Please Note that I am no longer able to offer individual advice on admissions or appeals. There is copious advice and information via the links in the Panels to the right.

 I am very grateful to all the 70 schools (some via KCC) which held appeals, that have sent me responses. 

Follow the links to find my general appeal information and advice for Kent Grammars, Medway Grammars, and oversubscription for grammars and non-selectives. Other recent articles include Medway Test outcomes for 2020 admission (Kent still to come, but 2019 data here) and Kent GCSE results 2018 (this year's outcomes still awaited and will be published here).

Most Kent secondary schools are Academies, Foundation or Voluntary Aided schools, with the right to choose their Appeal Panel provider. The grammar school split has been roughly equal between Panels provided by KCC and other providers for some years, although more non-selective schools are now choosing KCC Panels. It is my observation that the Independence of Panels is declining in the sense that they are more closely following the wishes of schools in terms of numbers of appeals upheld, possibly to ensure retention of their contracts. 

 You will find outcomes of all individual secondary school appeal outcomes for Kent here and Medway here including nearly all for 2019. Several pages are out of date because of pressure on time but I am happy to update appeal data if requested. The second of two articles on appeal outcomes in 2017 is here. I don't collect details of Reception appeals for the small number of individual primary schools, that organise their own appeals, as success rates are likely to be equally low because of Infant Class Legislation.

Whilst many schools will tend to see similar patterns year on year, circumstances for individual schools can change sharply, as can be seen from the Individual Schools tables, with some examples below, including the first two cited.

Simon Langton Girls continues to see a high rate of success with 31 out of 44 appeals being upheld, the second highest rate for a grammar school in Kent. Add this to Canterbury girls having the by far the highest  rate of successful Headteacher Assessments for either gender in any District at 14% of the total roll, which results in by some way the largest proportion of pupils who had not been found successful through the Kent Test being accepted into grammar school. At Barton Court, the third and mixed grammar there were 64 appeals all for children initially deemed non-selective, 12 were upheld, and another 26 were found selective, but were placed on a waiting list as the Panel considered there was not enough room.

Queen Elizabeth’s Grammar School,  Faversham (mixed), continues to draw pupils not only from Faversham but Whitstable and the villages towards Canterbury and Sittingbourne. The school has a different pattern of appeals being upheld to that of most oversubscribed grammar schools. Each year around half of the 33 appeals heard are from children already found selective, half of the total being upheld, and half of the successes come from children who had not been found selective under the Kent Test. For 2019, 45% of appeals were upheld. 

Highsted Grammar (girls) saw the highest rate of success at appeal in a Kent grammar schools at 86%, with 19 out of 22 appeals being upheld, on top of the Highsted Test which saw an additional 29 girls found of grammar school ability over and above those found selective through the Kent Test. The equivalent boys' school in Sittingbourne, Borden Grammar School, also had a high level of success with 61% of the 38 appelas being successful.    

Harvey Grammar continues low with 14% of appeals being upheld. 

Appeal Panels at both Gravesend grammar schools appear to favour local children at appeal. Gravesend Grammar had 64 appeals for boys, with 15 upheld, all from Kent, 10 of whom had previously been unsuccessful in the Kent Test. Mayfield Grammar saw 16 of its 44 appeals for girls upheld, 11 not having previously been found selective. 

*Chatham Girls data for 2018, with 2019 results awaited.

In total 32 non-Selective  schools held appeals across Kent and Medway, 21 using KCC Panels (up from 18 in 2018), with 27% of appeals being upheld.

There are few common factors in any of these sets of appeals, as they reflect individual school and locality circumstances, so I suggest you consult the data for Individual Schools for details.   

The most pressured districts are Thanet and Maidstone. In Thanet, where four of the six schools are heavily oversubscribed as many families try and avoid the other two, there were  just 17% successful overall, although many families will have made multiple appeals. St George's CofE Foundation School, the second most oversubscribed non-selective school in Kent saw 12 appeals upheld out of 65. 

The depth of concern in Thanet can be seen by the large number of appeals to get into Charles Dickens School every year, although it was in Special Measures until taken over last year. Hartsdown and Royal Harbour schools have the lowest Progress 8 GCSEs in the County for 2019, with Charles Dickens not far behind, being fifth lowest.  

In Maidstone, there is also considerable polarisation of popularity amongst the non-selective schools. All six with appeals held these using KCC Panels. Valley Park, the most oversubscribed non-selective, had just five appeals upheld out of 59. 

 St Simon Stock Catholic School with its single appeal upheld, at least had a better rate of success than the two previous years, which saw none successful. Lenham School, with Special Measures cancelled by academisation under the Valley Invicta Trust, was the only school with 100% of appeals upheld, although Westlands ran it close with 98%, just one of the 52 appellants losing out. 

Other schools where it was difficult to win an appeal were: Brockhill Park (1 out of 19); St George's CofE, Gravesend (1 out of 22); Bennett Memorial (3 out of 39); Fulston Manor (6 out of 76); all with a lower than 10% success rate. 

There were a number of schools with no appeals upheld, often with small numbers of appeals: Hugh Christie (0 out of 1); Malling (0 out of 11); John Wallis (0 out of 5); and Wye (0 out of 5).

 Note: Originally it was called an ‘annex’, although the extra ‘e’ appears now to have become the norm.

