This article looks at two OFSTED ‘Outstanding’ Reports close to my heart, for Christ Church Pre-School and The Harvey Grammar School. There is also good cheer for long-suffering Medway as they collect their first Outstanding OFSTED of the year at Barnsole Primary along with some other good outcomes, and four more recent Kent ‘Outstanding’ Reports at: Brookfield Infant, Aylesford; Great Chart; Herne CofE Junior; and Tunstall CofE. Then there is the enigma of the 'Outstanding' Monitoring Inspection of Canterbury Academy!....

Canterbury Academy

The previous OFSTED assessment of Canterbury Academy as 'Requires Improvement', was a surprise to many, 

....

Gravesham is blessed with many high quality pre-schools, other recent ‘Outstanding’ assessments being: Owl Pre-School, Shears Green; Playpen, Meopham; and Cobham Community;  another three having been Outstanding until recently, nearly all being at least good. This is a sharp contrast with the primary sector, which has the worst OFSTED record in the county in spite of the excellent start in the pre-school sector!

I was invited on Radio Kent yesterday, to comment on the effects on schools of the decision by Redbridge Council to purchase Howe Barracks in Canterbury to house 208 of the families on their Housing Waiting List. Canterbury City Council also tried to purchase the premises but were outbid, so local homeless families have been deprived of this accommodation. Not surprisingly, there is concern about pressure on local services including schools. 

In the past two months I have carried out surveys of Kent’s Primary and Secondary school allocations, for each District in Kent, looking at oversubscription and vacancies, the summary position for Canterbury is that at the time of allocation of places, there were 74 vacant spaces at Reception Year and not one for Year Seven in non-selective schools.

However, as always, the situation is more complex than this, as explained below…..

As it happens, two of the three are under a mile from the Barracks, and are the nearest schools, so there is clearly spare capacity in East Canterbury, and there should be no problem finding places. On allocation for Reception in April there were 20 out of 30 places left empty at Parkside, and 23 out of 45 at Pilgrims Way.

The third school is St John’s CofE, just over a mile away, with 31 vacancies out of 60. The school has recently come out of  Special Measures, but the other two are performing relatively well. It appears that some of the remaining part of the Barracks site is to be developed with 500 additional houses to be built, which would surely provide a much greater pressure.

According to The Times, Denise Shepherd, who is Chief Executive of the Thinking Schools Academy Trust, where she is paid £215,000 a year, was suspended from her post last month. The reason put forward by the newspaper is that the suspension was for alleged snooping on staff email accounts and doctoring parts of an external inspection report.

Meanwhile the controversy at Simon Langton Girls’ Grammar School in Canterbury is spiralling to an almost unbelievable level for any school, certainly a state of open warfare the like of which I have never before seen in a school. The protagonists have made extensive claims about the actions of Headteacher and Governors relating to the school’s application to become part of a Multi-Academy Trust whilst absorbing the struggling Spires Academy into the Trust. Kent County Council is being heavily drawn into the controversy with no obvious strategy to ease the problems.......

The Trust's flagship school is The Rochester Grammar School in Medway and, amongst the other eight schools the Trust runs are Chatham Grammar School for Boys, which is to be renamed Holcombe Grammar School for September 2017 and become mixed. This places it in direct competition with Chatham Girls’ Grammar which, as a small stand-alone school in an Authority full of big Multi-Academy Trusts, is vulnerable and it has been suggested could also be swallowed up by the predator. The monopoly politics of large academy groups appears far removed from the prime purpose of schools, to educate children, not just hot-house them through hoops, and the Trust is currently having mixed success with several of its Medway schools.  

Perhaps unsurprisingly, The Rochester Grammar School website makes no mention of the suspension, but The Times picks out the following section from Ms Shepherd’s introduction: “Our success is due to our strong educational vision… our outstanding and driven leaders, dedicated teachers and support staff backed by a committed team of governors. The greatest asset in our trust is our staff”. It then provides considerable evidence of lack of trust by those same staff  in their Chief Executive. !

Ms Shepherd is one of the most senior Academy Leaders in the South London and South East Region, being one of four elected headteachers to the Board of seven members (two from Medway) which make decisions on Academy approvals. The March 2016 Meetingof the Board approved an Academy Order being issued for Simon Langton Girls’ Grammar School to be a Multi-Academy Trust, and also approved it becoming a Sponsor Academy, with conditions relating to CEO development and performance, which leads neatly on to the next item below. Poignantly, it also had as a major discussion item “the Role of Executive Headteachers”. Should have been an interesting discussion!

What is clear is that there is an unprecedented breakdown of relationships between many parents and staff on one side, and the Headteacher and Governors of the school on the other. I cannot see how the school can go on without massive change internally, and it is going to take a long time for its reputation to heal. Without passing judgement, I cannot see how the headteacher can continue in post, having completely lost the confidence of so many parts of the community. Even the Simon Langton Grammar School for Boys has put clear water between itself and SLGGS, the headteacher sending home a letter to parents which contains a well-argued case for maintaining the status quo at present. No partner support there!

Meanwhile the school has put out an end of term Newsletter on Friday that underlines the appalling Public Relations skills of the school. Whilst completely failing to mention the dispute (understandable in the circumstances) or the fresh Consultation Meeting on June 8^th in the diary dates (unforgiveable), the letter is headed by a paragraph which states “The governors of Barton Court Grammar School have announced their intention to launch a consultation with parents, local community and other parties about their plans to open a Free School on the Chaucer site and also to sponsor the Charles Dickens School in Broadstairs”. One wonders which mastermind decided to show that another school was going down a similar path, presumably in the hope of suggesting that what SLGGS was doing was not controversial. Instead what it underlines indelibly is the contrasting complete failure of SLGGS to take parents into their confidence, by attempting to prepare the conversion to academisation in secret.

If you want to get more than a whiff of the troubles swirling around the school, try the Academy Status Forum and stand back. Admittedly it is dominated by the rebels, but there are enough allegations with evidence posted to realise there is a very strong case to answer. 

One final thought: Kent County Council has recently lost a very expensive legal action after it removed the headteacher of the Community College Whitstable, on grounds that it appears to have been unable to defend.  It will not be anxious to repeat the mistake. 

As I was preparing to publish this article, local academy news is overtaken by the ideological decision to force all schools in England to have converted or started on the route to become academies by 2020.  Whilst I normally confined myself to matters relating only to Kent and Medway on this website, the impact of this appalling decision on local schools is such that I have added a couple of paragraphs at the foot of the page.

As the conversion rate to academise has reduced to a trickle before this news, there are just two new Academies for February, Manor Community Primary School, Dartford, and Twydall Primary School in Gillingham, the latter having finally seen its future settled as it has been sponsored by Rainham Mark Grammar School after a very difficult failed take-over attempt by the Learning Schools Academy Trust.

There are several new converter applications: Simon Langton Girls Grammar; Upton Junior, Broadstairs; Temple Hill and Oakfield Primaries, Dartford.

News below about: two new build primary academies; Maidstone School of Science and Technology (or rather lack of news!); Castle Community College; Cranbrook School; Chatham Grammar School for Boys; Royal Harbour Academy (not an academy) and the Coastal Academies Trust; and a new 11-14 extension (or is it?) to Leigh University Technical College.  

It was only when I alerted parents on this website in January that the school had applied for academy status that many people learned what was going on and I was contacted by concerned staff to ask if it were true......

Opposition to the proposal is now growing rapidly and has clearly been fuelled by the failures of the school to keep parents and staff informed of the decision and its progress, of their handling of the situation, and also of multiple failures to follow procedures. A parental petition against the proposal has attracted over 1000 signatures.   

