Time for school students to organise?

PRECOCIOUS

In blue lagoons I once did play,

Tossing the surf,

Catching the spray.

Living my life as each day came,

Never looking for fortune or fame.

Clever and youthful,

Strong and brave,

Carelessly riding the tidal wave -

but I was only 4.

From BLOT magazine 1976

 

 There is a connection between my last blog on SATs and the previous one on young people and the cuts.

The connection is that the generation now experiencing the cuts, whether through their school buildings not being rebuilt, losing their Education Maintenance Allowances, having Kilburn College sold off from under their feet,  seeing tuition fees increased or facing unemployment, is the generation that has experienced the full force of the target culture in schools. They have been the most tested generation of pupils ever.

Yes, there has been investment in schools but often of the wrong kind: thousands spent on the SATs regime and national curriculum materials and all serving the purpose of meeting targets..  Throughout, the mantra repeated by the government, teachers and often parents has been, "Keep your heads down, do what the teacher says, work hard and you will end up with good qualifications, a good job and enough money to have a decent quality of life".

Back in the 70s and 80s I remember when that mantra was blown apart in the face of unemployment and we are approaching that point now. Youth will be arguing "What was the point?"  I remember very well back at that time, when a child in my primary class in Fulham remarked, after I had foolishly repeated the mantra,  "My brother worked hard and got qualified and can't get a job so why should I bother?"

This is particularly true now because the Blair government, and the Tories before them, have reduced education to individuals getting the employment skills to keep the UK ahead of competitor nations. Having narrowed the purpose of education and reduced schools to qualification factories they will face resentment and rebellion, disaffection and desperation.

In the 70s school students organised in the National Union of School Students and other organisations. One of their major campaigns was against the use of corporal punishment in schools. The NUSS publicised their activities through a magazine called BLOT and for some time they got a grant from the Gulbenkian Foundation. At the height of their influence they had the support of 30 or so MPs.

Now such magazines are 'last century' compared with social networking sites and their power to mobilise large numbers at short notice. I wonder how many would answer a call such as this (taken from a 1976 edition of BLOT):

You've got no rights, none at all - you've got no voice. No-one will hear you complain. You haven't got a chance to change a thing - you're too young to hear, speak or think. 

That's what a lot of people think of us. 

Well we know different - we know we think and we've got a lot to say but nowhere to say it. No-one to listen. I, me, myself will never be heard. I've got to be louder so I can shout and if we all shout together then we'll be heard.

Bew Review should end SATs and league tables

"Too many schools believe that they must drill children for tests and spend too much time on test preparation at the expense of teaching and learning."

Wow, who said that - the NUT, Green Party, NAHT?

No, the Department for Education announcing an inquiry led by cross-bencher Lord Bew.

Schools drill children to pass the tests so as to get a high position in the league table and to keep Ofsted off their backs. The only logical outcome of an inquiry would be to abolish league tables and SATs, something I have long campaigned for.

Schools are caught in a double bind, particularly in areas such as Brent where there is high pupil mobility, many children newly arrived from overseas and economic deprivation. In order to reach the nationally expected Level 4 the curriculum has to be narrowed, particularly in Year 6, to concentrate on English and Maths and additional support given in the form of 'booster classes' often after school or in holiday time. Year 6 for many children can become an arid experience. If schools don't put children through this programme their results push them down the league tables and they will lose pupils to better 'performing' schools as well as have Ofsted knocking on their door.

This is not to take away the achievement of Brent schools faced with these pressures. Krutika Pau, Brent's Director of Children and Families, this week issued a circular congratulating schools for 'their work in driving up standards' in the borough. She notes that at Key stage 2 (SATs taken by 11 year olds) scores in English and Maths are above the national average for both Level 4+ and Level 5. The question has to be asked though, is it worth the pain and the pressure on both teachers and children?

I have likened the boosting to training horses to get over jumps by a mixture of encouragement, threats and cajoling with the addition of half a dozen people placing their hands on its rump to push it over. It can get over the jump in this one off 'snap shot' but...

There is another issue that is seldom addressed. Both the 11+ examination which used to be used to select pupils for secondary modern, grammar and technical schools and the London Reading Test used to band pupils into ability ranges to ensure a balanced comprehensive intake, used different result tables for girls and boys. Boys needed a lower score than girls to get selected for grammar schools or the top band. This was to correct the perceived differences in maturation of boys and girls at this age. Girls were seen to develop intellectually, as well as physically, earlier than boys. If the results of boys and girls had been treated equally there would have been disproportionate numbers of girls allocated to grammar schools and the top reading band.

Now they are expected to achieve equally and we have an on-going crisis about 'boys' under-achievement' with all sorts of initiatives including the televised antics of a choir master experimenting with a group of boys in a competitive outdoor classroom with shades of Lord of the Flies. Not so much pushing them over the jumps with hands on rump but pulling them over by tugging on their penises!

I confess that as a headteacher I shared in the collusion whilst also protesting against it. Perhaps the comment that pulled me up most sharply was the mother of a high-achieving, creative girl who accused me of robbing her daughter of her childhood, because of the additional work and pressure in Year 6.

