Michaela school - experiences?

[teathyme]

This is purely out of curiosity as I live nowhere near it. I saw an interview with the HT and whilst I didn't agree with everything she said the results are very impressive. I know sometimes on paper things are very different to on the ground so just wondered if anyone had experience of it and what they thought?

every single child who'd started in Y7 with middle and high SATS results got 5s in maths and English

I know that her results are good.
But your statement literally says that all the middle to high SATS kids passed GCSE.
I would be pretty shocked at a school where the middle to high SATS kids did NOT pass GCSE.
Much more interesting is what happens to the kids who scored low in SATS?

I think she has raised a lot of interesting issues. She herself came from a disadvantaged backgroud and some of her ethos is a kick back against the parenting that doesn't allow a kid to succeed.

But I really seriously cannot get past her SEN views. They make me so angry.
So a kid, who in another context would benefit from the quiet focussed atmosphere, would get kicked out of her school for not being able to sit perfetcly still looking at the teacher.
Horrific.

I've never liked the sound of the Michaela schools. I doubt I would ever have sent any of my DDs there.

No provision at all for any form of special needs because apparently they don't need it. Two of my DDs (and maybe even all three of them) would probably not have coped. One had severe mental health issues and an eating disorder in her teenage years, although was and still is very academic. I doubt much pastoral care would have been provided. Another was just not academic and although well behaved was simply not suited to school life - she was relieved to leave.

@Zib Doh, what a fool I am. Of course. Michaela’s ethos is not for me but I do appreciate that people should have the right to choose.

She came from a disadvantaged background

Eh?

Her father lectured at Warwick University and her mother was a nurse.

By your exacting standards I must have been brought up in a cardboard box at the side of a motorway!

When I heard her being interviewed she stressed her crappy school and difficult background and how none of the teachers encouraged them to aspire to anything as they didn't expect them to achieve anything 😮

I am a bit shocked that she is the daughter of a university lecturer!

Just because she was the daughter of a lecturer doesn't mean she didn't go to a shit school. I think she's great and speaks loads of sense. I'd send my children to Michaela

Such a crappy shit school she got a place at Oxford. Both her father and her grandfather were educators, her mother was an educated woman, I am pretty sure they would have made sure she went to decent schools.

The school is very ethnically diverse. But non white British pupils far outweigh white British. The cohort isn't representative so it's hard to compare to other schools in other areas.

It's works well because the pupils that attend there generally come from different cultures who think education is above all and also believe in strict punishment and control of children.

But Education needs to be about raising the whole child.

The documentary has a pupil talking about the day they forgot their rubber and got punished. She discusses about it taught her personal responsibility etc.

I was watching it thinking "poor girl." She's flogging herself for being human and making a mistake. When she's an adult and forgets house keys, wallet, phone or anything most of us forget at times how she's going to cope? What MH difficulties are we setting her up for when she realises in the real world it's fine to be under perfect. I also worry about them being able to understand boundaries. They are completely and utterly enthralled to the point of over acceptance to authority. Will they be taken advantage of on the employment sector?

For me the bigger issue is the underfunded schools in deprived areas who don't get the funding needed and these children being failed rather than a subset of strict parents who choose Michaela because they believe in uber strict parenting and raise their children that way anyway.

She’s a shameless self promoter who’s been angling for a peerage for years. Shes also an utter bullshitter. Her life story is a carefully curated work of fiction.

That aside, I don’t even think she believes in her own model of education. She just knows what the Tories want to hear.

I wouldn’t entrust my child’s education to her.

I think it is easy to sit on the sidelines and knock the school with ones own kids who are encouraged and helped at home and expect to pass all their GCSEs.

Maybe less easy if kids are in a community where parents are less educated and schools have low expectations and results.

Like it or not, GCSE results matter. You can have all the enrichment you like, and entertaining lessons, but if you don't pass your English & Maths GCSEs your options are far more limited.

My DD would have been happier in school with quiet corridors and well behaved classes. Whether the rest of it would have suited her is less clear.

Suppose there was a traditionalist view that children do better in schools where the classrooms are all painted grey inside. And that most schools didn't do that any more because it makes them dark and dingy, but there was still a common perception that grey classrooms lead to better results.

I set up a new school in a disadvantaged area with lots of schools, and my USP is that the classrooms are grey. My school will attract applications from traditionalist parents who worry about the quality of education in the local schools, care about their own kids' school results, think that's more important than how pleasant the classrooms feel, and believe there's a chance this school could be better. Those kids will have a home ethos that values education and backs up the school. They'll get good results, making the school more attractive to a wide range of parents who care about how well their kids do at school. Soon the school will be filled with the children of parents who value and support their kids' school and education, and who have the inclination and the spare time and energy to put effort into getting their kids into their preferred school, and possibly the existing educational advantage to be able to understand the system, read all the paperwork, and navigate the complexities. The children's results will be good and continue to be good. And the results will be even better if reasons can be found to remove children who might spoil the numbers.

