Showing posts with label secondary schools. Show all posts
Showing posts with label secondary schools. Show all posts

Monday 16 November 2020

NEU call on Government to 'massively increase' level of testing for pupils to bring coronavirus under control in schools

 I only have anecdotal evidence on Covid19 positive test results in Brent secondary schools so have put in an FYI request to Brent Council for actual statistics.

This is the National Education Union statement released on Friday:

ONS data shows highest rate of infection is amongst secondary aged pupils.
 
The Office for National Statistics' latest infection survey shows that secondary-age pupils now have the highest rate of infection of any age group and, whilst it has fallen a little as a result of the half-term holiday, it is likely to carry on increasing. 
 
The National Education Union has today received a letter from Sir Patrick Vallance and Professor Sir Ian Diamond  in response to a set of questions posed on 20 October.  The letter confirms that ONS and SAGE will be collecting data on school bubbles and ventilation, which is particularly important given the emerging evidence on airborne transmission of the virus. 
 
The NEU is concerned that the continued trajectory of infection rates in schools and colleges will make this lockdown much less effective, and not make the sacrifice worthwhile. Initial indications show that R has not come down far enough - ZOE estimate it to be 0.9, whilst SAGE estimate it 1.0 – 1.2 (see note 4). This indicates that while coronavirus might go into retreat, it will not retreat very far.
This concern is heightened by the SAGE finding that children aged 12-16 played a "significantly higher role” in introducing infection into households in the period after schools reopened their doors to all students. 
 
We are also troubled by new evidence from Public Health England  showing that the positivity rate amongst school-age children is extremely high. For secondary age children it is 18% and for primary age children it is 12%. The level of testing amongst school-age children has actually fallen in recent weeks. This means that only a tiny proportion of pupils with coronavirus are self-isolating. We call on the Government to take urgent steps to massively increase the level of testing for school pupils. 
 
Dr Mary Bousted, Joint General Secretary of the National Education Union, said: 
We are pleased that SAGE has recognised the important role that schools and school-age children play in transmission of the virus . We have been concerned for some time that an erroneous belief that children do not play a significant role in the transmission of coronavirus was badly distorting policy. This is in spite of a clear and sharp trend in infection rates among secondary school pupils in particular since the start of term. 
 
We call on the Government to play a much more active role to suppress the transmission of COVID within schools. Schools have gone to great lengths to make themselves as safe as possible but there is only so much they can do on their own. We put forward a ten-point plan in June with suggestions including hiring additional space and teachers to reduce class sizes.  More recently we have put forward ideas to enable social distancing in schools through the use of rotas for older secondary school pupils.  All these suggestions were ignored. Schools have been given inadequate advice - more often than not delivered at the last minute - and with no additional funding. 
 
The situation is untenable and widespread disruption will continue unless the Government takes steps to get coronavirus under control in schools.

Wednesday 14 March 2018

Vacancies and waiting lists in Brent secondary schools

An FoI request has revealed secondary school vacancies in Ark Elvin Academy, Newman Catholic College and Convent of Jesus and Mary Language College. Crest Academy and Ark Elvin are more popular than in previous years and the controversial Michaela Academy Free School has a large waiting list. No secondary child is without a school place although the waiting lists show that many would like to transfer to other schools. All Brent secondary schools are now academies or religious schools, none are under the control of the local authority.

The figures are for the January 2018  'in year' census and will have changed to some extent since then. There are plans for a new secondary school in North Brent as the previous primary bulge pupils move into the secondary phase.

