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?

The problem with a class of 48 is not ‘lack of discipline’. It’s that there’s 48 little developing g minds in need of an education and only one person able to educate them. Beating them doesn’t change that.

Because it’s a sadistic way to educate children.

Actually, I should have said ‘it’s a sadistic way to chase academic results’.

I think I read she only employs young teachers.

Whilst Totteridge’s P8 score is very good at 1.03 it isn’t anywhere near Michaela’s at 2.27.

I'm not sure why I'm weighing in in favour of Michaela - I don't live nearby and my kids are fortunate enough to go to excellent schools anyway. But it's driving me mad to see so many falsehoods on this thread being quoted about the place.

Falsehood 1: Michaela is selective

Fact 1: Michaela admits LAC children, then siblings, then staff children, then at random from children within a 5-mile radius. It is a community school and is non-selective. Admissions policy here: michaela.education/home/secondary-school-wembley/y7-to-y11-admissions/

Falsehood 2: Michaela does not accept children with SEN.

Fact 2: 15.76% of children at Michaela have SEN support compared with 11.92% nationally. (School data here: www.find-school-performance-data.service.gov.uk/school/140862/michaela-community-school/absence-and-pupil-population )

Falsehood 3: Michaela takes only privileged children.

Fact 3: 29.25% of children are on FSM, compared with 26.92% nationally. Source school data as above

Falsehood 4: The school offers a very narrow curriculum with nothing to extend pupils' experiences

Fact 4: extracurricular clubs are popular and well attended (source Ofsted report here reports.ofsted.gov.uk/provider/23/140862 ). List of clubs and curriculum details here: michaela.education/home/secondary-school-wembley/curriculum-wembley/

Falsehood 5: pupils are beaten with sticks and have poor mental health

Fact 5: the school's work to promote pupils' personal development and welfare is outstanding ... leaders and teaching staff actively encourage pupils' social and emotional development ... pupils are readily appreciative and caring. (Source: Ofsted report as above)

I get that people wouldn't necessarily choose the school for their own kids, and that they disagree with the headteacher's views, but I'm flabbergasted at how many easily refutable falsehoods have been introduced onto the thread to justify arguments.

We kind of guessed what a lot voted due to ..... the things we gleaned about their home life.

How are those any of your damned business?

'Things we gleaned' - do you mean gossip and tittle-tattle?

Re: selective — nobody's saying there's an entrance exam. There are lots of subtle factors that cause differences in school populations, meaning that differences in approach may not be responsible for as much of the difference in achievement as it might initially appear. Whenever parents get to express a preference, patterns will emerge and become stronger over time.

They are different schools that's just my point. What does it matter than Michaela's is better? They don't have silent corridors, no group work, arms folded yet they still get great results.
Totteridge Academy is a bigger school, plus the new headteacher turned the school around within a couple of years. He didn't open the school from scratch like KB did with her school.

Michaela is not a selective school.

I take it back. I apologise - Michaela is not a selective school.

The discipline is still ridiculous and performative.

You compared the 2 schools, including their results and P8 score, so I was commenting that their results aren’t in the same league. Whether one thinks that’s relevant or important depends on your individual perspective. Totteridge may have more pupils in the school but they had fewer Y11 pupils last year.

It’s not selective but will only be selected by certain types of parents and this self selecting group will be ambitious and engaged. FSM is a comment on income that by extension is related to deprivation although many FSM families may be highly motivated and successful. They are certain ethnic and social groups more likely to do very well and to be on FSM. More of these students attend. Where I used to teach the impact of immigration on our school saw our FSM increase alongside the academic expectations of our students. Poor white boys off the local estate continued to fail in relative terms. Many schools have a broad curriculum and excellent extra curricular provision whereas that school does offer a comparatively narrow curriculum.

There are lots of structured shared social moments and language teaching is particularly good, as is their use of oracy but the level of conformity demanded is bizarre. The head’s views on girls and STEM are shocking.

Oh and the National trend is that new schools opening with a strong ethos do well. Those same academies take over local failing schools and make much less of an impact. This is all about the students and the families they come from rather than the ethos and implementation of policy.

That's not what I was saying. I am saying her school is not the only school in the UK that does well, yet she is all over the media. Why don't other headteachers doing good things get airtime?

