Nearly 50 years on, time for a new 'Great Debate' on education? Ofsted, high stakes testing, narrowed curriculum and a devalued profession all features of the current crisis

 

I was in my first year of teaching, as a mature entrant, almost 50 years ago in 1976 when the Prime Minister James Callaghan launched the 'Great Debate' on education in a speech at Ruskin College. LINK

That speech was the launchpad for the many changes that followed implemented by both Labour and Conservative governments, some good, some bad and often with unexpected consequences.

Today government attitudes towards teachers exemplified by the derisory pay offer are clear and contribute to low morale, demotivation and a recruitment and retention crisis. The role of Ofsted is under scrutiny as never before following the tragic death of a headteacher in the wake of an expected poor Ofsted judgement on the school that she cherished. Ofsted itself, despite claims of its independence is linked to Government policies including the high stakes testing found in primary schools, which in turn contributes to a narrowing of the curriculum and the loss of arts  subjects.  This is compounded by a school funding crisis that means such subjects are a low priority when it comes to allocating the school budget.

It is worth quoting Callaghan:

Everyone is allowed to put his oar in on how to overcome our economic problems, how to put the balance of payments right, how to secure more exports and so on and so on. Very important too. But I venture to say not as important in the long run as preparing future generations for life. RH Tawney, from whom I derived a great deal of my thinking years ago, wrote that the endowment of our children is the most precious of the natural resources of this community. So I do not hesitate to discuss how these endowments should be nurtured.

 

Let me answer that question 'what do we want from the education of our children and young people?' with Tawney's words once more. He said: 'What a wise parent would wish for their children, so the state must wish for all its children.'

The campaign group 'More Than a Score' has undertaken research to see what parents wish for in terms of their children's education and their report concludes LINK:

It is wrong to use SATs results as shorthand for high standards in primary education. While test data may generate easy headlines, parents and school leaders understand that an 11-year-old’s tests results cannot provide an accurate picture of their overall academic abilities and should not be used as a blunt tool to measure standards.

These views — held by an overwhelming majority — are not reflected in current policy. Everyone who values children’s education believes in high standards, but it is time to change the language and shift the debate so that children’s learning, not data, is prioritised.

The report is extremely important at a time when government ministers justify their education policy, including Ofsted and SATs with the mantra 'we know this is what parents want' backed up with very little evidence. Callaghan called for a 'rational debate based on the facts' - More Than a Score's effort to intruduce some evidence into the discussion is very welcome.

Reacting to the report Rosamund McNeil, assistant general secretary off the National Education Union, said;  

The views of education staff and parents have been made clear in More Than a Score’s research – primary school SATs are not an indicator of educational standards, or whether a child is ready for secondary school.

Both parents and educators feel standards should be measured in better ways, such as engagement with a broad and rich curriculum, not limited to English and Maths. This is a standard our high-stakes system is failing to meet. Schools face incredible pressure from government to prioritise tested subjects which mean the arts, humanities, and sciences are being squeezed from the school week.

Children’s mental health should also be an indicator of standards. Engagement with, and excitement about learning is not well served by SATs preparation or the SATs pressure. Children deserve a fairer system which captures more of what they achieve and they contribute. Children should be looking forward to another day of primary school, where they feel inspired and happy to learn.

The NEU wants to see an assessment system that supports children's learning and gives meaningful information to parents and educators. The system needs to be redesigned to meet those standards, not the ones set by government to hold schools to account.

High Stakes Testing is just one aspect of the current crisis and the report (below) perhaps will start a process of evidence gathering that will contribute to a new debate.

Year 2 tell it how it is!

 

 

 

From More than a Score

Year 2 pupils have never spent a full year in school without Covid disruption. But these children will sit more government tests than any other class this year.

Last term, they took the phonics screening check. Next term, they’ll be facing their year 2 SATs. This is not the way to instil a love of learning.

Best wishes

Jill and Alison at More Than A Score

PS. If you haven’t done so, please Write To Your MP today. It will only take a minute.

 

Caroline Lucas speaks out against SATs at More Than A Score Rally

59% of primary NEU members voting in ballot supported tests boycott but turnout did not meet Government imposed threshold

From Mary Bousted & Kevin Courtney, Joint General Secretaries of the National Education Union have sent this message to NEU members in primary schools

The union’s executive met on Saturday, 13 July and looked at the results of our indicative ballot of over 50,000 primary members.

Our members resoundingly told us that they want to high stakes tests replaced by better alternatives inour primary schools. 

