Someone has sent me the following quote:
"He [the Director of Schools] added that the Council had agreed to a more just admissions process, which might eventually help the school to recruit more students; but there would be no public discussion of the proposals before the local elections in May 2003, and another year of consultation before any decision would be made. There were many marginal seats and so the controlling Labour Party was afraid of provoking debate which might lose them.
"My feeling of exhaustion as I left the meeting was compounded by the thought that if the future of the children was to be manipulated, yet again, by political expediency, my work would be futile." (p.129)
This "more just" admissions process was presumably the move to distance measurement, which would have meant more QP kids going to Comart, had it remained open. But the delay helped to sink the school.
Is it ringing alarm bells? Are you thinking of Cllr McCaffery's dismissal from the Children, Family and Schools Committee by the Labour Group? Perhaps it is time for a change at the Council?
Technorati Tags: Brighton & Hove Council, CF&S Committee, McCaffery, SAR, Secondary Admissions Review
3 comments:
Please don’t make assumptions about the history to the current admissions situation. I suspect that the change Jill Clough refers to was not 'walking distance' as you presume, but catchment areas, which were recommended by the Scrutiny Review Panel in 2003, a year before 'walking distance' was chosen out of the blue. Unfortunately CFS, on the advice of officers, declined the Review's recommendations arguing they needed further consultation. Of course Jill Clough is quite right to state that this was not implemented for political reasons in the run up to the May elections in 2003. They waited a year, conducted a 'city wide consultation' that received 183 responses and then implemented 'walking distance' in 2004 with no thought of the inevitable consequencies. Weeks later CoMART was formally closed.
Had they opted for balanced catchments in 2003 I think CoMART would have been saved and we would not have the current inequality.
I doubt very much that 'walking distance' would have saved CoMART.
Thank you for this. I stand corrected on that detail.
Even so, the fact remains that political demands are outweighing the needs of many children in our area and across the city at this point in time and this quote does make it clear that this is not the first occasion that this has happened.
I would also add that it is a shame that they did not opt, on February 2nd, for a more balanced catchment for Falmer School. 36% FSM is much higher than any other school in the city and they had the option of extending the catchment south to alleviate this a little, but did not take it. Yes, this would involve a further six weeks consultation, but I think this extra period of consultation more important than a "solution" that will damage this area and Falmer School.
Given the sort of representative democracy we live in this is a sad inevitability. When they threw out last year's nodal proposals it was pretty clear that councillors were mostly concerned about the impact it would have on their wards rather than the city wide picture.
Remember that the original November proposals recommended that Falmer be part of a dual catchment with Patcham in order to better balance FSM figures. Sadly a political deal was done to split the two in an attempt to appease Tories at CFS.
The Patcham/Falmer catchment was never a comfortable option given potential travel issues, but would have addressed concerns about balanced intakes and 'choice' given existing links between Patcham and areas east of Lewes Rd. Sadly the deal need not have been struck given Tory support was ultimately neither given or needed.
The prime rationale given for including the area south of Bear Rd down to Elm Grove in the Falmer catchment was to alleviate pressure on the Stringer/Varndean catchmnet numbers. As a relatively unaffluent area it would have had a negligible impact on Falmer's FSM figure.
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