You will find a considerable number of articles about the Sevenoaks Annexe(s) dating back to 2012 on this site. Place the word 'annex' in the search engine, top left hand side, front page. In my first full article, I wrote: 'There is a shortage of grammar school places in West Kent. The problem is that it is a shortage for boys in the north of the area - it is said that there are 49 boys displaced without any grammar school place in and around north Sevenoaks town, unable to gain access to Tunbridge Wells Grammar School for Boys in the south.  Clearly for these it would be ideal'. Nine years on, it looks as if it will happen! 

Since the Sevenoaks annexe was conceived and championed by previous Leader of KCC Paul Carter as long ago as 2012, it soon switched from proposed management by Invicta Grammar School in Maidstone, to become a single annexe managed by two grammar schools, one for boys and one for girls. This fell when no boys’ school came forward at the time and so the Weald of Kent took on an annexe for girls only, with adjacent premises to be built for boys when a suitable sponsor came forward.  Planning Permission for the additional premises was granted along with those for the first half, now in full use.

TWGSB has always been the obvious tenant for the new premises, and it may be that the change of heart has followed the retirement of the previous long serving headteacher, John Harrison, and the appointment of his successor, Amanda Simpson. TWGSB is one of the last remaining Local Authority grammar schools in the county, which although it means it has fewer freedoms than academies such as Weald of Kent, the proposal is easier to manage. For the proposal will be driven by KCC whose new Leader, Roger Gough, just happens to represent Sevenoaks as a County Councillor. National politics?????

The consultation also proposes that in addition, there will be improvements to the school’s main Tunbridge Wells site to ensure all pupils have access to the same standard of facilities regardless of the site they attend.

The Trinity School and the two grammar satellite provisions would work together to coordinate the most effective use of any shared facilities, both during and after the school day. This proposal has resulted in updated feasibility studies being produced to ensure sufficient sports facilities and external circulation and play spaces are available for all the schools on site.

There may be limited times when students from all three schools on site interact, such as sixth form students sharing common, social spaces. However, students will not be taught together. The schools will look to ensuring dining facilities are sufficient to ensure pupils from the boys and girls satellites will not dine together. Break times will be staggered and accordingly, sporting and outdoor facilities will be timetabled appropriately to avoid students mixing during the school day.

Two comments below (with my own thoughts) identify possibly the greatest objection to the proposal, which is the access to three establishments from a single narrow road. 

The Consultation document notes that as the demand for places continues, KCC will likely seek new secondary provision elsewhere in the district.

Kent County  Council has a rolling Education Provision Plan, most recently updated earlier this year. This states:

You should also read the parallel article for 2019 admissions as it contains much more information and comment, including an analysis of the continued failures of Officers and Members of Medway Council to act in the interests of local children and address these three issues.

For 2019 admission, there were just 800 Medway children allocated places at the 1093 grammar school places available which makes a nonsense of  the Medway Council bid for a new grammar school. Instead another 236 Out of County children were allocated places, to fill up the vacancies.

The inbuilt bias towards  girls and older children arises because of the nature of the Medway Test, with two fifths of the total marks being awarded for one piece of written work, marked subjectively as against the maths and verbal reasoning tests which are multiple choice. This is explained here. To highlight this issue consider four children who passed the Test this year with minimum marks, whose scores were:

These are four children have achieved the pass score of 495 on the basis of a high scoring single piece of writing along with two below average marks, maths very low, hardly suggesting they will thrive in grammar school. I hope for their sake I am wrong.  What I do know after years of talking with the families of children who have not passed the Medway Test is that success in the Extended Writing paper and therefore the whole Medway Test can be according to whether the child has experience of the genre of writing examined or not. 

Out of County passes

 For the second year running, the number of Medway Test passes from outside Medway is larger than that from Medway state and private schools. The split is: Medway state schools– 808 children passed; Medway private schools – 59 pupils passed; OOC – 921 children passed (including three Home Educated children, none from Medway).

In practice, fewer than a third of all OOC children who pass the Medway Test are offered places in Medway grammar schools in March, and it is likely that many others withdraw before September, having received a better offer closer to home. The provision of  testing facilities for the additional 1303 OOC children who took the test, including many who are not looking for a Medway school but simply taking the test for practice, places a considerable practical and financial burden on the Council, most of which is wasted.

As discussed in previous articles, the breakdown of OOC offers for girls will look very different this year, with The Rochester Grammar changing its admission criteria to give high priority to local girls, whatever their pass score. Some of the OOC girls displaced will take up places at Chatham to replace the girls lost there to Rochester.

 Astor College has been one of the lowest performing schools at GCSE in Kent for years, along with the other three first named schools in the list. Three years ago it was served with a warning by the DfE about low standards, and has not really improved since.  New Line Learning Academy struggles for numbers against the other Maidstone schools and 2018-19 is the first time for some years that it has not been in the top four schools in this table. Medway UTC was, to use the phrase in vogue, a car crash from its opening in 2015, and will be no loss as it has now re-opened as Waterfront UTC, run by The Howard Academy Trust, although with Howard School in Gillingham also well featured in the table we may not see see too much change in this measure.

St Augustine Academy, Maidstone, is perhaps another surprise in this company, having gained rapidly in popularity in recent years. However, GCSE performance has tailed off badly over the past two years and it may be this is an attempt to rectify it. Ursuline College, Thanet, has a reputation for tough discipline dating back to its days as a private Catholic School, but has not appeared at this level before. Goodwin Academy, Deal, is a school with an enormously chequered history under its short lived tenure as a SchoolsCompany Trust school, before the Trust was closed down by government. It was taken over by the Thinking Schools Academy Trust from Medway at the beginning of the year, which has plenty of experience in such schools, but presumably believes it needs to make its mark on pupil attitudes.