I have now been sent a comprehensive and convincing document that exposes what appears to be a cover up by the Governing Body to avoid public debate on the issue and numerous examples of malpractice and serious conflict of interest. The sad thing is that reading the Context section of Spires Academy's Response to the Pre-Warning Notice, one can see why Simon Langton has set out to support Spires Academy  for wholly laudable reasons as part of its Community mission, but has gone about it in entirely the wrong way, perhaps driven by government pressure which is ever-present in such situations.   

There has been just one consultation event, on 14^th April, at which the school claimed that that Parents had been informed of the decision in a Newsletter of November 2015, and the information had been on the website. In response to concerns raised at that meeting: “The governors believe that the consultation was well publicised as the newsletters are on the website, as are the letters to parents. An Academy Status section was added to the website for further information at the end of term 4 as well”. As it happens, there is no newsletter for November 2015 published, nor was the email received by some parents, and there was no other mention at all of any discussion about academies in Newsletters or elsewhere when I published my article in January, until it was reported in a consultation document sent out on 15^th March. It was subsequently referred to in the end of term newsletter at Easter, which also referred to the new academies section published on the website at the end of that term. To be fair, there is a full Report of what is clearly a contentious Consultation Meeting now published on the website, including a note that there were only three governors attending (apart from the Head and Chair who presented the case), although this is itself a worrying statement of governor priorities. The Principal of Spires Academy was present as a guest speaker to promote the proposal, although I fail to see the relevance of her attendance or contribution as the two schools are not formally connected.  

Since then there have been three further letters from the headteacher to parents, perhaps attempting to conciliate, but I suspect likely to inflame the protagonists further. The consultation period has now been extended to the 16^th May, and the latest news is that governors have themselves requested a review of procedures by KCC, suggesting they are losing their nerve.

Kent County Council has published a draft Report on Grammar Schools and Social Mobility, prepared by a Select Committee of County Councillors to be approved at a final Meeting of the Committee on June 6^th before going to full Council. There is widespread agreement that the proportion of able children from disadvantaged families gaining access to grammar schools in Kent is too low, although once the children are admitted there is clear evidence they perform almost as well as the whole cohort of grammar school entrants. This Report establishes some important principles and recommendations to be put to full County Council on 14^th July for approval, as set out below, and it is hoped that KCC will agree to promote these for the sake of those children.

For me the key statistic is that just 57.4 % of children on Free School Meals Ever (FSE, my preferred measure) who have achieved a commonly recognised grammar school standard of two Levels Five Plus in their Key Stage 2 Reading, Writing and Maths, begin grammar school, compared with 78.7% of similar ability children not in this category. This has to be wrong, especially as many of the reasons behind this disparity lie in the education sector itself………

With registration for the Kent Test opening tomorrow, 1^st June, there is still time for some of these proposals to put into place for the sake of those children concerned who will be entering secondary schools in September 2107, although there is the real issue of Test preparation where they are handicapped by competing against others who may have been coached for years for just this purpose. You will find a previous article here, that looks at the task facing the Committee, which by and large I think they have succeeded in carrying out.

None of the Committee Recommendations propose any increase in the proportion of Kent children as a whole gaining access to grammar school, currently running at approximately 29% after Kent Test, Headteacher Assessment and the Appeals procedure, and throughout there is an implicit acknowledgement that coaching for the Kent Test is currently skewing outcomes to the disadvantage of children on Pupil Premium.

Using government figures, currently 6.2% of children attending grammar school have been on FSE, compared with 22.4% in Kent non-selective schools. Two non-selective schools have a lower percentage of FSE than most grammar schools, partly because of their admission arrangements - Bennett Memorial Diocesan school, and Duke of York’s Military Academy, with another three - The Archbishop’s School, Mascalls and High Weald, having a lower percentage than one or more grammars, three other faith schools close behind. Surely this emphasises a different criterion for selection to these schools which also penalises Pupil Premium children, but appears to pass unchallenged.  

There is clear evidence that there are real barriers to progression for children on Pupil Premium from primary schools to grammars, underlined for me by a question I was asked by the Select Committee, based on their enquiries about a school in an area of high social deprivation: “What would you do about a school whose headteacher has said that there is no point in encouraging children from here to apply for grammar school, as there are too few employment opportunities in this District at the end of schooling?”. I am afraid my answer was succinct!

Sadly, there is too much evidence that children in primary schools, whose headteachers oppose selective education, are discriminated against with regard to grammar school admission. I regularly talk with families where there is no encouragement or advice given for able children by the school, no Headteacher Assessments (Appeals) and no support at appeal, so they are massively disadvantaged by their schools. It is a disgrace that such teachers use their personal opinions to damage the futures of children they should be nurturing.

I would have suggested the key target for success of the proposals should be a significant closing of the gap between the proportions of FSM and non FSM children gaining Level 5s at Key Stage 2, but with the replacement of Levels from this summer by an ill-defined numerical figure the gap, and therefore the target, will need to be redefined.

Many families of able children on FSM are put off by the very image of 'grammar school' and a sense that it is not for them, as they won't fit in. The recommendations offer a variety of strategies to involve families in the process of exploring 'grammar schools' both by individual primary and secondary schools and also the Local Authority. 

Grammar schools need to play their part in this and, whilst many are building up good relationships with primary schools, working to understand the barriers, and making themselves more approachable, others remain in their ivory towers with expensive uniforms and other trappings that can be very off-putting. The Committee goes so far as to propose “outreach to primary schools including after school classes in English and mathematics, mentoring and preparation for the Kent Test for primary aged pupils in Years 4-6 including those most academically able children in receipt of the Pupil Premium” which already happens in some areas.

Also amongst the recommendations is a challenge to grammar schools to support such children through their oversubscription criteria. In particular, this applies to the super and semi super-selective schools, The Skinners School already offering a model in which up to five top performing children who are in receipt of Free School Meals will be offered places at the school.  

There are many excellent ideas in the Sixteen Recommendations, and examples of good practice already in place, but KCC has now lost many of its powers to bring about change. With good will and determination on all sides, there is much that can be achieved, with children’s life chances being enhanced through the Social Mobility that the system ought and must encourage, a simple measure of success being the clear criterion of high performance at Key Stage 2 to measure progress,

Update: See latest article here. 

Meanwhile the controversy at Simon Langton Girls’ Grammar School in Canterbury is spiralling to an almost unbelievable level for any school, certainly a state of open warfare the like of which I have never before seen in a school. The protagonists have made extensive claims about the actions of Headteacher and Governors relating to the school’s application to become part of a Multi-Academy Trust whilst absorbing the struggling Spires Academy into the Trust. Kent County Council is being heavily drawn into the controversy with no obvious strategy to ease the problems

.......

The Trust's flagship school is The Rochester Grammar School in Medway and, amongst the other eight schools the Trust runs are Chatham Grammar School for Boys, which is to be renamed Holcombe Grammar School for September 2017 and become mixed. This places it in direct competition with Chatham Girls’ Grammar which, as a small stand-alone school in an Authority full of big Multi-Academy Trusts, is vulnerable and it has been suggested could also be swallowed up by the predator. The monopoly politics of large academy groups appears far removed from the prime purpose of schools, to educate children, not just hot-house them through hoops, and the Trust is currently having mixed success with several of its Medway schools.  

Perhaps unsurprisingly, The Rochester Grammar School website makes no mention of the suspension, but The Times picks out the following section from Ms Shepherd’s introduction: “Our success is due to our strong educational vision… our outstanding and driven leaders, dedicated teachers and support staff backed by a committed team of governors. The greatest asset in our trust is our staff”. It then provides considerable evidence of lack of trust by those same staff  in their Chief Executive. !