It was the biggest survey of primary educators for decades, with 50,000 voting by 97 per cent that they want high stakes tests to end.

While the results showed members are not yet ready to engage in a national boycott, they made it absolutely clear they want the union to continue our campaign for an alternative. 

Although 39 per cent of members voted and 59 per cent of those supported calls to boycott, this wasn’t enough to reach the Government’s imposed double thresholds for industrial action in schools. 

To reach those, 50 per cent of all members would have to cast a vote and 40 per cent of all members would need to vote yes.

The union will continue our campaign to secure changes to the way we assess our youngest children,and engage with politicians of all parties in Parliament and local councils on this issue.

We will also continue to work with Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens – all of whom agree with us that high-stakes testing must stop – on their assessment policy proposals. 

We’d like to thank you for taking part in the biggest-ever survey of primary practitioners on this issue and will keep you posted on the next steps in our campaign to stop these toxic tests. 

The union is backing a petition against reception baseline assessment, which is being piloted in some schools from September.

Help us to keep up the pressure by signing and sharing the More Than A Score petition against baseline and visit our website to find out more about our assessment campaign.

Thank you for your continued support for our union and everything you do for the children in your schools and colleges.

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Labour adopts Green Party policy on academies but there is more to be done

There was a welcome move at the Labour Party Conference towards the Green Party’s long-standing policy of opposition to academies and free schools and a commitment to reintegrating existing ones in the local authority school system. There is still a long way to go including the abolition of the SATs tests that narrow the school curriculum and stress both children and school staff unnecessarily, and the scrapping of Ofsted and its replacement by a peer-based method of school improvement such as that pioneered by the London Challenge and provided by Challenge Partners.

Unfortunately the change in Labour Party policy came after an article I had written for Green Left’s Autumn Conference Water Melon had gone to the printers. 

However, I think the following passage though is still relevant:

The concept of a National Education Service is relatively vague and still being worked on by the Labour Party.  At its worst it could be top-down, restrictive and bureaucratic at its best it could set up an entitlement framework across all sectors. 

Both Labour and Greens have to face the problem of the decline of local government both in terms of finances and democratic structures. The Cabinet system has meant very little open debate about local schools, which used to take place in Education Committees and scrutiny is often poor. Alongside this is a lack of public involvement with poor election turnout.

How will national government, local government and governing bodies interact in the future and how can democratic accountability be enhanced?

This is the statement issued by the Anti Academies Alliance:

Angela Rayner’s bold speech has put an end to the era of ‘cross party consensus’ on academisation that has dominated the education policy of the main parties for over a decade. In a move that will send shock waves through the board rooms of MATs and academy chains, there is now a realistic chance that the whole privatisation bandwagon will be halted.

Rayner’s speech to the Labour Party conference highlighted many of the problems and gave a glimpse of solutions through creating a democratic and locally accountable National Education Service. She tore into ‘fat cat’ pay and obscene profiteering. She put the needs of children and their families back centre stage of the debate. It was a genuinely refreshing vision. At last a politician has stepped outside the Westminster bubble and started listening.

Some may worry that there is insufficient detail as yet, but a new direction of travel has been set. Our job is to work together to help build this vision of a National Education Service, to help solve the detailed problems of “de-academisation” and to help carry the news of this important change into every school community.

That means challenging every academisation proposal. No school should academise this side of the next general election. It would be a costly, reckless and probably futile decision. The process consumes resources that would be better spent on ameliorating the effects of cuts to school budgets. Governors should refocus on real school improvement and local councils should scrutinise all plans for academisation and propose alternatives.

But it is also time for some introspection from the fat cat CEOs. The writing is on the wall. The least they could do is acknowledge how inappropriately they have been rewarded and offer serious pay restraint. But the likes of Sir Dan Moynihan, Sir Steve Lancashire and other fat cat CEOs should get out of education altogether. Their model of leadership has corrupted public services values in education. We need leaders in our school system who are committed to a National Education Service, who welcome local democratic accountability and who refuse to line their own pockets with exorbitant salaries. We need education for the many not the few.

Statement of Interest: I am a member of the Steering Group of the Anti Academies Alliance and a member of the National Education Union

NEU Joint General Secretary at Green Party Conference

As results are announced keep the SATs in perspective - schools and children are much more than a test score

  Children’s author Michael Morpurgo, in a striking phrase, has referred to the SATs taken by 10 and 11 year olds as a ‘dark spider spreading fear in primary classrooms.’