The high number of vacancies at the large majority of these schools on allocation for September 2019, clearly reflect parental views of these schools, with anything over 50% hardly financially viable. Again, there is no evidence that a tough exclusion policy will raise standards.

It may be a coincidence that Richmond Academy,  Sheerness, and Martello Primary, Folkestone, were both run by the disgraced and defunct Lilac Sky Academy Trust, but have now been under their current Trusts since January 2017 and should by now have developed their own ethos.  However, they have both been amongst the top excluders for three consecutive years. I have looked at Martello in more detail in the Turner Schools section above. Richmond Academy is now with the Stour Academy Trust which has had considerable success with some of the struggling schools it has taken over.  

Saxon Way Primary, Gillingham, Special Measures a long time ago in 2012, was taken over by the Griffin Trust in 2013 who took it through to a Good Ofsted in 2016. Key Stage 2 results look sound. I cannot see why this should now need such a high exclusion rate to continue its success. Downsview Primary, Swanley, also appears sound in other respects. Whitehill Primary, Gravesend, was the subject of a disgraceful scandal and meltdown seeing its headteacher banned from teaching, the story concluded in my final article here.  It was rescued by Malcolm Moaby as headteacher, transferred from Gravesend Grammar School, the other school in the Academy Trust, but he has now become Headteacher of the grammar. I hope this is not a sign of regression.  

Oasis Academy Skinner Street, Gillingham failed its first Ofsted after being taken over by Oasis Learning Trust, but improved rapidly to Good in 2016. Poor KS2 results in 2018 may have put pressure on to improve. More details above. Delce Academy, Rochester, is a current disaster which went into Special Measures in June. You will find a dedicated article to its troubles here, this high level of exclusions simply filling out a dreadful experience of education for the children of the school. 

Edenbridge Primary, Sevenoaks, Ofsted Good in 2013, crashed to Special Measures in 2017, as explained here, the article chronicling another school on its way down which should have been picked up earlier. It was taken over by The Pioneer Academy, operating out of Croydon in July 2018 but has clearly not yet thrown off the high excluding pattern seen the previous year when it appeared in the corresponding table of high excluders.  

 National Exclusion Rates

 Half of these schools are in towns without one of Kent’s five Catholic Secondary schools, which are scattered across Kent, meaning in many places there is no secondary school 'to promote Catholic education in the area' . As a result, many Catholic pupils seeking a Catholic secondary education will in any case have to travel miles or make a difficult journey daily to reach one of the five. 

The Kent Catholic secondary schools are: St Anselm's, Canterbury; St John's Gravesend;  St Simon Stock, Maidstone; St Gregory's. Tunbridge Wells, all heavily oversubscribed; and St Edmund's, Dover with a few vacancies. There is also St John Fisher in Chatham, Medway, with a large number of vacancies, being unpopular with families and the only one of the six to potentially benefit if this policy is to have any effect. However, one of the longest journeys will be from pupils at St Edward’s Catholic Primary in Sheerness to St John Fisher Catholic School, in Chatham, a distance of 21 miles by road. I suspect few children whether Catholic or not are likely to be tempted by that journey, although the Diocesan policy is presumably designed to encourage this.   

The current rot at Folkestone Academy dates back to well before September 2018, by which time the school had completely failed to attract a new Executive Headteacher in spite of extensive advertising by a high profile firm of head-hunters. The Trust then settled instead for an internal promotion in the secondary section of this all through school.

In between these two events, the Board of Directors at Folkestone Academy appeared to go into meltdown. On 1^st May, the Secretary of the Trust, Hayley Porter-Aslet resigned after just over a year in office as Chief Operating Officer for the Trust.  Her previous post was at John Wallis Academy, Ashford, and a number of staff followed her from there. She was succeeded in post by Jenny Bledge, Trust Governance and Compliance Officer, whom I found very helpful and competent on FOI matters.

The next item on the agenda was: Leadership and Governance Culture. ‘JS (CEO Jo Saxton) informed the Board on her plans to run a training session with all senior colleagues on leadership culture, using the Nolan Principles, as published on the Trust’s website. GC suggested that informal/social contact may also be beneficial. JS noted the latter already took place. Professor Lygo asked JS to consider informal mechanisms for “triangulation” JS agreed to do so. This meeting was conducted as a closed session. There being no further business the meeting was closed’. And that was it. Conclusion: There had been a bust-up amongst Directors, confirmed by the next event.

3^rd July. Professor Lygo (Founder Director and Chairman of the Trust) and Dame Susan John resign as Directors, although no indication of this was given in the Minutes of the Emergency Meeting.  Even this managed to get fouled up, as the resignations still appear on the Trust Website on a page via a link called: ‘Details of Former Trustees/Directors can be Found Here’ as having happened on 9^th July (Companies House describes the revision of  the date as ‘Clarification: a second filed TM01 registered on 8/08/2019’). The Minutes of the July Meeting, below, claim that the reasons for these simultaneous mid-meeting resignations was travel difficulties and that the Board wished to thank them for their services, but there still remains no public appreciation or even mention.  

 A further meeting, planned for 6^th September was postponed (presumably as there was nothing pressing!), to seven weeks later on 30^th October. The agenda is, as all official documents are, rather bland but notes that resignations are to be received along with Prospective Director Biographies. The latter will have included information on Michael Buchanan and Professor Helen James, details here, and a new Interim Chair, James Booth-Clibborn. 