Ms Shepherd is one of the most senior Academy Leaders in the South London and South East Region, being one of four elected headteachers to the Board of seven members (two from Medway) which make decisions on Academy approvals. The March 2016 Meetingof the Board approved an Academy Order being issued for Simon Langton Girls’ Grammar School to be a Multi-Academy Trust, and also approved it becoming a Sponsor Academy, with conditions relating to CEO development and performance, which leads neatly on to the next item below. Poignantly, it also had as a major discussion item “the Role of Executive Headteachers”. Should have been an interesting discussion!

What is clear is that there is an unprecedented breakdown of relationships between many parents and staff on one side, and the Headteacher and Governors of the school on the other. I cannot see how the school can go on without massive change internally, and it is going to take a long time for its reputation to heal. Without passing judgement, I cannot see how the headteacher can continue in post, having completely lost the confidence of so many parts of the community. Even the Simon Langton Grammar School for Boys has put clear water between itself and SLGGS, the headteacher sending home a letter to parents which contains a well-argued case for maintaining the status quo at present. No partner support there!

Meanwhile the school has put out an end of term Newsletter on Friday that underlines the appalling Public Relations skills of the school. Whilst completely failing to mention the dispute (understandable in the circumstances) or the fresh Consultation Meeting on June 8^th in the diary dates (unforgiveable), the letter is headed by a paragraph which states “The governors of Barton Court Grammar School have announced their intention to launch a consultation with parents, local community and other parties about their plans to open a Free School on the Chaucer site and also to sponsor the Charles Dickens School in Broadstairs”. One wonders which mastermind decided to show that another school was going down a similar path, presumably in the hope of suggesting that what SLGGS was doing was not controversial. Instead what it underlines indelibly is the contrasting complete failure of SLGGS to take parents into their confidence, by attempting to prepare the conversion to academisation in secret. 

Too many other misleading communications including one sent to parents of joining children just last week which said, ".. wanted to congratulate her on obtaining a place at Langton Girls in what has been another oversubscribed year". Except that it hasn't! On allocation in March, the school put up its Planned Admission number to 170 from 165, even though it was only able to make 163 offers, so either 7 or two vacancies, take your pick. For 2015 entry, the school just filled thanks to one girl allocated a place by KCC who hadn't applied. 26 girls were offered places who hadn't put the school first, the school actually starting in September with just 157 girls for its 165 places even after appeals, the higher figure for Barton Court suggesting a shift towards the latter.   

If you want to get more than a whiff of the troubles swirling around the school, try the Academy Status Forum and stand back. Admittedly it is dominated by the rebels, but there are enough allegations with evidence posted to realise there is a very strong case to answer. Its certainly unusual to have a PTFA not allowed to meet in the school, that has to assemble in the car park to discuss ways of raising funds!

One final thought: Kent County Council has recently lost a very expensive legal action after it removed the headteacher of the Community College Whitstable, on grounds that it appears to have been unable to defend.  It will not be anxious to repeat the mistake. 

I make no apology to returning to this subject but events are unfolding so fast it is difficult to keep up.

My previous article written just on Saturday, described events at the two grammar schools, with the CEO of Thinking Schools Academy Trust, flagship school The Rochester Grammar School, being suspended The Times alleging amongst other claims that she snooped on staff email accounts and doctored parts of an external Inspection Report. Although the suspension took place back in April, it wasn’t until The Times went to press that it became public, and today the Trust has issued a statement as a result.

By contrast the Headteacher and Governors at Simon Langton Girls Grammar School in Canterbury, appear to be getting into deeper water daily, with a letter sent out yesterday from Patrick Leeson, Head of KCC’s Education and Young People’s Services Department, requiring a re-run of the Governing Body decision to apply for Academy status last November, on grounds of maladministration. Surely more importantly, the GB should have been focusing with concern  the strong evidence of the school’s sharp fall in popularity as explained below, an issue that has been raised by several commentators concerned for the future of the school.

"Recently the Board received an allegation from an individual about the Chief Executive, Denise Shepherd. The Trust, which is duty bound to investigate any allegation, took the decision to suspend Ms Shepherd whilst it investigated the substance of the allegation."

The Trust said it was unable to make any further comment on details of the allegation, although the suspension took place over a month ago, but said it had taken steps to ensure the education of the pupils is not affected. Stuart Gardner the previous Executive Head of Chatham Grammar School for Boys and The Victory Academy is to assume the role of Director of Secondary Education in TSAT, and will be supported by Claire Stevens who is already the Director of Primary Education in TSAT.

My own view is that it will take a very brave, or very foolish, Governing Body to proceed with academisation in view of all the controversy they have released through their self-evident mishandling of the process, the misleading statements that have been released, and the attempts to hide what was going on until it became impossible because of adverse publicity.

There is no doubt that the whole reputation of the school is severely tarnished and it is going to take considerable time, determination and ability to right the situation and return to it the fine reputation the school rightly earned just a few years ago. That its reputation is clearly fading is demonstrated by the 2015 admission figures and rates of transfer into the Sixth Form.

For September 2016, the headteacher has written out to parents of new girls joining in September, describing the school as ‘oversubscribed’. This is unfortunately untrue, as just 163 girls were offered places in March, out of 165, although actually as the school increased its Planned Admission number by 5 to 170, there were 7 vacancies before appeal. Because there was no oversubscription, no girls who appealed will have passed the Kent test, although I don’t yet have the data for outcomes.

King’s Farm Primary School in Gravesend has been removed from Special Measures early, OFSTED Inspectors making three ‘Good’ assessments in: The Effectiveness of Leadership and Management; Personal Development, Behaviour and Welfare; together with Early Years Provision. However it is still classified as ‘Requires Improvement’ because of the vagaries of the ‘Quality Assurance’ process.

The school had been placed in Special Measures in October 2014 by OFSTED as explained here. That Inspection team, although faced with the wreckage left from a train crash brought about by the appalling management of a local Multi Academy Trust brought in by Kent County Council to improve standards, acknowledged early signs of improvement in their Report after the school had been handed over to the leadership of neighbouring Ifield School. 

The following paragraph is based on quotes from the most recent Report, as is much of the commentary that follows.  

As a Governor, I am delighted that Governance is described as excellent, the Consultant Headteacher responding to the previous Inspection with determination and a clear and uncompromising vision shared by staff that promotes the achievement of every child within a caring community. Since the last Inspection, leaders have relentlessly driven improvement, their accurate knowledge of the school, and the highly positive ethos they have created helping to promote further improvement. Overall, the school has been transformed. This rapid improvement was enabled by the partnership with Ifield school (an OFSTED Outstanding Special School) in a Federation from September 2015 which brought in the visionary oversight of the executive headteacher. …..

Much of the Report describes a school that is actually outstanding in a number of respects and, at the Inspectors’ Feedback at which I was present, there was much discussion of the agreed astonishing trajectory of improvement taking place in the school. However, there is no doubt that the school is still catching up on the appalling situation of the summer of 2014 when two thirds of the staff resigned many in protest at the leadership of the school, Key Stage Two results were cancelled because of cheating by senior staff, and KS1 results were also annulled because of cheating, both of which appeared to have been tolerated by the Academy Trust, as those responsible were allowed to remain in post in their home schools. You will find the background here. 

It was acknowledged by the Inspectors at this latest Inspection that, where there were still areas for improvement any issues behind them are now fundamentally resolved because of robust action by the school leadership and, with the current more stable staffing situation any remaining underperformance should fade away.

