Michaela Results

[RueDeWakening]

The Michaela free school has got its first set of GCSE results - I know the school's approach gets mixed views, but the results are amazing.

#MichaelaResults on Twitter is just lovely, I'm really pleased for them. Which is ridiculous really, we live nowhere near the school and have no connection to it :o

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/08/22/britains-strictest-schools-first-gcse-results-four-times-better/?WT.mc_id=tmg_share_tw

18% of results at grade 9 (vs 4.5% nationally)
54% grades 7-9 in all exams
85% grades 4-9 in English and Maths

Yes, they 'recited' poetry on a train platform (She has an interesting taste in poetry, KB, all Kipling and Invictus) and it was posted on Twitter. There was a nasty spat about it, people fell out and got blocked.

They also do this at school in a call and response fashion. It's very loud and loses the beauty of the poetry so I cannot be convinced it is about the beauty of the poetry.

A bigwig at United Learning said no excuses type schools were like workhouses www.tes.com/news/exclusive-no-excuses-schools-workhouses so he might clash with the Magna head!

From what I know of United Learning they have some pretty strict behaviour policies so it would be interesting to know where the workhouse line is.

Has anyone anlysed Magnas results? They certainly dont seem in the Michaela teritory.

Magna got progress 8 of 1.15 last year so even though their headline figures don’t seen brilliant, they’re doing pretty well with their intake.

That video had been deleted by the time I saw the spat. I’ve seen plenty of others though.

Perhaps if they had a drama teacher...

The poetry thing is interesting. I was reading about fun and how it is a group activity. Fun is increased when you are in a group doing a synchronised activity - I imagine group shouting of poetry would fit that bill - giving a sense of pleasure and belonging.

I guess schools used to do it through hymn singing.

I don’t think it’s even about the fun. It’s about ‘learning poetry by heart’ and everyone’s supposed to fall over themselves in amazement that michaela are getting kids to learn poetry. It doesn’t matter that it sounds awful or that other people might not want to hear poetry being shouted badly by a large group of teens on a tube station platform.

noble that definition of fun was certainly one embraced by the Hitler Youth....

Really, watch The Wave...much group chanting and marching.

Think the army also do chanting and marching, Piggy!

I suppose it serves more than one purpose - unity and pride, learning poetry AND it gives the teachers a way of controlling the kids during downtime when they might potentially get a bit antsy. Like when you’re waiting for that last class to turn up for assembly, it’s got to beat stern looks, shushing and dragging miscreants out of their seats.

It’s sort of the idea behind Sunday Assembly isn’t it. So I don’t think that sort of ‘fun’ definition is always weird and cult like.

In michaela’s case it combines with everything else though. Or perhaps it’s how you do it.

Hymn singing wasn't usually randomly done on a station platform though and the army do it on drill exercises, not for fun. Plus, I'm a pacifist so don't want army stuff in schools, myself! We also didn't shout hymns in my day but, yes, I am sure it is done because it is fun...

Reminds me a little of the sheep in Animal Farm, sorry: just don't like it.

Ah I don’t mean that it’s done because it’s fun in a frivolous way. I mean that the feeling of fun contributes positive feelings towards the group identity.

Like football chants (and I’m pretty sure I’ve seen that done on a train station platform!).

KB is very much about creating a group identity within the school to counter gang culture. ‘We’re Michaela’. I’ve also heard that she tells the kids that people don’t like the school and want it to do badly (which is fair) - an us against the world thing.

That ‘us against the world’ thing comes across when the kids are interviewed. There’s often a point where that ‘unlike in other schools’ rhetoric starts coming out of the kids mouths. It’s a bit creepy and cult like.

It's funny though how football chants are viewed as yobbish, but I take your point. The platform thing was orchestrated by a teacher, not the pupils and I feel it is more than a bit strange as if they want the public to notice them. I have not heard of another school doing this but I guess Eton and co do it en route to rugger matches, perhaps.

But probably not substandard Victorian poetry!

Hey ho. If the kids are proud that's great. But they will probably end up as adults posting ill informed crap on MN about the poor standards in British schools!

I’d imagine they go more for songs and not necessarily the official versions of the school songs.

There is an argument that Harvard pep rallies were the inspiration behind Nazi rallies, after Albert Speer was on an exchange there. Yelling stuff as a group - almost regardless of what - is something I find very uncomfortable. I don’t think it’s the kind of school I’d want to work in or snd my children too.

Their Progress 8 score is officially 1.54, putting them 5th in the country.

Wonder who the higher 4 are!

One of them is Wembley Technology College!
https://www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/schools-by-type?step=default&table=schools&region=all-england&for=secondary

I just googled and Wembley Technology College is a 15 minute drive from Michaela. Something in the water?!

Parental influence and attitude to education is greatest indicator of academic success. Far more important than school.
If one imagines the parents who choose Michaela they are not going to be those who dislike rules or think it’s OK to flout uniform rules. It’s not the parents who give duvet days for tiredness nor those who say grades don’t matter.
The children’s attitudes to learning and behavioural norms are set well ahead of secondary school.

I'd heard about this school and had a look at their website recently. I love the idea of family lunch, with children setting the table and serving others.

I think the sniping at Michaela is unreasonable. It looks like an excellent school, and I love the fact that the staff put in so much energy to try this approach which is so different to other schools. I was glad to see it had paid off with their results.

I don’t have a problem with the no-talking in corridors, poetry learning and smart uniform. If I lived locally I would want my kids to go there. The head has been a bit negative about white middle class families on Twitter, but frankly that wouldn’t put me off.