On 5^th September, Jenny Bledge resigned as Secretary to the Board, after four months in post and just over a year with the Trust, to take up a post elsewhere. Overall, the  rate of turnover amongst the administrative team at Turner Schools is also very large, once again making the point that this is not a happy organisation. On 19^th September, Jenny King resigned as a Director, one of eight who had gone since the Trust was set up in 2016, including all six of the original Directors, apart from Dr Saxton.

At the 30^th October Meeting Mr Buchanan was appointed Chairman of Directors.

The stark nature of the problem was set out in the 2018-22 KCC Schools Commissioning Plan, on pages 159/160 as follows: although the 2019 Plan tries to disguise it! 

The second quotation 'the strategic response to this demand is a proposed 6FE expansion of an existing school or a new school from 2021-22’, comes from the Kent Commissioning Plan for 2019-2023, as explored in my article on 2019  school allocations, here, and which is clearly some years away The article also explores the problem of two thirds of TW non-selective places being in the two church schools: Bennett Memorial Diocesan (CofE) and St Gregory’s Catholic which select on religious grounds, and also admit some 50 children a year from outside Kent, to displace further children. As a result, for 2019, some 55 TW boys were offered places at Hayesbrook School in Tonbridge, the nearest school with vacancies for boys, and another 40, probably all girls, at High Weald Academy in distant Cranbrook the nearest school with vacancies for girls. Both these two latter schools were awash with vacancies.

Meanwhile a common bolthole for many TW families, the comprehensive Beacon Academy in Crowborough, which took 82 Kent children in 2018, admitted none in 2019 as it was full of local children.

Whilst it is clear from the above that local candidates for Parliament have no awareness of the crisis or interest in it, local families of children who are not found to be suitable for grammar schools can expect no favours from the winner of the Tunbridge Wells election. Sadly having listened to several of the other Radio Kent local constituency programmes, they appear no more ill informed than in other districts. Apart from extravagant promises from the  magic money pot for education, on the ground the coming and chronic shortage of school places and education in general are clearly not seen as a priority for anyone. 

For the next three years I highlighted the failures of Lilac Sky in a series of highly critical articles but could make no progress, even though I came to be regarded as the lead on this issue by various media outlets. The main reason for this was that KCC and its CEO, Patrick Leeson, appeared bewitched by the Company and Mr Leeson repeatedly reported back to KCC on their excellence. He also took time out to wrongly allege that I was not telling the truth and asked me to retract, but unsurprisingly was unable to supply details. You will find a key article here, although if you put Lilac Sky into my search engine you will find much more.  

Eventually, after his Deputy switched loyalties to Lilac Sky as described in the article, and after the Regional Schools Commissioner took the Lilac Sky schools away from their Academy Trust, Mr Leeson saw the light and describe the Academy Trust’s behaviour as ‘outrageous’, as explained here. It is obviously unfortunate that during these four years, Lilac Sky was able to siphon millions of pounds out of the schools, KCC funds and the ESFA. It then handed over the five badly run primary schools in Kent, with just one of these having recovered to date. Knockhall Primary, Martello Primary and Richmond Academy have all subsequently been found by Ofsted to Require Improvement, and all feature in articles along with Thistle Hill Primary.

The high performing Stowting CofE Primary School was no doubt aided by having just nine pupils in Year Six, one of 13 Kent schools with fewer than 10 pupils in the Year Group, including . 100% achievement Water Meadows and Worth primaries. At the other end of the scale Nonington CofE was the second smallest in Kent, with just six pupils in Year Six. Such small numbers clearly mean each child will influence outcomes directly, making these of limited value. All other schools mentioned in this article had full, or nearly full class groups. 

You can see my 2017 report for  comparison here. Unfortunately, I don’t have one for 2018

15 schools in Kent and four in Medway had all three elements graded Well Above Average, listed below. Four of the Kent schools have been in Special Measures in the past five years with St Mary of Charity rising to Outstanding after academy conversion, with Chantry, Kings Farm and Istead Rise in Gravesham all rising to Good. Regular browsers will know of my interest in Kings Farm Primary which serves an area of social deprivation in Gravesend, and has remained a Local Authority school whilst rising to an Ofsted Good. Just two of the schools have an Outstanding Ofsted, St Mary of Charity CofE and Hernhill, near Canterbury. Ide Hill CofE and Fawkham CofE in Sevenoaks come from West Kent; Gateway Primary and Our Lady’s Catholic schools from Dartford;  Oaks Primary Academy and South Borough from Maidstone. Otherwise, apart from the three Gravesham schools, the other six all come from east Kent. In Medway, both Kingfisher and Wayfield have been in Special Measures in the last few years, with Lordswood having been found to Require Improvement by Ofsted.  

 Also of note are: Reculver CofE Primary, recently found Outstanding after academisation by Canterbury Diocesan Trust following Special Measures, with all Progress classifications above average; and Royal Rise Primary in Tonbridge, most recent Ofsted placing it in Special Measures before academisation under Cygnus Trust, two Well Above Average levels.

After these and the other schools identified in the introduction above, came: Bredgar CofE (A), Sittingbourne; Bredhurst Cof E, Medway border; Herne CofE Junior, Canterbury; Our Lady of Hartley Catholic (A), Longfield; Rodmersham, Sittingbourne; and South Borough (A), Maidstone, all with 94%. Then: Fawkham CofE, Sevenoaks; Folkestone, St Peter’s CofE; Hartlip Endowed CofE, Sittingbourne; Speldhurst CofE, Tunbridge Wells; St Joseph’s Catholic (A), Aylesham; and St Peter’s Catholic (A), Sittingbourne all with 93%. Again, noteworthy is Royal Rise Primary (A), Tonbridge with 90%.