King’s Farm Primary serves a community with above average levels of deprivation, although this would be difficult to determine from aspects of the Report. Creativity pervades the school, illustrated by magnificent displays which celebrate pupil’s work and also the imaginative approaches used to help pupils learn well. Singing has been energised by a music specialist. Pupils' understanding of the fundamental British values of democracy, tolerance and respect are strong because these values are reinforced through the curriculum and throughout every aspect of school life. There is a strong sense of community based on the school’s values and pupils who met the Inspectors could enthusiastically describe examples of aspiration, courage, creativity, honesty, kindness respect and responsibility around them. Great care is shown to all pupils, including impressive support for those who face challenges. Pupils are very supportive of each other, including those from Ifield School. Behaviour is good and pupils are proud to be members of King’s Farm Primary School. There is an extensive range of extra-curricular clubs. The family support worker is tenacious in following up issues.

There is plenty more in the same vein, reflecting what can be done in a maintained school which enjoys a productive relationship with the Local Authority.

I am so proud to be a governor of the Cedar Federation, of what has been achieved at King’s Farm Primary, of commitment of the teachers who have worked so hard to bring this about (amazing how many are still working away after school on a Friday, a time when I am in) but most of all of our children, described as being polite to each other and to visitors, opening doors, and showing good manners at all times. The Executive Headteacher and driving force of the Federation, Pam Jones OBE, is a National Leader of Education who has overseen this astonishing recovery.  She is supported by a superb leadership and, whilst the inspirational Consultant Headteacher of King’s Farm, Catherine Taylor, is moving on job done, to Murston Primary School in Sittingbourne for September, she will be succeeded by a head of school designate who has worked in the school since January and, according to OFSTED, is flourishing in his role and well prepared for the leadership transition, taking over a fully staffed school.

OFSTED waxes lyrically over the new Federation Governing Body led by an astute chair of governors. They praise governors wide ranging expertise and their high motivation, using detailed knowledge of pupils’ progress to challenge school leaders effectively, and frequently visiting the school to see for themselves how staff are implementing changes.

However, there is still much to be done. Not surprisingly the school is full for September, and the school is now a happy and safe place for children, but the relentless drive for further improvement required by OFSTED is in the safe hands of a total committed and able teaching staff, leadership and governing body. 

For update, go to here.

Kent County Council has published a draft Report on Grammar Schools and Social Mobility, prepared by a Select Committee of County Councillors to be approved at a final Meeting of the Committee on June 6th before going to full Council. There is widespread agreement that the proportion of able children from disadvantaged families gaining access to grammar schools in Kent is too low, although once the children are admitted there is clear evidence they perform almost as well as the whole cohort of grammar school entrants. This Report establishes some important principles and recommendations to be put to full County Council on 14th July for approval, as set out below, and it is hoped that KCC will agree to promote these for the sake of those children.

For me the key statistic is that just 57.4 % of children on Free School Meals Ever (FSE, my preferred measure) who have achieved a commonly recognised grammar school standard of two Levels Five Plus in their Key Stage 2 Reading, Writing and Maths, begin grammar school, compared with 78.7% of similar ability children not in this category. This has to be wrong, especially as many of the reasons behind this disparity lie in the education sector itself………

With registration for the Kent Test opening tomorrow, 1^st June, there is still time for some of these proposals to put into place for the sake of those children concerned who will be entering secondary schools in September 2107, although there is the real issue of Test preparation where they are handicapped by competing against others who may have been coached for years for just this purpose. You will find a previous article here, that looks at the task facing the Committee, which by and large I think they have succeeded in carrying out.

None of the Committee Recommendations propose any increase in the proportion of Kent children as a whole gaining access to grammar school, currently running at approximately 29% after Kent Test, Headteacher Assessment and the Appeals procedure, and throughout there is an implicit acknowledgement that coaching for the Kent Test is currently skewing outcomes to the disadvantage of children on Pupil Premium.

Using government figures, currently 6.2% of children attending grammar school have been on FSE, compared with 22.4% in Kent non-selective schools. Two non-selective schools have a lower percentage of FSE than most grammar schools, partly because of their admission arrangements - Bennett Memorial Diocesan school, and Duke of York’s Military Academy, with another three - The Archbishop’s School, Mascalls and High Weald, having a lower percentage than one or more grammars, three other faith schools close behind. Surely this emphasises a different criterion for selection to these schools which also penalises Pupil Premium children, but appears to pass unchallenged.  

There is clear evidence that there are real barriers to progression for children on Pupil Premium from primary schools to grammars, underlined for me by a question I was asked by the Select Committee, based on their enquiries about a school in an area of high social deprivation: “What would you do about a school whose headteacher has said that there is no point in encouraging children from here to apply for grammar school, as there are too few employment opportunities in this District at the end of schooling?”. I am afraid my answer was succinct!

Sadly, there is too much evidence that children in primary schools, whose headteachers oppose selective education, are discriminated against with regard to grammar school admission. I regularly talk with families where there is no encouragement or advice given for able children by the school, no Headteacher Assessments (Appeals) and no support at appeal, so they are massively disadvantaged by their schools. It is a disgrace that such teachers use their personal opinions to damage the futures of children they should be nurturing.

I would have suggested the key target for success of the proposals should be a significant closing of the gap between the proportions of FSM and non FSM children gaining Level 5s at Key Stage 2, but with the replacement of Levels from this summer by an ill-defined numerical figure the gap, and therefore the target, will need to be redefined.

Many families of able children on FSM are put off by the very image of 'grammar school' and a sense that it is not for them, as they won't fit in. The recommendations offer a variety of strategies to involve families in the process of exploring 'grammar schools' both by individual primary and secondary schools and also the Local Authority. 

Grammar schools need to play their part in this and, whilst many are building up good relationships with primary schools, working to understand the barriers, and making themselves more approachable, others remain in their ivory towers with expensive uniforms and other trappings that can be very off-putting. The Committee goes so far as to propose “outreach to primary schools including after school classes in English and mathematics, mentoring and preparation for the Kent Test for primary aged pupils in Years 4-6 including those most academically able children in receipt of the Pupil Premium” which already happens in some areas.

Also amongst the recommendations is a challenge to grammar schools to support such children through their oversubscription criteria. In particular, this applies to the super and semi super-selective schools, The Skinners School already offering a model in which up to five top performing children who are in receipt of Free School Meals will be offered places at the school.  

There are many excellent ideas in the Sixteen Recommendations, and examples of good practice already in place, but KCC has now lost many of its powers to bring about change. With good will and determination on all sides, there is much that can be achieved, with children’s life chances being enhanced through the Social Mobility that the system ought and must encourage, a simple measure of success being the clear criterion of high performance at Key Stage 2 to measure progress,

A BBC news item last evening (Monday), reporting on the recommendations of the Grammar Schools and Social Mobility Committee of KCC (see previous article), contained the startling opinion that, in order to meet the objectives of the Committee, another 700 grammar school places would need to be created.

Although not mentioned, this would be spread across the five years of compulsory secondary education and so, capping the secondary transfer rate at the current 29%, including all three routes to selection, the Committee is looking at just 120 more places for high performing children on Free School Meals in Kent’s 32 grammar schools each year, fewer than 4 children per average grammar school with an intake of 150 students  

In fact, there is no suggestion or intimation whatever in the Committee’s recommendations that a single new place should be created, which would of course increase the current 29% of the school population attending grammar school, an idea for which there appears no political will.

The Committee main thrusts are as follows:……

1) By improving opportunities and awareness for high-achieving pupils on Pupil Premium through a variety of strategies, outlined in the Report and as reported in my previous article, to narrow the current gap between 57% of these pupils attending grammar school, as compared with 79% of non-disadvantaged pupils.

2)To produce a fairer playing field by reducing the effects of coaching, started with the new Kent Test, by supporting Pupil Premium children to perform to their full potential in the Test, and through intervention in the Headteacher Assessment process. This would improve the balance between the two groups of children without increasing the number of places. 

