to D, I don't know! As well as G being a good school, I think there is an additional 'competition factor'. The minute something becomes hard to get, there will be some parents who go for that option out of sheer competition, or determination to get something that not all parents can get. Not all, obviously - many many good reasons to put a selective or over-subscribed option first.

Hamster calm restored.

The new school is the Bolinbroke one, with entry tied to attendance at Honeywell, Belleville, Wix and somewhere else.

Siblings - well, I tend to think of it as a way of preventing parents becoming seriously unhinged and actually marching on Parliament with pitchforks, garlic crushers, NVR/VR study books and whatever other implements they have to hand.

Let's face it - it's stressful enough once. Imagine having four children. That said, ds is at a school without a sibling policy, so I'm starting on the whole process again with my youngest. Great. Sooo regret not having gone for one of the BOGOFF (get one in, get them all in) schools.

Good to see the discussion that's going on here. So here's an INVITATION for
* TODAY 8th Feb *
Tooting Leisure Centre, Greaves Place, SW17 18.00 - 20.00
Michaela Community School - Meeting for prospective parents.
Come and meet the team and get all your questions answered.
Hope to see you there
www.proposedmcstooting.co.uk

Irisjohnson, apparently they are currently investigating off-site sports options and it could be Tooting Bec/Crystal Palace/Tooting Leisure Centre - all off-site but with a playground big enough for a footie kick-around at lunchtime.

They will know before 1st March deadline if they will go straight into the Trident Centre or have to go to a temporary site before-hand.

I shamefacedly have to say that we were impressed by the presentation and Ms Birbalsingh was very much talking about the school rather than her experiences elsewhere - very succinct and to the point. It had a high end feel about the whole thing and would be an attractive option if none of our top 5 are given to DS come 1st March.

Thanks to everyone who came to our Parent Information Meeting yesterday.
We had a packed house with standing room only.

I hope everyone had a chance to speak to the team and get their questions answered but if not please do email
[email protected]
and we'll answer you directly.

Did you have a packed house proposed? I heard a very different tale, but I'm sure you're right.

It was packed on Wednesday but not a huge room - probably about 50 people there possibly 75???

Does anyone have any news on the Michaela School? I note they are holding a third parents information meeting on 8th March- I wonder if that means that they are struggling to attract admissions? There's been nothing in the local paper or online....

I don't really think many people know about it to be quite honest but think they will drum up a lot more support come March once people know their other school option!

No, there has been very little information really...mind you I noticed that they are only just starting building work for the Bolingbroke Academy and that's supposed to be opening in September 2012 too.....

Even with the prospect of Bolingbroke, there was a woeful shortage of secondary places in Wandsworth. There are certainly enough children in the area to fill both, and the reduction in children having to go out of borough will surely be welcomed.

Blu: there's something in your first post I don't understand. The school that she criticised - St Michael and All Angels - closed. It can't have had any results; good, bad or anything in 2011.

I had thought that she said that the 'fictional' events in her book were based on real events in the real schools she had taught in - which I thought included Dunraven in Streatham.

The article from the person with a different view of some of the pupils she worked with is here

However I see that she has said that her experiences in the last school she was at were a contrast to that in other schools. Other state schools....that she would presumably be admiting of, then.

But I find it unethical to write about young people in the way she does, from her position, and when it is in pursuit of self-iinterest as a novelist / careerist.

I rather agree, Blu. I'd never trust her or her school because I don't want my DC in one of her blogs/novels/presentations/other self-promoting vehicles. To do that is unethical, vain and just rude, frankly.

But I do have some sympathy with her arguments about limitations imposed on poor children because of how some teachers perceive them. Perhaps she's right in some respects, that some problems can only be tackled with a radical overhaul.

I have no idea what became of my post in that middle paragraph! the sentence decends into nonsense.

I do think some of the comments about Ms Birbalsinghe are somewhat harsh.

I never saw her original (anonymous) blog but my understanding was that the children referred to were suitably anonymised and the examples in her book were not necessarily literal accounts but composites. I'd accept though that it was perhaps sailing close to the wind to show pictures of some of her pupils at the Tory Party conference, though she did claim that she had only done so with permission.

There have been a number of anonymous blogs by teachers, policemen, social workers etc etc giving an account of what life in life at the "coal face". Such people put themselves at some risk if they are outed but I think they provide a useful corrective to what we read in the mainstream media.

She expressed the view that our secondary education system is broken and went into some detail about why. As a result of this she was forced out of her job, dropped like a ton of hot bricks by her union (who are supposed to fight their members' case and would have surely taken her up as a cause celebre had she made a rabble rousing left wing speech at a a Labour or NUT Conference) and informed by recruitment agencies that no state school would ever touch her again with a bargepole.

Rather than just roll over and accept the destruction of her career she decided to step up to the plate and accept the challenge of setting up her own school.

She may have an ego and flair for publicity, but that isn't exactly unusual in a head teacher, and can be turned to advantage. I wish her luck.

I think quite a bit of the hostility towards her is from vested interests in the educational establishment. As John Prescott so memorably put it, "If you let people set up schools and they turn out to be good schools the problem is that everyone will want to go to them." Quelle horreur!

Incidentally I have no connection with her or the people setting up her school, nor do I have any personal interest since my own children are getting to the end of their secondary school careers.

I remember the stress of secondary admission and am glad I won't have to go through it again - also sympathise with those who are going through it right now.