Lowest in Kent was: Nonington, CofE, Dover, with 17% of its six pupils achieving this standard, followed by Leeds and Bromfield Cof E, Maidstone with 23% of its 12 pupils. Then came Sunny Bank, Sittingbourne (Special Measures), also with 23%, Archbishop Courtenay CofE (A), Maidstone (previously Special Measures), 27%; and Northdown, Margate, with 30%. Lowest in Medway was All Hallows Primary with 28%. 

Highest performer is once again Stowting CofE, with six of its nine Year Six pupils achieving this level. Next come: Bredhurst CofE with 44%; Gateway (A), Dartford, with 42%; Oaks (A), Maidstone & Valley Invicta at Kings Hill, 40%; St Thomas Catholic (A), Sevenoaks, 39%; Finberry (A), Ashford &Our Lady’s Catholic, Dartford, 38%; Preston, Canterbury, 37%; and Manor Community, 33%.  33 Kent primaries had no high performers, sharply down from the 121 of 2016.

In Medway, New Horizon’s Children’s Academy (A) was the highest performer, with its first KS2 intake, with 32% high performers, followed by St Benedict’s Catholic with 30%. Of particular note is third placed Temple Mill (A), with 24%, yet another school out of Special Measures, having been assessed as Good by Ofsted last year. Six schools had no high performers, again well down on 2016’s 19. All six are academies, showing this is no panacea.

Under the previous scheme, schools that have a Performance of 65% OR Progress above all of: Reading -5; Writing -7 and Maths -5, are regarded as having reached Floor Level. If both are below this standard, the school could expect unspecified intervention (now replaced by unspecified support) by government, unless the miss is in writing only. 4% of schools nationally were in this category; the number in Kent if the definition were still in place is 12, of which four are academies. At 2.8% this is well below the national average. Five of the Kent schools stand out, as below. Medway has three schools below Floor Level, including Delce Academy. 

Treat all the data outcomes with a certain amount of scepticism. Never forget that schools are under immense pressure to deliver the best possible Key Stage 2 results. The future of individual schools are sometimes at stake and this set of results will lead to some schools being taken over by others, by Multi-Academy Trusts, or even transferred between them. Some headteachers will lose their jobs. Other headteachers will yield under pressure and manipulate outcomes, for example one method can be to reduce Key Stage One outcomes to improve the progress rate through to Key Stage Two.

Government sets performance levels apparently somewhat arbitrarily as a tool to achieve its aims, so it is impossible to say if standards have improved or declined. What is certain is that the pressure to succeed is ever greater, so (1) look at other features of schools important to you than simply these tables. OFSTED performance, although strongly influenced by this data, the ethos of the school, the headteacher, do you see your child fitting in, etc., (2) High attainment performance is an indicator of high ability children in the school or else good progress or both.  Different families will choose different measures as a priority. (3) A sharp difference in progress assessments may be simply due to the teacher of mathematics (for example) having left, been ill or been on maternity leave with the school unable to make alternative arrangements. Find out if this problem still exists or has gone away (4) there appears currently an obsession in some areas over using the number of grammar school successes as a guide to a good school. Untrue and irrelevant. Firstly, this is six years of education away for the child entering a Reception class and many things can happen to change a school in that time. Secondly, success rates are likely to be related to the proportion of high ability children in the school. Thirdly, the tutoring factor which happens outside the school and applies to a high proportion of potential grammar school applicants is of considerable importance and is not reflected in these figures.

Primary school data is now far too complex for many parents to be able to compare schools and I suspect most will ignore it. However, if you put two schools together for comparison, accept all the caveats about poor data, look at what is important for you, if there are marked differences between the two it may prove helpful. But most importantly for many,  bear in mind the enormous pressure on school places in many areas, and you may find you actually have no real choice at all! Sorry.

Has this school failed, or have circumstances conspired to fail it?

The agenda papers for the Scrutiny Committee make clear that Mr Carter’s decision could not be overruled by the Committee and so it still stands, but his decision could yet be cancelled by Lord Agnew, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for the School System and the original proposal reinstated. Unfortunately, because the subsequent meeting on 18^th December was cancelled, the Minutes of the Committee are not yet in the public domain, and in any case there was a private part of the meeting, but there is a webcast of that part of the proceedings open to the public here.

The pressure to get the right answer can be seen from the October 2019 Schools Census which show that for 2019 entry, 1142 Year Seven places were taken up in the six schools, against a total Published Admission Number of 1159, a very small margin of error. You will find an analysis of the last five years outcomes and the potential numbers for the next five years below. 

In addition to the above, Mr Carter made the following points in his presentation to the Scrutiny Committee: He argued that the original decision was brought about by a short term demand, rising to a shortage of 5FE in 2021, but falling to 1FE in 2025, and that a decision was urgent if preparation works for a new school were to be halted. As any new school would not be built until 2022, the ugly interim plan was for Year Seven pupils at the new school to be educated at the site of the old Walmer School for the year 2021-22.