3)To free up more places in Kent grammar schools, by proposing to the super selective grammar schools and others in North West Kent, that they seek to offer more opportunities to local children, as exemplified by the Judd School’s recent decision to give priority to Kent children, rather than chase high fliers from outside the county. Whilst the two Wilmington grammar schools have also moved to offer priority to Kent children, the two Dartford Grammars have moved in the opposite direction, depriving local grammar qualified children of places, with a total of 320 NW Kent grammar school places going to out of county children, and reducing opportunities for those living in Kent.

I cannot see all the sixteen proposed strategies to achieve their aims coming into play quickly, for KCC does not have direct powers and so must seek to influence all the relevant schools. Realistically, I would therefore like to see the Council setting an ambitious target on the way to meeting equality of opportunity, to measure progress.  

I now have detailed figures for Medway’s Primary Reception and Junior School allocations for September 2016, and they confirm the data quoted in my initial article on primary school allocations, published in April.

The overall outcome in terms of preferences and vacancies is similar to 2015, although another 60 late places were put into two Gillingham schools, St Thomas of Canterbury Catholic and Woodlands Academy to head off problems. 40 extra unplanned places were put into Elaine Primary Academy, but in the end, these were not used.

Rainham is the most pressured area again, with not a single Reception place left unfilled. Most popular school is St Margaret’s Infants’ also in Rainham, turning away 39 first choices, soaring from nine last year. This is followed by: Brompton-Westbrook (Academy), (31), third most popular in 2015; Swingate 27, another school that has increased sharply in popularity; Pilgrim and Bligh Infants (Academy applications in progress), (25); and All Faiths Children’s Academy and Cliffe Woods Primary Academy (23).

Five primary schools have over a third of their places empty, headed by All Hallows Primary Academy on the Hoo Peninsula with a 60% vacancy rate for its 30 places, although Twydall has the largest number, with 34 of its 75 places going empty.

I look more closely at each Medway area below, together with the situation for Junior Schools…….

There are just four schools out of the 18 in total with vacancies, sharing 71 between them, most at Lordswood with 26 of its 60 places unfilled (one of the three primary schools in the Lordswood District along with Swingate), a sharp decline since its takeover by Griffin Academy Trust, from two years ago when it was full. This is a percentage of 43%, third highest in Medway. It is followed by Oaklands with 21 vacancies. There are 40 Local Authority allocations of children to schools for families who have not been offered any of their choices, biggest numbers going to Luton Infants and St John’s CofE Infants, the latter only having nine first choices, the lowest number in urban Medway.  

As a result there are now seven primary schools with vacancies, headed up by Twydall with 34, which has not yet recovered its popularity since being placed in Special Measures, followed by a controversial takeover attempt. After the closing date for primary applications it was taken over as an Academy by Rainham Mark Grammar and one can expect to see improvement next year. Next is Napier Community with 14 spaces, run by the controversial Kemnal Manor Academy Trust, these schools being two of just three with vacancies in 2015. Oasis Academy Skinner Street, hopefully recovering from its own Special Measures assessment, still has 9 vacant spaces after 20 children are allocated to the school by Medway Council.

As usual, fewer than half the nine schools are oversubscribed, also headed as usual by Cliffe Woods with its Outstanding OFSTED, the tribulations of the now departed headteacher not having dented its popularity, the school turning away 36 first choices. It is one of just six Medway Primaries along with High Halstow that only offered places to first choices reflecting its strong popularity with local families, or else geographical difficulties to choosing elsewhere. It is followed by Chattenden with nine rejections, and High Halstow with six.

However, just two schools with vacancies this year, All Hallows with 18, the Medway school with the highest percentage of empty places at 60%, and St James’ CofE Academy 14, fourth highest vacancy rate at 40%, and with both schools having an intake of just 30 they must be under considerable financial pressure.

Warren Wood Primary Academy has had a torrid time until recently taken over by Greenacre Academy, and it will take time for changes to work through. In the meantime, parents are waiting to be convinced and the school had eleven of its 60 places left vacant even after 25 children were allocated there by the Council, giving Rochester the highest proportion of Allocations in Medway at 7%.

The schools with vacancies are headed by Elaine Primary Academy, which bizarrely had its capacity increased by 40, but as a result now has 59 of its 90 places vacant with none of the extras taken up. An interesting way of creating extra capacity for remove these and the total number of vacancies across Medway falls from seven to six per cent. The other two schools with a small number of vacancies are Cedar, still losing its reputation as the troubled and previously named Sherwin Knight, and Cuxton Academy, now linked up with the failed Junior School as part of the Primary First Trust.

The previously failed Temple Mill is now full, having become an Academy sponsored by  The Howard School, suggesting that parents are comfortable with the new arrangement.  

17 of the 26 Medway Council allocations are to New Horizons Children’s Academy, which has opened up another class to accommodate the Phoenix children. 

Last Thursday, I had the privilege of attending the launch of Volume Three of the outcomes of St John's Catholic Comprehensive School awesome Historical Project, entitled “The Valour Still Shines” totalling 1250 expertly researched and professionally produced pages of detail, a superb model of research by any standard. The three book set records the lives and deaths of the 565 names on Gravesend’s Town War Memorial on Windmill Hill, along with much additional and relevant information about the war, the battles and the local history of the town and the Memorial.

What is even more remarkable is that such a project has been undertaken by over a hundred History Society students and others following the school Applied History GCSE Course. Not surprisingly, such an endeavour was led by an inspirational figure, in this case, Colm Murphy, a history teacher at the school, who has recently been awarded the accolade of Kent History Teacher of the Year. 

Coincidentally,……

I have been researching in a minor way the sixty names on the Christ Church, Gravesend, Memorial stone, which was recently re-discovered, having been interred in the church grounds for the past eighty years, as explained below.

The Windmill Hill biographies were created using various sources from the Commonwealth War Graves Commission website through to Pension Records, Census Returns, newspaper reports and obituaries and drawing on Regimental Histories and books on the subject. One aim was to have as many illustrations as possible and even if there is not a portrait, every serviceman who fell in France or Belgium has an image of their headstone or name on a Memorial included. This required several well organised trips to France and Belgium to cover the many soldiers commemorated there. The students benefitted from help by staff and from many local historians as well as relatives of the casualties. Sponsorship was provided from Gravesham Council which paid for the first book and from the Heritage Lottery which paid for the following two volumes. The three books cover 565 names – each volume comprising over 400 pages, A4, softback and heavily illustrated. Books retail at £25 each to include postage from the school.

The school is widely recognised for its expertise in this area and is regularly chosen to represent English students at commemoration events. There is an all night vigil at Westminster Abbey, in the presence of the Queen, on the evening before 1st July. Members of the school are giving several of the readings at the vigil, whilst others will form the Guard of Honour at the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior  during part of the night. In addition students and staff at St John's have organised and are taking part in a  Charity Cycle Challenge from Gravesend to Ypres and back beginning on 2^nd July.

This is not a Society that rests on its laurels and now the Windmill Hill Memorial set of volumes is completed, the students are focusing on the many other memorials in the Borough starting with those in the Swanscombe area.

There is an accompanying website and the progress and work may be followed here – www.gravesend14-18.co.uk. 

I have been researching the names, greatly aided by the arrival of the St John's research books, partially so that we can trace any descendants of relatives. You will find further information about the memorial, together with a list of the names, along with the results of my research so far here. 

Several times on the pages of this website, I have written about “the worst ever” OFSTED Report I had read at the time with regard to Kent or Medway schools or academies failing because of incompetent management and leadership. However, the recent Report placing Wayfield Primary School in Chatham in Special Measures leaves the competition standing. In 2013, just before the school was taken over by Griffin, OFSTED had found it a GOOD school.