Primary school headteachers were able to access their school’s results overnight and social media is buzzing with reactions.

The TES reports:

The government also published the tables which show how many marks are needed in each subject to reach a scaled score of 100, which is the “expected standard”.

This year pupils needed 26 out of 50 in reading, 57 out of 110 in maths and 36 out of 70 in spelling, punctuation and grammar (Spag) to reach the expected standard.

This compares to 21 out of 50 needed in reading last year, 60 out of 110 needed in maths and 43 out of 70 needed in Spag. The jump in the marks needed to pass the reading test comes after Year 6 teachers had reported that the reading test this year was “kinder” than it was in 2016.

The new tests were introduced last year and could not be compared with previous years. It would be a mistake to make too much of any comparison this year as leading experts suggest that the data is ‘too fragile’ to interpret with any confidence.


The TES reports Russell Hobby, General Secretary of the National Association of Headteachers:

Currently, the methods to hold schools to account aren’t as fair or reliable as they should be. Sats data only gives parents part of the picture when judging a pupil’s success or a school’s effectiveness.

At the moment, parents and schools know these results have to be taken with a pinch of salt. This can’t be right. Just looking at data misses the majority of the real work that schools do to help young people achieve their full potential.

Schools do need to be held to account but inspectors should look at more than just data. That way, when parents are reading Ofsted reports they can have more confidence that the report properly reflects how good the school actually is.

We are seeing the signs of a more balanced approach to the use of data by Ofsted, as expressed in a recent speech by Amanda Spielman, the chief inspector, in which she said, ‘Rather than just intensifying the focus on data, Ofsted inspections must explore what is behind the data, asking how results have been achieved.’

The issue of how results have been achieved is crucial.  Schools vary in their conduct of SATs and the amount of preparation. Concern about ‘teaching to the test’ in the last year of primary school, with a resulting narrowing of the curriculum and teachers and children feeling stressed by the pressure, has been widespread. Some schools hold special revision classes during the school holiday and others have endless practise tests.  Meanwhile children in private schools and those who are home-schooled escape the SATs completely.

Whatever one’s views we can probably all agree that schools and children are far more than a school. SAT results do not capture the many facets of a rich primary curriculum that will be familiar to many parents and that teachers struggle to provide despite all the pressure of SATs ‘success’.


 

Three key pledges from the Greens to create an inspiring education system

 Kenmont primary school pupils, many from Brent, demonstrate against education cuts

Vix Lowthian, Green Party Education  Spokesperson announced three key pledges this morning to create an inspiring education system:

1. Invest £7bn to fill funding gap
2. Abolish SATs
3. End academies programme and bring existing academies under local authority system

The Green Party want to create an inspiring education system that transforms lives and transforms Britain.

But that can’t happen without the very basic foundations being in place and this Government has been removing those foundations brick by brick.

Since 2015 £2.2bn has been taken out of the education system and between now and 2020 the Government plans to take out a further £3bn. That’s over £200,000 for every school or £1000 for every pupil. The academies programme has taken schools out of the hands of local authorities and parents and given them over to private businesses. That means that if a school isn’t performing a commercial interest, it can be shut down at will by the owners, leaving pupils without a school to go to.

At the same time as schools are getting less resources, more is being asked of teachers and pupils. Children are now being tested from age 7 onwards, with their results affecting the classes they are put in and their chances of getting into a decent secondary school. Asking children of that age to learn, revise, and test their knowledge has sapped all the fun, creativity, and inspiration out of going to school. The fact that teachers too are assessed on how well they drill their pupils for these exams - with the shadow of Ofsted hanging over them - means they have no time to do the thing they are meant to be at school for: teaching.

We believe in creating an inspiring education system. First and foremost we must make up for the enormous shortfall, the massive neglect, in our education system. Greens will ensure the education spending deficit of £7bn is plugged, laying the foundations for a transformative education system. We will scrap SATs so that pupils are no longer subjected to pointless, pressurised testing. And we will put an end to the academies programme and bring existing academies back under local authority control so that our children’s education is in the hands of teachers and parents, not businesses.

Primary assessment: NAHT call for end of Key Stage 1 statutory assessments and broader judgement of school effectiveness

The National Association of Headteachers (NAHT) yesterday published the Assessment Review Group's report on primary assessment. The Group was set up in May 2016 so this is speedy work that reflects the great concern from parents and teachers about last year's chaos around SATs and the new curriculum, teacher and pupil stress and the narrowing of the primary curriculum through the domination of high stakes testing. The report does not go as far as seeking the abolition of Key Stage 2 SATs, a demand that arose from teachers and parents last year, but it does argue for the end of Key Stage 1 SATs.