He also argued that the expansion would enable Hartsdown, Ursuline and King Ethelbert’s to offer a wider curriculum and that there was evidence both Hartsdown and Royal Harbour were both on an upward trajectory in terms of performance. He initially promoted a new proposition by the three form entry Ofsted Outstanding Newington Primary School in Ramsgate, to become an all through school, of the same size, although this would be a secondary intake of only 90 pupils leading to a very narrow curriculum (Two other free schools have opened at this size: Wye and Hadlow, and both have very rapidly expanded, realising the problems that a small sized secondary school incurs, probably in terms of curriculum choice and provision). Later in the meeting he appeared to backtrack on this for the same reason.

To present the case were: Paul Carter, ex-leader of KCC; Roger Gough, new Leader of KCC and ex-Education Cabinet Member; and Richard Long, new Education Cabinet Member. There were two witnesses representing Thanet secondary schools, both from the Coastal Academies Trust (CAT), which runs three of the six non-selective schools. These were Paul Luxmoore, Executive Head of CAT, and Kate Greig, Executive Head of two CAT schools, Dane Court Grammar and King Ethelbert, both witnesses being prominent in support of Hartsdown, King Ethelbert and Royal Harbour in their evidence. With no officer present, there was nobody to give an alternative or independent view on the situation, which would have made proper scrutiny possible.

One Member of the Committee did rightly suggest that KCC Officers should have spotted this long before last January, but there appeared no appetite to follow this query through and no officers were present to defend themselves, perhaps deliberately as their position is surely indefensible. As is so often with such failures, no one is accountable, but excuses are manifold. The two tables below confirm at a simple reading firstly, that there has been an increase of just 50 pupils joining Year Seven in Thanet non-selective schools over the past five years, and secondly that there is now a steady decline in the number of primary pupils working through the system. I have given the relevant data for the same peer groups for 2018 and 2019 separately, to see if there is inward migration, only to discover that if anything there is a decline in nearly every age group. If you, the reader can follow this, then you may well ask why KCC officers have failed completely to do so! 

 * Published Admission Number

 Note: In several of these years additional temporary places were created to meet the pressures.

Please note that the information below, sometimes scarce, is gleaned from a variety of sources and I am happy to receive any additional material or to correct errors and omissions. My thanks to all those who have replied to my requests for information. 

When the Building Schools for the Future scheme was scrapped in 2010, 29 Kent secondary schools lost their improvement plans, including five on the current list. You will find a full list of those that lost out and those which survived the cut here. At least two who lost out: Castle Community College (now Goodwin Academy) and Meopham School, have since been rebuilt under different schemes. Two more: Pent Valley and Walmer Science College, have now closed. 

A consultation about closing one school on the list, Pent Valley Technology College, began in December 2015, although the outcome was inevitable, with the school finally being shut down eighteen months later. It has been replaced by the Turner Free School (TFS) opening on the same site in September 2018, run by the controversial Turner Schools (TS) academy trust, and now to be housed in new premises from a different funding stream. The school was originally planned for an intake of 120 pupils, but thanks to its normal ‘Blessings from on High’ has managed to obtain funding for 180. The main consequence of this is that Folkestone Academy also run by TS now has 91 vacancies in Year Seven, the second highest number in Kent, with TFS also having empty places. Clearly, the DfE has money to burn on favoured schools!

Benenden Primary School (School website appears ‘unsafe’ to visitors at time of writing). The scheme replaces historic Listed buildings around the village green. Completed September 2019 on a site just outside the village boundary. This was originally a KCC project approved in 2012, with plenty of detail on the KCC website, including here. KCC was then awarded the contract to carry out the rebuild, costing some £5.5 million as explained here.

Colliers Green CofE Primary, Cranbrook. A new build is nearly completed as described on the school website.

Platt Church of England Voluntary Aided Primary School, St Mary's Platt, Sevenoaks. Currently waiting to sign off funding as planning is almost complete. The school is hoping for completion in the next twelve months. 

Dover Grammar School for Boys is to be completely rebuilt, with the old school demolished and turned into a car park. When I used to visit over forty years ago, taking school chess teams to play, I could not believe the premises, built on the side of a steep hill, with a somewhat Gothic appearance and thought it not fit for purpose even then!  Previously on BSF List

The Folkestone School for Girls has a new six classroom block, replacing old modular buildings.

High Weald Academy. The new academy building, replacing most of premises is now open and is described as one of the most state of the art learning environments in the area. It boasts 69 climate controlled classrooms and offices, which includes eight science laboratories, three art rooms, five ICT suites and the purpose built drama studio. The school is the most undersubscribed in Kent, with an intake in September 2019 of 39% of its Published Admission Number, the lowest in Kent. Third lowest is Hayesbrook School, also run by the same academy trust, Brook Learning Trust. More details here. Given the school’s historic low intake this is surely below what is viable. I looked at the Brook Trust and High Weald in more detail two years ago, the Trust hoping that the new buildings will draw in more students, for if not one can only wonder at what will have been a monumental waste of money. Did not qualify for BSF in 2010, possibly because of its vulnerability.

Mayfield Grammar School  Appears to have settled for a new science block, funded by KCC. No information from the school in spite of request. 

Pent Valley Technology College Closed, see above

Simon Langton Girls' Grammar School. A complete rebuild costing some £20 million.  The school sensibly offers a Q&A about the new premises on its website which also takes the opportunity to respond after earlier controversy about the design losing the character of the 1950’s design.

Swadelands School (now The Lenham School). Following the Ofsted failure of Swadelands in 2015 the school was taken over as an Academy by Valley Invicta Academies Trust and became The Lenham School. KCC had earlier won the PSBP contract to build a new science block at a cost of some £3 million. 