Whilst the school may indeed have been "Proud to Achieve" in 2013 some excerpts from the current Report describe the shocking fall from grace brought about by the Griffin Trust :

Media commentary by Radio Kent and the Medway Messenger on this appalling betrayal of children’s life chances missed my previous story, first reported in the Guardian, that: “in just two years the Trust paid over £700,000 to a company jointly owned by its two chief executives.Three other companies in which trustees of the charity have majority interests received smaller payments that amounted to around £100,000 for “educational consultancy services’”, the trust’s accounts show”. This is a common device by some academy chains to ensure an adequate financial reward for their leaders’ noble endeavours.....

Griffin took over four Medway schools when it expanded into Medway, all placed under pressure to convert to academies, in order to improve standards(!). Governors of Wayfield Primary, in spite of its previous Good OFSTED, will also have been pressured because of low KS2 Results (reflecting the Community!) and presumably gave in, believing the false propaganda that they were acting in the interests of children, but instead plunging the school into a sharp spiral of decline. They were also let down badly by Medway Council which proposed two alternatives, Oasis and Griffin. Skinner Street Primary which took the alternative also fared badly under Oasis!

One factor in the disaster is clearly down to the financial arrangements for the school imposed by Griffin. Governors at another of the four schools were informed that their income would be top-sliced by 3.5% to pay for the Griffin Trust Services (I am told this being at the top end for such arrangements), presumably to part fund the ‘educational consultancy services’. However, shortly after their take-over, when they had lost control to Griffin, Governors were brusquely told that the top-slice would be increased to 5.5%. In spite of strong complaints to the Griffin Trust and the Regional Schools Commissioner governors concerns were completely ignored. 

Reading the Wayfield OFSTED Report, one can see some of the direct outcomes of this approach, with major staff economies needed to pay for Trust top-slicing:

 A very poignant sentence reads: ”Pupils who spoke with inspectors were friendly and polite. They are normal, nice children, with hopes for their futures. They were just rather wistful at times, wishing for something better in their school". As in so many examples in this Report, I have never read anything like this elsewhere, showing precisely where the sympathies of the Inspectors lay. 

The Report goes on to state: “The Griffin Schools Trust recognises that it has not been successful in gaining the necessary support of parents and the local community. It has worked with the regional schools commissioner to agree to pass the school to another academy trust in the autumn. The two trusts have established transition arrangements. The new trust intends to add immediately to the school’s leadership capacity. It is correct in this aim”. Actually, the abject failure of the school is not primarily to do with gaining support, it is in ruining children’s futures, with the loss of support of parents following on as a consequence. The Trust's pathetic excuse is that it was unable to attract staff. I agree that finding staff in the current climate is especially difficult, but retention is equally important and when the Trust took over Wayfield Primary, staff were ready and enthusiastic to face up to the challenge. Sadly, they rapidly became disillusioned and many left. A description in the media stories above about how OFSTED Inspectors had to break up a fight amongst children in the lunch-time during the Inspection, because school staff would not intervene is almost beyond belief and shows the depths to which Griffin Trust has lowered staff morale and commitment.

One must not forget that the previous OFSTED Report from February 2013 before the school became an academy, recorded that: “This is a good school. Since the last inspection, the school has maintained its nurturing and caring strengths at the same time as improving achievement, teaching and leadership.  Behaviour is good in lessons and around the school, and pupils feel safe and secure. Their enthusiasm for learning helps them to achieve well. Good teaching makes learning interesting and fun for pupils so that they try hard. Strong links with parents and the children’s centre help children to settle into the Early Years Foundation Stage and learn to enjoy school and their learning. The headteacher and governing body give strong leadership and direction to the school’s work, and senior leaders, managers and staff work effectively as a close team to bring about improvement”. It takes a particular kind of talent to destroy such achievement so rapidly.

Of course that was all four headteachers ago, and before Griffin really got to work. I have seen correspondence between Governors of another Griffin school, the Trust and the Regional Schools Commissioner complaining bitterly about how Governors were misled by false promises into joining up with Griffin, the arrogant way that Griffin acted without consultation on strategic matters, about headteachers and staff who were moved from school to school without discussion, with inappropriate and inexperienced replacements being made to fill gaps (a not uncommon practice in some academy chains, amounting to asset stripping); able senior staff quitting in dismay; and failure to respond to any attempt at dialogue about such decisions. 

The new chosen sponsor for Wayfield Primary is another small Trust, “Primary First”, which runs four Bexley Primary Schools and the two at Cuxton in Medway, Cuxton Juniors having previously been placed in Special Measures and then let down again and again by Medway Council. Because of the government decision not to OFSTED new academies for two years (now extended to three to avoid this type of disaster being picked up too soon!), there is no current OFSTED evidence of the success of otherwise of this second Trust, but early signs are good with much improved KS2 results over the past two years at Cuxton.

See more recent comment on Simon Langton here, and on Thinking Schools Academy Trust here. 

I make no apology to returning to this subject but events are unfolding so fast it is difficult to keep up.

My previous article written just on Saturday, described events at the two grammar schools, with the CEO of Thinking Schools Academy Trust, flagship school The Rochester Grammar School, being suspended The Times alleging amongst other claims that she snooped on staff email accounts and doctored parts of an external Inspection Report. Although the suspension took place back in April, it wasn’t until The Times went to press that it became public, and today the Trust has issued a statement as a result.

By contrast the Headteacher and Governors at Simon Langton Girls Grammar School in Canterbury, appear to be getting into deeper water daily, with a letter sent out yesterday from Patrick Leeson, Head of KCC’s Education and Young People’s Services Department, requiring a re-run of the Governing Body decision to apply for Academy status last November, on grounds of maladministration. Surely more importantly, the GB should have been focusing with concern  the strong evidence of the school’s sharp fall in popularity as explained below, an issue that has been raised by several commentators concerned for the future of the school.

"Recently the Board received an allegation from an individual about the Chief Executive, Denise Shepherd. The Trust, which is duty bound to investigate any allegation, took the decision to suspend Ms Shepherd whilst it investigated the substance of the allegation."which claims 

The Trust said it was unable to make any further comment on details of the allegation, although the suspension took place over a month ago, but said it had taken steps to ensure the education of the pupils is not affected. Stuart Gardner the previous Executive Head of Chatham Grammar School for Boys and The Victory Academy is to assume the role of Director of Secondary Education in TSAT, and will be supported by Claire Stevens who is already the Director of Primary Education in TSAT.

There is no doubt that the whole reputation of the school is severely tarnished and it is going to take considerable time, determination and ability to right the situation and return to it the fine reputation the school rightly earned just a few years ago. That its reputation is clearly fading is demonstrated by the 2015 admission figures and rates of transfer into the Sixth Form.

For September 2016, the headteacher has written out to parents of new girls joining in September, describing the school as ‘oversubscribed’. This is unfortunately untrue, as just 163 girls were offered places in March, out of 165, although actually as the school increased its Planned Admission number by 5 to 170, there were 7 vacancies before appeal. Because there was no oversubscription, no girls who appealed will have passed the Kent test, although I don’t yet have the data for outcomes.

I wrote in a previous article, back in January, about Sixth Form Staying on Rates into Grammar Schools and expressed my long held view that there needs to be a healthy transition from non-selective to grammar schools at Sixth Form Level, to allow for late development. Possibly as a result of this article, an FOI request was made to KCC through the 'What Do They Know' website asking for the full data on post sixteen destinations from non-selective schools.

This shows that 513 young people from non-selective schools transferred into grammar Sixth Forms, an average of 16 into each of the 32 Kent grammars, surely a very healthy number. Another 4880 stayed on in non-selective sixth forms whilst 4889 progressed to Further Education Colleges or other Training situations. That left at most 6.5% of the cohort of 11151 young people to become, using the horrible term NEETS, not in Education, Employment or Training, exactly the national average......