The report, LINK claims it is a contribution to the process of seeking a consensus around how to 'redress the balance' and suggests :

Have two statutory assessment points for primary pupils 

Statutory assessment in primary school should be restricted to two points, Reception and Year 6, in order to create the space in between for schools to focus on delivering a broad and balanced curriculum, appropriate to the needs of all children. Throughout the primary phase, schools should be free to determine their own processes and procedures for pupil assessment, informed by widely available evidence of best practice, that allows teachers to maximise pupil learning and progress. 

High stakes testing narrows the focus of the curriculum to that which is tested. The group do not believe statutory testing should be used by the government to influence teaching, learning and pedagogy. The various screening checks deployed by the government, including phonics and the proposed multiplication tests, should instead become part of the national sampling framework.

Introduce a start of primary school statutory assessment 

In order to establish a baseline from which to measure progress, teachers would carry out an observation-based assessment during a child’s first year in primary school. This should take the form of a single, nationally agreed assessment to avoid a repetition of the problems experienced in 2015/16. We anticipate that a moderation process would be necessary to support this. Great care would need to be taken when designing such an assessment, with significant input from Early Years experts. It is important that the results of this assessment should not be used to set targets for individual pupils or as a predictor of their future progress. Instead, the data from this baseline should be used solely as part of a cohort level measure of progress at school, local and national level. 

Whilst it was relatively clear that the end point would be the summer term of year six, agreeing on the best ‘start point’ or baseline proved one of the most challenging issues the group faced. There was general agreement that the initial assessment or ‘start point’ should be as early as possible in a child’s time in school, in order to take full account of the progress they make throughout their primary schooling. There is much to consider regarding any baseline assessment and these issues are outlined later in this report. 

Remove end of Key Stage One statutory assessments 

In the proposed model there would be two statutory assessment points. One at the start of a child’s time in primary school and one at the end. The key measure arising from statutory assessment should be the progress children make between these two points therefore end of Key Stage 1 assessments should be removed as a statutory requirement. 

Streamline and improve Key Stage Two statutory assessments 

At the end of year six, in the medium term, we envisage statutory assessments in reading, maths and writing would continue in some form. Reading and maths would continue to be assessed through a national test, externally set and marked. Writing would remain teacher assessed through an improved system that focuses on the overall quality of a child’s writing rather than the component parts. Early evidence suggests that comparative judgement may provide a workable and valid alternative to current arrangements for teacher assessment of writing. 
 
Make statutory tests accessible and enable pupils to show progress 

Statutory assessments and tests must be designed in such a way that the majority of children are able to access them. At the very least, tests should be structured so that the questions, and where appropriate any texts, appear in order of difficulty. Serious consideration should be given to removing the hard time limits for statutory assessments, particularly in reading, and replacing these with a minimum and maximum time limit so that children can focus on demonstrating what they can do rather than test technique. Inevitably there is likely to be a very small proportion of children with more significant special educational needs who are not able to access the tests. The Rochford Review has offered some interesting and potentially useful recommendations in this specific area which should be considered fully. 

Introduce national sampling and assessment banks 

Within this model, the government would have the option of carrying out national sampling if there were a need to monitor standards in particular subjects or aspects of the curriculum. The data produced through sampling should be used to gain an understanding of national standards. It should not be used to hold individual schools to account but could provide national data against which schools can evaluate themselves. In the long term, there is potential for national sampling to replace the current model where every pupil takes every test at the end of Key Stage 2. 

All schools would be expected to have robust assessment processes in place and to be able to explain how they use these to support pupils’ learning, to identify and intervene where pupils are falling behind, and to report to parents. Schools should be mindful of the recommendations made in the Commission on Assessment Without Levels Final Report when designing such processes (DfE, 2015). To support teachers and schools, a national bank of assessment materials should be made available. Such resources would also help teachers in assessing the progress children are making against national expectations.
Report pupil performance as a score on the national scale 

The terminology used to describe pupils’ attainment in 2016 (working towards the expected standard, working at the expected standard or working at greater depth within the expected standard) was unhelpful, arbitrary and demotivating. Such an approach also fails to recognise and celebrate the progress that a significant group of pupils have made. The group were particularly concerned about the effect on those pupils who, despite making significant progress, could only be judged to be working below expectations at both the end of Key Stage 1 and the end of Key Stage 2. Stopping the use of such terms and simply reporting a child’s scaled score would be a positive step forwards. 