In answer to some of the criticisms about the crudity of pure attainment (test results) statistics, a contextual value added score has been added to the league tables. A significant measure is whether children have made the expected progress from Key Stage 1 (results for 7 year olds) and Key Stage 2. To monitor progress the National Curriculum levels are each divided into 3 sub-levels. Normal progress is to move up two sub-levels a year. Better progress than this results in a higher value added score. Apart from giving schools a whole new burden of statistical recording and analysis it can result in the paradoxical pressure on teachers of  Key Stage 1 pupils not to grade their pupils too high so that they can make greater progress measured against a lower starting point. 

In fact real learning, as most of us know from our own experience, doesn't proceed in a smooth linear progression but there are fits and starts, periods of consolidation, a few steps back before a surge forward - the model assumes a mechanical or even industrial learning process that just does not accord to real life.

Because of the drilling and boosting, secondary teachers often question children's primary school results, when they arrive in Year 7: is this child really operating at Level 4? Some secondary schools retest their children with standardised English and Maths tests, ignoring the results sent in by primary schools. Copland High School ensures a balanced intake by using a non-verbal reasoning test.

Following on from last year's SATs boycott by the NUT and NAHT, the Conservatives were suggesting during the election campaign that children should take the Key Stage 2 SATs on arrival at secondary school, rather than in the last year of primary school. It is hard to gauge what the impact of this would be: it could liberate Year 6 teachers and enable them to return to a broad, balanced and creative curriculum or instead mean that Year 6 pupils are 'boosted' right up to the end of the summer term and beyond so as to safeguard the primary school's reputation.

Anyway as Greens we should welcome the review and urge that both league tables and SATs be abandoned to be replaced by formative teacher assessment that guides future teaching and learning for each child.

Brent Cuts Briefing

Councillor Zaffar Van Kalwala contacted Brent Fightback to give his apologies for Thursday evening’s meeting, but sent the attached briefing prepared by him and Cllr Muhammed Butt, deputy leader of the Council outlining the probable effects on the people of Brent from the Comprehensive Spending Review.

BRENT: COMPREHENSIVE SPENDING REVIEW (CSR)
October 2010

KEY POINTS:

• Brent Council will have 28% cut from its central government grant resulting in a total loss of £65m over the next 4 years
• Some of Brent’s low-income households face being worse off by upto £10,000 per year (based on increase in rents and loss of benefits)
• 41,000 residents will see cuts to their Housing and Council Tax benefit payments
• Freezing of the Sure-Start grant will result in a total funding cut of £1m
• 4.250 Brent 16-19 year olds will lose their Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA)
• Brent is in the top 20 most income deprived local authorities in the country. It also has the 4th lowest average income levels in London with 16,901 households (16%) having an average annual income of £15,000 or less.

BACKGROUND:

The Chancellor, George Osborne insists there is no alternative to his huge and unnecessary cuts, detailed on Wednesday 20th October to the House of Commons. That is simply not true. The Lib-Con Government’s reckless gamble with growth and jobs runs the risk of stifling the fragile recovery. Labour is committed to halving the deficit over the lifetime of this parliament but this Government is going much faster and much deeper than is necessary.

The CSR was meant to be fair with the Lib-Con Government saying ‘those with the broadest shoulders should bear the greatest burden.’ However, the £81bn worth of cuts released including significant spending reductions on welfare, housing and education will see some of Brent’s most vulnerable residents impacted on disproportionately.

The full extent of the cuts on Brent will not be properly known until early December when the Local Government Grant is finalised and a more detailed analysis of the CSR has been undertaken.

HOUSING:

• New social housing tenants face increase in rent with charges of up to 80% of market rates. The average rent for a three-bedroom social home is around £85 a week. National Housing Federation warns that this could triple to a “staggering” £250 a week, an extra £8,500 per year.

• Council houses for life could also end for new tenants, who might be handed fixed term contracts, under the proposals.
• Brent’s Council Tax benefit budget will be reduced by 10% from April 2013

• Cut of 50% to the social housing budget will severely reduce the supply of affordable housing in Brent. As mentioned, the Government wants to charge rents of up to 80% of the market rate and use the extra funds to make-up the housing shortfall. Brent has 23,000 people on the waiting list. These proposals are likely to add further stress to the borough’s housing situation.

EDUCATION:

• Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA) which provides young people from households with incomes of less than £30,000 an incentive to continue in education will be cut. 4,250 Brent youngsters will loose upto £1,100 per academic year.

• Funding for Sure-Start Centres will be reduced by £1m in real terms as the amount received by Brent is frozen for the next 4 years. For 2010/2011 a grant of £10m was given for the programme.

• Schools will only see a 0.1% increase in funding. However, if increased demand is factored in and taking out the previously announced Pupil premium this amounts to an actual cut to the schools budget. Brent has 185 4&5-year olds that do not have a school place for this academic year. This will rise drastically to a cumulative total of 500 by 2015. A government spending cut will only exacerbate one of the borough’s most pressing issues.