KB did say that quite a large % attend merely because it's the local school, and that these are the ones that are less likely to be engaged with the school's ethos. These children apparently learn to be disciplined quite early on and do well too.
@Middledazedted that's an interesting point you make about certain BME groups on FSM being more likely to be engaged. Part of me wonders if the school being predominantly not White British is the secret of its success? Many of these dc are likely to have family backgrounds where a traditionalist approach is favoured, therefore the children are generally conformist, have high respect for teachers and therefore the strict rules are not difficult for them. I wonder if this same model would be as successful in a school which was predominantly White, wc boys?

I think before you judge you should go and see it.

I’ve been. They welcome people who want to go for a tour. I’m a teacher and made the trip down from Manchester to see what actually goes on there. It is very structured and regimented but I met genuinely happy kids. A few myth-busting points:

“they don’t get free time” - they do. They have break and lunchtime and there are loads of things to do on the playground like table-tennis, basketball nets etc. Visitors are encouraged to mix freely at break time with the pupils to talk to them without staff influencing what the children might say (you have to have a DBS to do this). The pupils were falling over themselves to share info with me about school and their favourite lessons etc. They were happy and proud of their school and wanted to show it off. They look forward to Friday football and trips like kids in any other school do.

The discipline: it’s more about learning routines. I saw staff having a laugh and joke with pupils like I would in any school. The kids are drilled in routines and then they just fall into them. They get detentions for forgetting equipment etc but this is used as time for staff to sit down with them and unpick if they are having any problems or struggling with organising themselves due to something at home.

lunchtime is amazing. I sat on a table with children who served each other and me, cleared the table afterwards and asked me about my school, my uni etc. One stood up in front of the school and thanked me for coming all the way down to see them. They do that for all visitors. Plus the staff are eating with them (same food) and using it as an opportunity to gently teach table manners etc. That stands them in good stead for adulthood.

It’s not for everyone. But I do think you should see it for yourself before writing it off as a brainwashing cult.

Perhaps those HTs choose not to be in the media in the same way. I’m sure they would get coverage if they wanted it. Or maybe it’s because those HTs approaches aren’t outside of the norm so they don’t feel there’s a huge amount to discuss about how the school is run. Some schools do have coverage at a more local level.

What are KBs thoughts about women and STEM?

@GiantCheeseMonster

Did you speak to any of the girls? How did they feel about their HT views on girls in STEM and her opinion that the limited number of girls studying maths and physics is because it’s ‘probably just a natural thing’ since there’s ‘lots of hard maths they just don’t want to do?’ Do the girls feel let down by this brush off?

What about things like being held in ‘lunch isolation’ because your parents haven’t paid the lunch fees to teach personal responsibility? Did that come up at the beautiful lunch hour you admired?

Of course I’m sure a lot of things aren’t really made obvious to visitors though - they’re hardly going to display the child who is being excluded because their parent didn’t give them lunch money! Doesn’t fit in with the ‘we’re all so happy’ narrative.

@teathyme

That there’s no reason to encourage girls into those topics, they probably just ‘don’t fancy’ them because they can’t be bothered doing hard maths, and it’s just a natural thing. There’s obviously no environmental or social issues that make it difficult for girls to access those subjects, they’re just too lazy and stupid to do hard maths.

I went a few years ago when they only had Y7-9 in the school as they’ve built them up year on year, so I can’t comment about the sixth form issue. I spoke to lots of girls who enjoyed STEM as much as boys and watched some Maths lessons with equal participation from boys and girls.

The lunch time detention didn’t come up, no. But in some schools if parents haven’t paid, kids don’t get fed. At Michaela they feed them at least.

As I said - you’re free to knock it but I think you should see it first-hand first. I went expecting not to like it for the reasons on this thread and I came away very surprised. I don’t necessarily agree with the Head’s views on everything but I met happy children.

I agree
I just hate how the HT seems to think she has some authority over schools in the UK.
She is always tweeting about what other schools should be doing, following her policies etc. There are loads of schools in inner cities that get great results and are not as strict. I don't like the way she is being seen as the go to for education in the UK.

Are you sure that if meals are not paid for schools would not give kids ? I refuse to believe that. I believe they will contact the parents asking them why they haven't paid etc..but i refuse to believe a school will refuse to give a student any sort of lunch.
The fact that you are making excuses for that says it all really. Do you work at Michaela by any chance?

Hahaha. No, I’m Mancunian born and bred and still live here. Why on Earth would I have to work there in order to defend it?! I went to visit expecting to hate it and I was surprised to find lots of it that I liked. That’s the end of it. They’re not paying me anything to promote them 🙄