Within a school system which allows parents to influence the school their child goes to, basically any kind of quality that makes a particular school more desirable in some way, or more difficult to get a place at for some reason, is likely to skew the intake towards children who are more likely to have parental support and do well, which then becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. And that applies even if all the children are from disadvantaged backgrounds, because within that group there are plenty of parents who will do what it takes to get their kids a good education. Excellent Catholic schools in places where the standard schools aren't great, for example, aren't difficult to get a place at because they're so good; they're so good because they're difficult to get a place at.

I've no idea why Ofsted aren't concerned about how narrow the Michaela curriculum is, when it's such a focus for them. And as an earlier poster says, the behaviour policy (perhaps not accidentally) weeds out lots of children with SEN or any additional behavioural needs, which won't hurt the results.

Interesting replies. I was actually going to post this thread in Black MN because I wanted to see if anyone there had experience. I am second gen SE Asian and KBs 'traditionalist' attitude is closer to my home values (teachers must be highly respected, no back chat to elders etc) and her ideas on racism are very parallel to my DFs - he taught us we should never be ground down by racism ("because racists will always exist") and to "dust yourself off and get on with it".
I also never was aware growing up that BAME students were at a disadvantage, we were not economically well placed but "education is the key" was drummed into us from such a young age and doing well in school was never optional, it was a given.
Now that I'm older and I'm aware of socio-economic/racial barriers within the education system, I do wonder how right she is about "not falling for the victim narrative". These barriers most definitely exist, but I do think for some people they have hung onto this narrative in an attempt to give up before they've even started - I've seen this in my own community. But as a leftist I'm very uncomfortable even admitting that... So I suppose I was wondering what the school does/doesn't do to address these issues?
I had no idea about her thoughts on SEN, that wasn't touched on in the book.
Thanks for the heads up on the documentary, will be watching that.

Results don’t speak for themselves. The results speak for the self selective cohort who apply. The families represented were likely to invest in their children’s education. There are many things I like but they are present in lots of good schools. The lack of choice over social time, corridor time and about how to engage are draconian.

A FSM ratio of 4% when the national average is over 22.

Siri, show me what private education looks like without showing me a private school. I'm not even exaggerating because 4% is a reasonable figure for a private school that offers bursaries for exceptional children.

So it's not really a "disadvantaged" school then?

As @HerculesMulligan posted, the range of subjects offered at GCSE is very limited. In the most recent results only half of the cohort did a creative subject - Art & Design. Although the school teaches Music, no one was entered this year.

Narrowing the curriculum to spend more time on fewer subjects obviously has a positive impact on grades, my concern would have to be about breadth of experience.

The school down the road from Michaela, Ark Academy, have very good results, are strict (not to the level of Michaela). How-comes we don't hear about the headteacher of the school all over the media like we hear about katharine birbalsingh?

Even the school in East London, Brampton Manor I think it's called, that sends loads of kids to Oxbridge. I had to google what the headteacher look like because I never see him doing media rounds. My point is, why is katharine birbalsingh always in the media? Is she trying to be a PM one day or something?

different kids thrive in different schools. Same with workplaces - some need fast-paced, demanding environment. Some need relaxed, calm environment. Some need lots of structure and rules. Others need autonomy and freedom.

i haven’t watched the documentary yet, but I’m E Asian and sounds like the attitudes which were drummed into me as I grew up. I can imagine some kids thrive in this environment. But also it can be terrible for other kids. Not a bad idea to have 1 such school in a town, but not great if it’s the only choice - unwilling people shouldn’t be subjected to it.

katharine birbalsingh didn't come from a disadvantaged background. Her mum was a nurse and her dad was a university professor. I would hardly call that disadvantaged!

I think she's often in the media because she is justifying the school to its detractors. I don't think she has political ambitions, I believe her ambitions all focus on education.

I don't think her dad was a lecturer in much later in life. When they came to UK he was a supply teacher and remained like that for years.

Ark Academy is down the road from her school and gets very good results. It's also strict. Howcomes we don't hear about that school often as much as we hear about Michaela?

Because KN has decided to make education a political matter.

The way she's disparages other educators and headteachers saying most are "lefties" is disgusting.

She only ever talks about discipline, punishment, rules and politics when discussing her school.

We never hear about enrichment, performances, sports achievements for school teams or creative achievements of her pupils.

She does talk about how so many choose to hand their mobile phones into school to keep safe for months at a time so they are distracted by them.

Her pupils aren't disciplined. They are brainwashed.

My ds managed to train 16 hours a week at his sport, manage his mobile use, achieve GCSEs including 8/9's and a T level merit (a level equivalent of BBB). All this without getting a single detention throughout school - and also having a rare degenerative neuromuscular disorder and autism and having some learning difficulties.

He has much more realistic view of the world than a Micheala student who doesn't understand that forgetting a rubber isn't a crime necessitating punishment and who hold themselves to such ridiculous standards of perfection at some point they risk MH difficulties when they realise it isn't sustainable or who won't be able to cope in RL when they need to socialise, make personal choices and manage their own time with confiscation of items.

KB thinks she's something she isn't.

I've met far better HT in my time with much more able and well rounded students than hers.

I would be pretty shocked at a school where the middle to high SATS kids did NOT pass GCSE.

Then you'd be shocked at most schools, steppemum. It's certainly not normal for all middle prior attainers to pass maths and English, even in good schools.