Accept data is only one part of the picture of school effectiveness 

It is important to reiterate that this model should be viewed in light of the overarching recommendation that any data produced from such statutory assessments should be seen as only one element when judging school effectiveness. Schools should not be held to account on the basis of this data alone. It is also important to  recognise that such statutory assessments will never be able to capture all aspects of a child’s progress or all the different ways in which a school contributes to the progress a child makes. 

No one single set of results should lead to negative consequences for the school. All data should be considered over a rolling three year period. There needs to be a recognition that cohorts of pupils vary; a dip in results in one year does not necessarily equate to a decline in school effectiveness. Basing interventions on such a short-term approach is unlikely to be helpful or indeed valid. 

End floor and coasting standards as determinants of intervention 

The use of floor standards and coasting standards to determine intervention in individual schools should be stopped. Instead there should be a greater level of dialogue between schools and those that seek to hold them to account, including RSCs. The starting point should be a discussion around the data to understand the context and story behind it. Any intervention at this point should be supportive, recognise the knowledge and understanding of the professionals working within the school and be based on working with the existing leadership team in the school. 

In an ideal world, data from assessments should be used as part of the inspection process. The results of the inspection may, if appropriate, trigger supportive intervention, and the RSCs (Regional School Commissioners) should base their work on the inspection results rather than independent evaluations. This streamlines the accountability system without reducing rigour, inserts the necessary expert judgement into the process, reduces conflict and duplication, and minimises the level of fear and uncertainty.

The report  makes the case for a separation of the statutory assessment and the school's own internal assessment procedures and calls for an emphasis on assessment to help children progress further - something that SATS do not do.

It is all too easy for statutory assessment to become entangled with in-school assessment - particularly when schools are driven to predict and provide data on future performance in statutory assessments. Under these conditions, in-school assessments inevitably take on the form of statutory assessments, in order to produce compatible data, however inappropriate this form may be to support teaching and learning. We should shift away from predictions of future performance and focus more on capturing accurate pictures of current performance of pupils against expected standards for their age. This has a major impact on what data should and shouldn’t be asked for. 

The core focus of assessment should be on supporting learning, not simply tracking progress. To help maximise the progress children make, we should expect all schools to have highly effective and robust assessment processes in place. These are entirely separate from statutory assessments but should give a clear sense of how children are progressing, and how they can be supported to progress further. Such information should allow teachers and school leaders to identify which children need additional support or challenge and in which specific areas.

The reports quotes rsearch on the impact of children's background on the level of achievement, including level of education and earnings:

Research therefore supports the fact that judgement of a school’s success or failure on the basis of statutory tests is unjust and unreliable. No intervention should be triggered on the basis of test data alone. Rather, the results from statutory assessments should trigger further discussion leading to a qualitative expert judgement. We should also remember that superficially good test results can be achieved at a high price in terms of curriculum breadth, extra-curricular activity, pupil welfare and school sustainability - none of which are evident in the raw data. Over reliance on data is simply naive and in some instances dangerous.

Last year's changes made many pupils feel that they were failures and the report tackles this head on:

A basic expectation of any assessment system is that it should recognise the progress made by all children. The current interim framework and assessment materials fail to do this. Simplistic, overarching labels such as ‘working below the expected standard’ mean that the progress of too many children is ignored and too many children are effectively labelled as failing and the cumbersome bureaucratic language does not conceal this perception from pupils or their families. This is not only unhelpful to the school but it also sends entirely the wrong message to our pupils, potentially having an impact on their future motivation.

The report calls for a recognition of the unfairness of judging schools on attainment data alone: 

Whilst any form of data from statutory assessment alone should not be used to judge school effectiveness, if such data is to be used as part of the wider picture when holding individual schools to account then the fairest way to do this is by focusing on the progress pupils make. Attainment is important and all teachers want as many children as possible to reach the highest standards. However, when it comes to holding schools to account, it would be grossly unfair to base comparisons on attainment when children’s starting points can be so different.