St John Fisher Catholic Comprehensive School was able to confirm that St. John Fisher is part of the Priority Schools Building Programme and that it remains the intent to address the significant condition need on the Upper School site, with further information in the coming months. 

The Howard School  was awarded £5 million for a new Science and Technology Block. Due to commence construction in the summer of 2019, unfortunately the contractor pulled out. A new contractor has now been appointed, the plan now being to commence construction this summer, with two buildings to be demolished by December 2021.

This should all be a very serious matter of concern amongst the leadership of an Academy Trust that two years ago had ‘an ambitious plan to turn Folkestone Academy into the best school in the south of England’! Instead it is still limping along at the floor, with: GCSE Progress 8 at -0.62 (Well Below Average); Exclusion rates still through the roof; Absence and Persistent Absence rates second highest in Kent; over a third of Year Seven places empty this October, the Sixth Form having fallen in size by over a third since this time last year, and its Governance in disarray. 

Ofsted Statistics

This table takes account of all Short Inspections also carried out. See here for a definition of Short Inspection, together with considerably more detail and explanation relating to these outcomes. You will find National and Local Authority tables here.  The inclusion of Short Inspections makes in the National table unfortunately make it impossible for me to separate 'Good' and 'Outstanding'  outcomes in the statistics (feel free to enlighten me). 

This table also takes account of all Short Inspections also carried out.  See here for considerably more detail and explanation relating to these outcomes. This primary school article makes clear that in both Kent and Medway, the academisation of underperforming primary schools is generally good for most of them (but certainly not all), with considerable improvement in performance taking place after conversion.

Stuck Schools

According to Ofsted:

Note: in the references below, 'Satisfactory' for an Ofsted Outcome was replaced by 'Requires Improvement' and is regarded as the equivalent. 

I have identified four Kent secondary ‘stuck schools’ and six primary schools through an analysis of all Ofsted performance. There would be many more primary schools on the list if were it not for the policy of encouraging or forcing poorly performing schools to become academies. This site shows a steady flow of Kent primary schools improving their Ofsted rating after academisation, most recently at Kent and Medway Primary School Ofsted Outcomes 2018-2019, reflecting the poor performance of Kent’s School Improvement department, the now commercial The Education People. In an interview with Kent Messenger, Matt Dunkley Kent County Council’s director of young people and education wrongly claims that 'there were only one or two schools in the county that were classified as being ‘stuck’'.  Very different from my ten, listed below which equate to 2% of all schools, the national average!

The criterion for defining a 'stuck school' is very specific, and my analysis shows that there are a number of others one might expect to comply who are not on the list. These may be  by virtue of one very old 'Good'; assessment, or schools being brokered or re-brokered as academies, giving them a three year break from Inspection according to the rules. Examples on this site include Delce and Elaine primary academies from Medway both of whom had been sponsored by weak Academy Trusts and have now been rebrokered to more reliable sponsors, but as a result each have a total of six inspection free years. 

Kent Secondary Schools. If you follow the link to each one below, it will take you to the Individual Kent Secondary Schools Section of  this website, where you will find a full list of all Ofsted Inspections and Monitoring Inspections since the date quoted. In some cases I have not been able to access older data, before the school was academised, so it is possible they should not be on the list if there was a previous 'Good' outcome  

Dover Christ Church Academy Before becoming a sponsored academy with Canterbury Christ Church University in September 2010, it was called Archers Court School. Has four Ofsted outcomes below Good since 2012, but no Inadequate assessment. 

St Edmund's Catholic School, Dover. Five below 'Good' outcomes since 2006, including Special Measures in 2013.  Sponsored Academy with the Kent Catholic Schools Partnership  from July 2016, after a difficult time. 

Note: Both these two Dover Schools, as well as Astor College which escapes by virtue of a Good Ofsted in 2011, suffer academically because of the influence of the Dover Test, which takes away an additional 120 plus higher ability pupils a year who did not pass the Kent Test for admission to the two Dover grammar schools.

High Weald Academy, previously Angley School before sponsored academisation in September 2012, with the Brook Learning Trust. One 'Notice to Improve' in 2010  and three subsequent 'Requires Improvement'. Struggles to attract pupils, many of whom look to schools in other accessible towns. 

Oasis Academy, Isle of Sheppey. Has been a disaster area for as long as I have known it (stretching back to 1984), re-brokered once in 2009, now with Oasis Community Learning . Multiple articles accessible by the site search engine. 'Notice to Improve' in 2010 and then three subsequent 'Requires Improvement', along with five Monitoring Inspections. 

Kent Primary Schools.

If you go to Individual Schools, Kent Primary Schools you will find a list of Kent Districts. Click the one you wish to look at and you will find a list of all Ofsted Inspection Outcomes for each school in the District, dating back to at least 2012. 

Archbishop Courtenay Primary School,Maidstone. Frequently appears in lists of low performing schools.  The one failure by Aquila (Diocese of Canterbury Academy Trust).  Ofsted Record: May 2010 - Satisfactory; November 2012 -Serious Weaknesses; March 2014 - Requires Improvement. September 2014 became a sponsored academy with Aquila. July 2019 - Requires Improvement.

Cage Green Primary School, Tonbridge.  Ofsted Record: Sep 2006 - Outstanding; Dec 2009 - Satisfactory; October 2012 - Special Measures; July 2014 Requires Improvement; Oct 2016, Requires Improvement; January 2019 - Requires Significant Improvement; July 2019 became Sponsored Academy under Connect Schools Academy Trust. 