 
School Name Round Vacancies (unfilled places) Waiting List
Alperton Community School 2017-18 Y07 In Year 0 3
2017-18 Y08 In Year 0 6
2017-18 Y09 In Year 0 2
2017-18 Y10 In Year 0 2
2017-18 Y11 In Year 0 0
Ark Academy 2017-18 Y07 In Year 0 4
2017-18 Y08 In Year 0 1
2017-18 Y09 In Year 0 1
2017-18 Y10 In Year 0 0
2017-18 Y11 In Year 0 1
Ark Elvin Academy 2017-18 Y07 In Year 9 0
2017-18 Y08 In Year 32 0
2017-18 Y09 In Year 52 1
2017-18 Y10 In Year 25 1
2017-18 Y11 In Year 16 0
Capital City Academy 2017-18 Y07 In Year 0 2
2017-18 Y08 In Year 0 19
2017-18 Y09 In Year 0 21
2017-18 Y10 In Year 1 10
2017-18 Y11 In Year 0 17
Claremont High School 2017-18 Y07 In Year 0 24
2017-18 Y08 In Year 1 33
2017-18 Y09 In Year 0 30
2017-18 Y10 In Year 0 20
2017-18 Y11 In Year 5 11
Convent of Jesus and Mary Language College 2017-18 Y07 In Year 22 0
2017-18 Y08 In Year 10 1
2017-18 Y09 In Year 11 0
2017-18 Y10 In Year 3 0
2017-18 Y11 In Year 9 0
JFS 2017-18 Y07 In Year 6 0
2017-18 Y08 In Year 0 0
2017-18 Y09 In Year 0 0
2017-18 Y10 In Year 11 0
2017-18 Y11 In Year 14 0
Kingsbury High School 2017-18 Y07 In Year 0 27
2017-18 Y08 In Year 0 32
2017-18 Y09 In Year 1 30
2017-18 Y10 In Year 1 20
2017-18 Y11 In Year 6 18
Michaela Community School 2017-18 Y07 In Year 0 47
2017-18 Y08 In Year 0 48
2017-18 Y09 In Year 0 29
2017-18 Y10 In Year 2 19
Newman Catholic College 2017-18 Y07 In Year 46 0
2017-18 Y08 In Year 12 1
2017-18 Y09 In Year 7 4
2017-18 Y10 In Year 26 5
2017-18 Y11 In Year 0 1
Preston Manor School 2017-18 Y07 In Year 0 19
2017-18 Y08 In Year 1 10
2017-18 Y09 In Year 2 5
2017-18 Y10 In Year 0 2
2017-18 Y11 In Year 2 4
Queens Park Community School 2017-18 Y07 In Year 0 17
2017-18 Y08 In Year 0 26
2017-18 Y09 In Year 0 16
2017-18 Y10 In Year 0 17
2017-18 Y11 In Year 0 16
St Gregorys Catholic Science College 2017-18 Y07 In Year 0 9
2017-18 Y08 In Year 0 17
2017-18 Y09 In Year 2 14
2017-18 Y10 In Year 0 9
2017-18 Y11 In Year 0 7
The Crest Academy 2017-18 Y07 In Year 0 10
2017-18 Y08 In Year 0 20
2017-18 Y09 In Year 32 25
2017-18 Y10 In Year 15 17
2017-18 Y11 In Year 6 15
Wembley High Technology College 2017-18 Y07 In Year 0 6
2017-18 Y08 In Year 0 5
2017-18 Y09 In Year 0 1
2017-18 Y10 In Year 0 1
2017-18 Y11 In Year 0 0


Sunday 9 June 2013

Professor: academies are failing black students

An interesting article from Voice on Line LINK which gives pause for thought as the academisation of Brent secondary school nears completion:

A LEADING academic has said that black pupils achieve worse GCSE results in academies than in local authority schools with a similar intake.

Professor David Gillborn, director of the centre for research in race and education based at the University of Birmingham, pointed to the Government’s data which revealed that while other ethnicities performed better, attainment among black pupils leaves much to be desired.

According to the Department for Education’s Equalities Impact Assessment: Academies Bill published in 2010, 37.1 per cent of black children enrolled at academies achieved five top GCSEs including maths and English.

But in local authority-run schools with similar characteristics, that figure was 41 per cent among children of African and Caribbean heritage.

A Department for Education spokesperson said: “These are not the most up-to-date figures. In fact, results in sponsored academies are improving at a faster rate than in other state-funded schools. Analysis published by the department last year shows that, in 2011, the proportion of black pupils achieving five good GCSEs including English and mathematics was 2.5 percentage points higher in sponsored academies than in similar council-run schools.”

For other ethnic groups including white and Asian, this pattern was in reverse with both groups performing slightly better.

Academies tend to have a higher proportion of black pupils than other ethnic groups. Gillborn, a guest speaker at the annual London Schools and the Black Child conference, said: “The Government claims that academies are going raise standards for everyone but, actually, its own data suggests academies are bad news for black students.

“When compared with similar local authority schools they do worse...this has not stopped the policy being rolled out across the country. [The Government] has taken no steps whatsoever to identify where this problem might be arising from, let alone taking steps to ensure that it doesn’t happen in every single new academy.”