Nick Brook, Deputy Geberal Secretary of the NAHT concludes by focusing on how the wider picture will impact on any reform of assessment :

Firstly, we must look again at how data from statutory assessment is used to hold
schools to account. Over-reliance on statutory assessment data raises the stakes of testing and ultimately distorts curriculum emphasis and outcomes. Unless we address some of the worst aspects of the current accountability system, including acceptance
of the inherent limitations of data, even the most sensible assessment arrangements will become skewed. Floor and coasting standards cast a shadow of fear over many schools and school leaders. Poor test results can trigger an avalanche of interventions, based on
a presumption of school failure, which are distracting at best and career ending at worst. It is easy to understand why schools in this shadow struggle to recruit teachers and leaders. There needs to be better join-up amongst those that hold schools to account and a more constructive approach to intervention. Most importantly, we need to replace the presumption of failure with an expectation of support.

Secondly, better governance of the assessment system is needed, leading to a stable, proportionate cycle of design, evaluation and implementation for every national assessment. Effective national test design is a complex skill which requires careful thought and substantial evaluation. The scale of national assessments in a system the size of England means that effective implementation of change is a major challenge in itself. Frequent reforms and constant tinkering around the edges can therefore have a negative impact on quality.

Thirdly, assessment for learning is not an intuitive skill possessed by all. There needs to be substantial investment in the training and development of staff in schools if this is to be done universally well. Not all schools or academy chains will have in-house expertise to draw upon and external support will come at a cost. We know that school budgets are already at and beyond breaking point, following real-term cuts since 2010. More resources are required. Additionally, the development of national assessment banks will require investment to ensure the highest quality materials are available to schools. These cost pressures should however be offset by savings achieved by reducing the amount of statutory testing required within these proposals.

The new Secretary of State, Justine Greening, has shown a desire to listen and a willingness to set right mistakes of recent years. With political will and genuine engagement with the profession these challenges are far from insurmountable.

Brent primary academies perform less well than the best maintained primary schools

Regular readers of this post will know that I am extremely sceptical of the value of the SATs, especially the Year 6 tests, and even more so after last year's fiasco.

Because it is a new system with new expectations the 2016 results cannot be compared with previous years and comparison between schools is unreliable given that some schools may have been panicked into 'teaching to the test' and abandoned much of the rest of the curriculum.  The changes in the curriculum and testing resulted in much press coverage of distraught children and we saw the launch of several national parent campaigns against the tests.  Teachers felt that the new 'expected standards' were far too high and unattainable for many children.

Nevertheless readers may be interested in the results for Brent as announced by Brent Council:

The headline measure for Brent of the proportion of pupils attaining the expected standard in reading, writing and mathematics is 55 per cent compared to the national average of 53 per cent and the London average of 59 per cent. The proportion of Brent disadvantaged pupils attaining the expected standard is 48 per cent, well above the  national average of 39 per cent and just below the London average of 49 per cent.

This is the first set of test results following the introduction of the new national curriculum and cannot be compared to the results of previous years. 

The new measures of the progress that pupils made during Key Stage 2 show that the average progress scores for Brent pupils are above the national averages for reading, writing and mathematics. Brent is below the London average for reading and writing but well above London for mathematics:

An ongoing issue is of course the merits, or not, of academies versus local authority schools, faith schools and 'all-through' schools (catering for 4-19 year olds). Independent schools do not have to take SATs so no comparative data is available for them.

SAT results are a very limited measure and I would argue that there are more important aspects of schools that should be taken into account.

Bearing in mind these caveats it is possible to review those issues in the data published by the DfE which can be found HERE along with much more background information about schools.

Using the rather crude measure of the percentage of Year 6 children reaching the new 'expected standards' the figures are:

National: All Schools 53%
                All state funded schools 55%
London Average: 59%
Brent Average: 55%

The highest faith school in Brent was Our Lady of Grace (Catholic) at 93% an exceptional result compared with other Brent schools. The highest other faith groups were:  NW London Jewish Day School 76%.  Islamia Primary 67%. St Mary's CofE Primary 56%.

The highest local authority school in Brent was Wykeham at 80%

The highest academy was Oakington Manor which has only recently converted to academy status  from foundation status at 75%

Other academies:

Ark Franklin 57%

Sudbury Primary 56%

Ark Academy (all through) 53%

St Andrews & St Francis Academy 47%

Preston Manor Academy (all through) 31%

It doesn't appear that all-through schools can claim any superiority on this measure and other academies are mixed.  Although Our Lady of Grace has a stand out result other faith schools  are lower than the best local authority maintained school.

From this very limited survey I cannot see any clinching argument for mass conversion to academy status.

REMINDER

If you have a child born between 1 Sept 2012 and 31 Aug 2013 you need to apply for a Reception place before Sunday Jan 15th https://www.eadmissions.org.uk/eAdmissions/app