Interestingly, 2.5% of Pupil Premium students in non-selective schools move across at 16+, as part of the 4.6% overall population trnaferring, a higher proportion than I would have expected.

Of course very few of these children will have transferred to the wholly super-selectives, and a break down by individual school would have been more helpful to show those grammar schools embracing the concept of wider accessibility into the sixth form, compared with those adopting a more insular approach.

However, my previous article suggests the schools most likely to encourage transfer of ‘late developers’, include: Simon Langton Boys in Canterbury; Chatham & Clarendon, and Dane Court, both in Thanet; Highworth and Norton Knatchbull in Ashford; Gravesend and Mayfield in Gravesham; and Wilmington Girls and Boys in Dartford.

There may be others disguised by a lower staying on rate of their own students and I have submitted my own FOI request to try and determine this. 

Events at Simon Langton Girls’ Grammar School continue apace since my previous article at the beginning of last month. See also article on resignation of Chief Executive of Thinking Schools Academy Trust.

Main details are that the school has now withdrawn its application to become an Academy, a number of governors and the clerk to governors resigned, and the Chairman of Governors has resigned.

Now KCC has appointed five new governors to the GB and a new Chairman has been elected, “bringing with them considerable educational and leadership experience and nationally recognised expertise in school governance”. The new Chairman is Dr Christine Carpenter, who a few years ago was Headteacher of the Sacred Heart High School, a girls’ Catholic School in Hammersmith. Most of the other new governors are recognisable as also being involved with education in Kent. However, there are still massive and ongoing troubles which affect the school.

A letter to parents, “Sent on behalf of Simon Langton Girls’ Grammar School Governing Body and Kent County Council”, so unclear whether the existing Governing Body has actually produced or approved it, sets out the main changes and pledges that “Moving forward the school governors and Kent County Council are determined to ensure that relationships can be restored under a new climate of openness and transparency”.

However, matters to be resolved include ....

a wide range of formal complaints by over twenty staff to KCC about the conduct of the Headteacher including complaints about bullying of staff, and threats of strike action unless matters are resolved unheard of in a grammar school and indicative of massive management failure.

There are also significant issues relating to school finances, and those authorised to work on them, including the headteacher’s husband who appears to have no formal position, but is bursar of Spires Academy. As far as I am aware there are no suggestions of personal gain from any current financial mismanagement.

Although the formal connection with Spires Academy continues, the long term situation needs to be resolved, now the two schools are no longer going ahead with a Multi-Academy Trust. The likelihood is, that given the low academic performance of Spires Academy, it will now be placed under the control of an existing Trust as had been previously proposed. The difficulties of Spires have not necessarily been its own fault, and it has struggled as a school for as long as I can remember, since long before becoming an Academy.  

From the beginning there appears to have been no doubt that the headteacher and governing body kept parents in ignorance or misled them about the proposal to academise and formally take Spires Academy into the Academy Trust. The two leading figures here were the Chairman of Governors and the Headteacher. The Chairman has now gone, as have most of the responsible governors. So, will anyone be held to account?

When Governors cancelled the Consultation Meeting for parents on withdrawing the academisation application, they promised another meeting in early July. Whilst I agree that such a meeting would now serve no purpose, as the atmosphere would inevitably become poisonous and destructive, this needs to be acknowledged, even if only to inform parents that the new Governing Body will be issuing a statement after their first GB Meeting on 14^th July.

In spite of many allegations to the contrary there is no evidence that the headteacher sought personal gain from the academy proposal, and I believe that exactly like many other school leaders she saw this was the best future for the two schools. If the Governing Body had been open and transparent about its proposal, there would still have been a reaction, but the school may well have weathered it. As it is, by their actions the school has generated enormous bad publicity, morale has been wrecked, there is almost a state of civil war between some parents and some staff on one side, and the headteacher and current Governing Body on the other, with the Local Authority swinging from support for the school to recognising the need for urgent and decisive action.

 The Authority, which has final responsibility for the school, still has to take decisions regarding the staff complaints, the alleged financial irregularities, a multitude of parental complaints, the responsibility for what it has ruled are significant irregularities amounting to maladministration in the academisation procedures adopted by the governing body, and the actions of the headteacher.  

The school, the Local Authority, the Regional Schools Commissioner and the Department for Education have all been inundated with a plethora of multiple requests for information under the Freedom of Information Act and directly, of complaints about the headteacher and governors, with publicised requests to others to copy their actions, presumably on the basis that multiple identical requests will be taken more seriously, and developing what is now called an “echo chamber” of opnion.  I cannot speak for the other organisations, but it is a wonder that the school and the headteacher have managed to keep a semblance of normality under this torrent of correspondence to investigate and to respond to. Without knowing the details of how it has been managed in the interests of the girls, it is surely a matter for congratulation that they have kept the school operating, and planning for the new academic year, normally a very busy time of the calendar for senior leadership.  

The headteacher has been under intensive personal and destructive pressure from social media, the like of which I have never seen or heard of before, relating to any headteacher in the country. The damage that this will have done to the school is immeasurable and wholly unreasonable, and one can only speculate on what it has done to the thousand girls being educated at the school who must surely be bewildered as they see the character assassination of their headteacher carried out in public.  She has self-evidently made serious mistakes and could lose her job over this, but there are many other worse heads who have endured nothing like this, and one can only speculate what this has done to her personally. As a retired headteacher myself, whatever she has done, I have enormous sympathy for her situation which no one should have to endure.  

Those conducting the campaign to oust her will no doubt argue they have had no alternative, given the nature of the allegations and the failure of those in authority to act in a timely and appropriate way. They may well be right, but if so the failure lies with those in authority who should have acted as soon as the faults became apparent.

What is happening is no way to resolve problems, with personal abuse taking the place of process, demeaning all associated with it.

A plea from a wise and brave student attending Simon Langton Girls’ Grammar:

“I just want to know where the humanity has gone? Why has this gotten so primal? When did everyone start wanting blood?”. This statement should head up every communication from either side, to remind them what civilised behaviour should be.   

PLEASE NOTE: I DO NOT PUBLISH COMMENTS THAT CONTAIN PERSONAL ATTACKS ON INDIVIDUALS 

Following the news last month that Denise Shepherd, The Trust Chief Executive of the Thinking Schools Academy Trust had been suspended, a letter to parents today (Friday), on what is the last day of the school year for some (why just some?) of the Trust’s schools, announces briefly that she has now ‘decided to leave’ the Trust.

As is normal in such situations, it is likely that a financial deal has been done to avoid an expensive disciplinary action taking place, with a newspaper article in The Times reporting extensive evidence supporting claims of alleged snooping on staff email accounts and doctoring parts of an external inspection report, along with other allegations.....

Naturally any such financial deal is paid for out of Trust Funds which are supposed to be put towards the education of the children in Trust schools, a recent Kent settlement reported as being considerably greater than a half million pounds, for a headteacher on a far lower salary than Ms Shepherd’s £215,000 p.a.

The Rochester Grammar School website still contains a Principal’s welcome, main signatory the soon to depart Trust Chief Executive, the Principal himself coming after, confirming the main source of power in the school and the Trust, a fact that has contributed to considerable unhappiness amongst many staff, as encapsulated in The Times allegations. The ‘happy, caring’ ethos it describes is self-evidently historical, but may of course now be restored under the sound leadership of the new interim Trust leader.  