Royal Rise Primary School, Tonbridge. Previously St Stephen's Primary School, now part of the Cygnus Academies Trust. Ofsted Record: January 2007 - Satisfactory; February 2010 - Satisfactory; October 2012 - Special Measures; July 2014 - Requires Improvement; September 2016 - Special Measures again. Became Sponsored Academy under Cygnus Trust July 2017. Remarkable turnaround for 2019 Key Stage 2

NOTE: Cage Green and St Stephen's covered adjacent parts of North Tonbridge along with a third schools which also struggled but has now turned itself round. Between them they accounted for 49 of the 70 vacancies in Tonbridge's 14 primary schools, so not a lot of choice for families in the area.  

Pilgrim's Way Primary School, Canterbury. A school which has had considerable misfortune serving a difficult community in a socially deprived area of the city. Placed in Special Measures in January 2011, it was managed by the Executive Head of St Stephen's Junior with the intention of it becoming a Sponsored Academy and in 2012 it was found to be Satisfactory. However, relationships broke down and the school was moved on to the care of The Village Academy Trust, a moderately performing Trust. The school was then found to have Serious Weaknesses by Ofsted in October 2013, the school's circumstances being described as 'turbulent' by Ofsted. Two months later, the school became a Sponsored Academy under The Village Academy Trust. By November 2016 the school was found to Require Improvement but just a year later it was found to have Serious Weaknesses once again. The school served a former large army barracks, and until 2015 when this closed admitted a considerable number of transient children from army families. Then the London Borough of Redbridge bought the barracks and re-located 250 families there, a high proportion of whom would send children to Pilgrims Way. This placed the school under considerable strain and not surprisingly in September 2017 the school was found to have Serious Weaknesses by Ofsted. The Report opens: 'The school continues to undergo considerable turbulence. Pupils leave and join the school at irregular points. The turnover of staff is relentless. Leaders struggle to embed and sustain their carefully considered improvements. The tireless headteacher is frequently thwarted in her efforts to improve the school due to circumstances beyond her control'. The issues are enlarged by a local newspaper report at the time. In May 2018 the school was re-brokered to the Veritas Multi-Academy Trust.  

 Richmond Academy, Sheerness. One of the victims of the notorious Lilac Sky Schools Academy Trust, which was closed by government leaving the school carrying considerable debt. In July 2010 it was served with a Notice to Improve by Ofsted, and declined further to be placed in Special Measures in October 2011. The following year, Kent County Council  placed it under the control of Lilac Sky and it was found to Require Improvement in July 2013. Shortly afterwards it became a Sponsored Academy under Lilac Sky until the Trust was closed down by government in December 2016, being re-brokered to Stour Academy Trust in January 2017. It should have escaped a further inspection for three years, but probably because of low Key State Two performance was inspected early in January 2019 and found again to Require Improvement.  The Report begins with 'Pupils’ test results at the end of key stages 1 and 2 in 2018 were well below national averages', but continues 'Officers and trustees of The Stour Academy Trust have high expectations and are relentless in securing the necessary improvements. They are systematically reversing past weaknesses and creating a culture of achievement in the school' , one of many condemnations of the failures of Lilac Sky the Report looking forward optimistically to the future. 

Medway Secondary Schools

All Medway secondary schools have a current Good or Outstanding Ofsted rating apart from the new Medway UTC, opened in 2015, which has already been re-brokered after being placed in Special Measures in May 2018. It has been renamed Waterfront UTC and is  now run by the Howard Academy Trust.   

 Medway Primary Schools

The dire state of Medway primary schools ten years ago can be seen from a table listing Ofsted Outcomes for 2010-11, with some from 2009. This names 19 schools with a Good Ofsted, 26 with Satisfactory (Requires Improvement) and 11 Inadequate (Notice to Improve or Special Measures). You will find  a further damning flavour of Medway Council's incompetence a few years later (2014) here. Medway Council's solution was to develop a policy to encourage all of its schools to become academies, thus evading any responsibility for its schools, the figure currently standing at 52 out of 79 schools academised. As a result, many of the schools that might have been on this list have improved their Ofsted grading and no longer qualify as stuck schools. 

Featherby Junior School, part of the Maritime Academy Trust.  Ofsted Reports: January 2008 - Satisfactory; January 2011 - Satisfactory; March 2013 - Requires Improvement; January 2015 - Requires Improvement; March 2017 - Special Measures. The school became a Sponsored Academy in September 2017 and so will not be reassessed until later this year.

Stoke Primary Academy, Hoo Peninsula. Ofsted Record: December 2006 - Satisfactory: January 2010 - Satisfactory; June 2013 - Requires Improvement. Became a sponsored academy with The Williamson Trust in November 2014. September 2017 -  Requires Improvement  Re-brokered 2018 to the Leigh Academy Trust along with the whole of the Williamson Trust.

Elaine Primary Academy, Strood. you will find considerable history here. Like Stoke Primary Academy above, Elaine was first sponsored by The Williamson Trust in December 2013, but then re-brokered to the Inspire Partnership in May 2018.   I can't confirm that Elaine is on the list as I haven't been able to track down Inspections before 2010, but the school's track record suggests it ought to be on the list of those Stuck. Performance is already improving under new leadership. Ofsted Record:   January 2011 - Satisfactory; May 2014 - Requires Improvement;  June 2016 - Requires Improvement. April 2017, issued with Pre-Termination Warning Notice following poor standards.