Brent's headaches as it tries to expand secondary school places

Brent Council is faced with increasing demand for secondary school places as the increase in primary numbers moves through the system. Unfortunately, although charged with an overall responsibility to provide school places, to a large extent it exercises 'responsibility without power' as so many Brent secondary schools have become academies or are voluntarily aided and sources of finance are not directly under the Council's control.

An extensive study has led to a report going before the Executive on January 14th which recommends expansion in some schools (subject to governing body approval) and the use of the Gwenneth Rickus Building (Centre for Staff Development) in Brentfield Road as a six forms of entry secondary school. This building which was formerly part of Sladebrook High School, is next to the Swaminarayan Independent School, and is now surplus to requirements with the facility moving to the Civic Centre in the summer.

Adding to the complexity is the fact that three secondary schools, due to parental preference, are currently operating below capacity. These are Copland, following the financial mismanagement allegations; Crest Academy Boys and Newman College. The report states that the first priority is to bring these schools up to scratch so that all their places are used.

Wembley High is ruled out of expansion because it is proposed to make this an all-through school providing places for primary as well as secondary children in line with Ark and Preston Manor. The governing body of Preston Manor have recently decided to become a Cooperative Academy although this is likely to be strongly contested by education unions. The Copland and Alperton expansions are subject to rebuilds under the government's Priority School Buildings Programme.

If this wasn't enough Gove's reforms have thrown another wild card into the game with the report stating that there are three secondary  free school proposals:

In the event that government’s grant application for 2013-14 and following years is inadequate to meet the Council’s entire demand for funding new provision, we are considering the following options:

 Free Schools: The Executive noted that the demand for new school places cannot be met only through the expansion of existing schools due to the limited availability of funding; the Council is required to promote additional ways of creating school places by pursuing the current government agenda on free schools and academies. The latest round of free school applications is being considered by the Department for Education (DfE) in the new year with an opening date of September 2014. Given that the Council is not looking to open a new secondary school at this date, it has not collaborated with any potential providers at this point. There are likely applications submitted for Brent, however. These include:

• an independent school group looking to open an 11 to 18 school in Wembley – of approximately 4 forms of entry, planning to provide Year 10 places immediately as well as Year 7.

• a parent led school in Cricklewood to address perceived lack of choice for parents in that area (6FE).

4.5 In addition an already approved free school has been looking to acquire a site in Brent and open a 6FE secondary school in September 2013.

4.6 All three of the above have said in discussion that they would aim to meet the Partnership Criteria agreed by the Executive in August 2012 but it is clear that two of them would be likely to use the freedoms available to free schools in respect of staffing and the curriculum

Note that although the Council says it has not 'collaborated with any potential providers' they appear, as oen would expect,  to have had discussions with them. The council cannot really take these into account in its present planning as decision making is with the DfE and even when some free school applications have been approved they have failed to materialise.

Clearly the arguments made against academies and free schools on the grounds that they undermine the local authority's  capacity to make clear and rational plans to meet pupil demand gain traction based on these difficulties.  Most of the proposals are given a Medium Risk category in the report with the Gwenneth Rickus proposal deemed High Risk because of potential planning issues.

The Kingsbury High proposal would result in an extremely large school with 435 pupils in each year group based on a class size of 30.

Summary of the proposals:

School	Status	Current Forms of Entry	Proposed Addition Forms of Entry	Delivery of additional forms of entry
Alperton	Academy	7.3	1	2017/18-2019/20 (PFI)
Ark	Academy	6	0
Capital City	Academy	6.5	0
Claremont	Academy	8.4	0
Convent Jesus and Mary	VA Academy	6	0
Copland	Foundation	8	1	2017/18-2019/20 (PFI)
JFS	VA	10	0
Kingsbury	Academy	10.5	4.5	2015/16-2016/17
Newman Catholic	VA Trust	5	0
Preston Manor	Foundation Trust (pending Academy)	8.4	0
Queens Park	Academy	6.7	2	2014/15
St Gregory’s RC	VA	5.9	0
The Crest Boys	Academy	4	1	September 2014
The Crest Girls	Academy	5	1	September 2014
Wembley High	Academy (proposed All-Through)	7	0
Gwenneth Rickus Building	Possible satellite of existing school	0	6	2015/16-2016/17