Stuart Gardiner, the Trust’s current Director of Secondary Education, has been appointed Interim Chief Executive Officer, the two page letter to parents going into considerable detail about the backgrounds of the new Trust leaders, actually of limited interest to most parents who would be more interested in the consequences for individual schools. Naturally, no mention of the troubles that preceded the decision of Ms Shepherd to ‘decide to leave’ which must have had a debilitating effect on staff morale.

However, no doubt with her extensive background in high education politics she will find an important new role, as do so many other displaced senior leaders, hopefully having learned that certain actions are unacceptable. 

Notification of Decision

There is a somewhat hidden reference on each school website to a letter informing parents from the new Interim Chairman of the LSSAT Board:

Actually this is not true as ALL Lilac Sky Academies are being transferred to other Academy Trusts "to serve the needs of our children!" One can only speculate on how the Regional Schools Commissioner feels the current needs of children have not been met under LSSAT. 

The haste with which the decision to close the academies operation has been reached can be gauged by the previous decision to move the  move the Trust Headquarters to the Thistle Hill Academy on the Isle of Sheppey just a fortnight ago on 4th July, according to Companies House.  

A statement from the Trust on the BBC Website reads: "Lilac Sky Schools Academy Trust has decided that in order to serve the needs of our children we should seek new partners to take on the running of our schools. We are also working closely with the principal of each school, as well as the new trusts, to ensure that the children's education is not disrupted. All of the schools will finish the academic year as planned and be able to reopen for the new academic year in September." Of course it is not true that Lilac Sky has found new partners. The new Trusts taking over the schools will be completely independent of Lilac Sky whose interest is being terminated. The statement also confirms the changeover is to happen in September. 

A programme from the Channel Four Dispatches series with the above title, broadcast on Monday evening, focused on leaders of some Academy chains who are taking large sums of money out of the schools under their control, and away from the children's education.  

Issues in the programme focused on: huge salaries; what are called ‘related party transactions’ where business deals and services are connected back to the Trust; large expense accounts; and the exclusions of ‘inconvenient pupils’ often with Special Education Needs.  

I do not propose to go into detail about the general misuses of public funds uncovered, for you can read them in the accompanying article, but I have previously reported examples of many of the scandals in Kent and Medway in various articles in this website, some referenced again below.

An analysis of some of the more prominent academy chains shows that size and performance bear limited connection with reward, the Head of one single school Academy Trust earning £176,000 last year. This was some £25,000 more than the CEO of Kent’s largest Multi-Academy Trust (MAT) which is responsible for 13 schools, and ten thousand pounds more than KCC’s Corporate Director, whose responsibilities include direct control of some 400 schools together with a wide range of essential services for all children and schools in Kent,  who was paid £166,353 in 2015, with just £1,010 in expenses, all on travel.....

In 2014 - 15, one of the highest paid Principals in the country was the Head of a Single School Trust, judged by OFSTED to Require Improvement. Mary Boyle, Head of the Knole Academy in Sevenoaks, was paid £175,000 - 180,000 according to Accounts filed at Companies House, an increase of £20,000 over 2014. This included a performance bonus of £20,000. 

One never hears details about many of the heads of chains, with parents often not knowing who they are, including the mysterious departure of Dr Phil Limbert as Chief Executive from the Valley Invicta Academy Trust (VIAT) in Maidstone, as mentioned in passing without comment in the KM on 10^th June. According to Downs Mail, he handed in his notice in May and left immediately, with apparently no ceremony. He has been airbrushed out of the VIAT website, and there are rumours about the reason for his departure. His salary of £165,000 in 2015 for oversight of six schools and the coming Maidstone School of Science and Technology in September 2016 pales beside some others.

The Head of the Thinking Schools Academy Trust in Rochester also left recently after a disciplinary case reported in The Times that concluded without action being taken after (as?) she had resigned from the Trust, with a salary most recently reported as £215,000 (£190,000 - £200,000 in 2015), the highest I have come across.  

The Griffin Academy Trust was recently in the news following a disastrous OFSTED Inspection of Wayfield Primary, one of its schools. Here was a prime example of related party transactions with the a story in the Guardian reporting that: “in just two years the Trust paid over £700,000 to a company jointly owned by its two chief executives.Three other companies in which trustees of the charity have majority interests received smaller payments that amounted to around £100,000 for “educational consultancy services’”. Amongst other related party transactions, Company accounts note that £55,166 in 2015 (£71,992 in 2014) was paid to Sagacious Associates for school improvement services to Nick Hotchkiss, a Trustee and employee of the Company, now Headteacher of Fort Pitt Grammar School. However, just two employees were paid between £100,000 and £110,000. The Trust employed 225 teachers in 2015, along with 296 staff in administration and support, and 19 managers.

Then of course there is the Lilac Sky Schools Academy Trust, about which I have written extensively elsewhere. One person commented on this article: “What a farce! When I read the article (and despite having a degree!), I struggled to keep up with the complexities of the movement of the various leaders between all the different arms of Lilac Sky! However, I can clearly see the almost total lack of accountability. Not to mention that most parents will have been, presumably, totally unaware of who was behind the running of this failing academy trust and what was going on. The fact that it all seems so hidden is very worrying. How long did it take the authorities to spot all this and how many educations were ruined in the process by this debacle?” In order to prepare this article, I have contacted Companies House to check on Trustees and Directors salaries. Lilac Sky is the one company where I have no details for as, not only are the 2015 accounts overdue, but those for 2013/14 do not appear to contain this information, surely against the regulations.

There is at least one Kent Junior Academy with just 400 pupils, whose headteacher is paid over £100,000 per annum (no other staff over £60,000). In this case, the school lent the headteacher £600 to fund a new computer, and the headteacher's sister was paid £1,766 for the edit and production of a short story book. 

 To counter these,there are many Trusts who appear to show a different approach, placing the needs of the children first,  and I looked at the accounts of a couple of these to compare.

The largest Multi-Academy chain operating in Kent and Medway is the Leigh Academy Trust, with thirteen current and three forthcoming academies, including six successful secondary schools. The 2015 accounts show just three employees earning over £100,000 p.a.  with none over £150,000. Related Party Transactions amount to £660 for premises and maintenance work by the company owned by a governor. This excludes the work of Leigh Academies Trust for Kent and Medway Training, a school centred initial teacher training programme.  The Trust employed 862 staff: 656 teachers and educational support, 161 in administration and 8 managers, so starting to look like its own Local Education Authority!

The Fort Pitt Thomas Aveling Trust in Medway, with three secondary schools and one primary had NO employee earning over £80,000 p.a. in 2015. Related party transactions are mentioned, but not identified.

The Brook Learning Trust based in Tonbridge, running three secondary schools, has just the CEO paid between £100,000 and £110,000, all other staff below this figure. There are No related party transactions. One of its schools, Ebbsfleet Academy had the highest number of permanent exclusions, and also referrals to Pupil Referral Units in Kent.

Coastal Academies Trust in Thanet, which takes in four large secondary schools, one primary and a range of school support activities, has two staff earning between £100,000 and £130,000, its related party transactions being restricted to a donation of £1250 from the Dane Court Parents Association!

Conclusion

Will Academy Executive Heads and CEOs at the lower end of the scale reading this argue that their salaries should match the highest earners, or will Boards of Trustees at the top end suggest that being paid more than the Corporate Director of Education and Young People’s Services for KCC is outrageous. My money is on the leaders following the example of Captains of Industry!

Certainly the Headteacher Appraisal External Adviser, a retired headteacher who confided in me as a colleague that he considered a main objective was to ensure the headteachers he was appraising received as large an increase as possible, would be welcomed in many schools. 

Like the Dispatches programme, I am of the opinion that too much public money is being siphoned out of schools, depriving children of a proper education until there is much more accountability of academies, whose structures often invite misuse of those public funds because of greed, with the concept of public service going out of the window.