• 12% cut to the Education’s non-schools budget. This may involve cuts to areas such as Early Years, support for disabled children as well as grants for free school meals.

• Educational capital spending will be reduced by 60% putting spending on schools maintenance and development at risk.

• Adult-Learning funding to be cut by 25%. BACES (Stonebridge) will lose the ‘Train to Gain’ programme and will have to charge adults the full rate for GCSE/A-Level courses.

COUNCIL BUDGET:

• The settlement for local government is a cut of 7.1% for four years. Brent’s budget will be reduced by a total of £65m. This will see every council service area being cut by a minimum 7%. Some areas may have to make further cuts to support priority areas or to continue delivering other key services.

• Capital programme to be cut by 45% (£66m). This will mean less money for building schools, housing and adult social care.

• Majority of cuts in benefits and services will be ‘front-loaded’ and made in the first 2 years (2011/12 & 2012/13).

• Grants from the Department of Transport reduced by 28% which will see less funds available for Streetcare, pavement repairs and gritting.

• Funding for ‘Concessionary Travel’ which pays for 43,000 Brent Pensioners to have the Freedom Pass will be cut by 10%. Brent has already put in an extra £1.5m towards the scheme this year.

• Additional income for Adult Social Care will not respond to the increase in demand for the borough’s services.

• The rate of interest the council can borrow at from the Public Works Loan Board (PWLB) has been increased by 1% across the board. This will make raising finance for local building and development projects substantially more expensive.

Young People in the Firing Line

The Brent Fightback meeting was well attended yesterday evening. Roxanne Mashari outlined the various ways young people are being hit by cuts in Building Schools for the Future, Future Jobs Fund, Education Maintenance Allowances and the trebling of university fees. The cap on housing benefit could also mean young people's families having to move out of the borough or live in smaller, more crowded accommodation. She point out that just under 25% of the Brent population were under 25 and it was important that their voices be heard. She wanted to make the Youth Parliament of which she is co-chair participative rather than merely consultative.

Cllr Mary Arnold (lead member for children and families) said that the council had to make cuts but would fight for vulnerable children. S he said that only 20% of young people were involved in the youth service and she wanted a better coordinated universal service. Only 4% of Brent youth were NEETS (Not in employment, education or training), which was lower than other London boroughs, but the number would increase with the loss of the EMA and Connexions. She spoke against academies and free schools, which would mean a loss of democratic control and said the authority was arranging a briefing for headteachers and governors on the issue. She said that the housing benefit cap was tantamount to gerrymandering. 

In response to calls for the councillors to work with local trades unions she said that Ann John would be meeting with the NUT.

There was some discussion about whether it was right to focus on youth as receiving a disproportionate number of cuts or whether the real disproportion that should be emphasised was that between the wealthy and the rest of society. Roxanne said that she had been asked to speak about the impact on young people and that was what she had done but she agreed that bankers and the wealthy were escaping from bearing their fair share of the cuts.

In my contribution I suggested that councillors should also meet  with school governors about the impact of cuts in schools. When budgets were reduced governors would be in the front line under pressure to make cuts to balance budgets. He said that cuts already implemented in the council were making some of the services to schools less efficient because of reduced staffing. This then tempts schools to hire private contractors instead and further reduces the economic viability of local government services. 

Concern was expressed about the impact of cuts on children and adults with learning disabilities and the need to include them in the fightback by communicating effectively. The latest news that the College of North West London was to sell off its Kilburn Campus was discussed and the issue of occupation of the site was raised. 

"A dark day for students of the future" - Caroline Lucas

Responding to the news that a cap on university tuition fees in England will be set at a maximum of £9,000 a year, Caroline Lucas, MP for Brighton Pavilion, said:

“Today is a dark day for the students of the future – and for Lib Dem voters who have seen, yet again, their Party’s leader make a shameful u-turn on a key election pledge. The Greens are now the only main political party that support free education for all. A cap of £9,000 is simply unacceptable for a country that values social mobility and inclusiveness. This announcement will mean our public degrees will be among the most costly in the world. Many people will be priced out of going to university – and those who do go will be saddled with huge debt. All this at a time when our young people are facing increasing unemployment and anxiety about the future.

“A more progressive policy to address the challenge of funding our higher education would be a business education tax levied on the top 4% of UK companies, which would generate enough annually to abolish tuition fees and take our public investment in higher education up to the average in other comparable countries. As MP for Brighton Pavilion, I am determined to work hard to protect students and staff at Sussex University from creeping privatisation and devastating cuts.”

Brent Cross - Flawed Plans and Wasted Opportunity will Destroy Local Communities

The Coalition for a Sustainable Brent Cross Cricklewood (BXC) Plan has condemned last Thursday’s decision by a single unelected official at Barnet Council (leader Lynne Hillan -pictured below) to approve the fundamentally flawed planning application.

Lynne Hillan

The BXC Coalition fears the demolition of hundreds of local homes and road works on a massive scale will cause devastation to local communities.

Pauline McKinnell, Chairperson of  Cricklewood Community Forum and Hendon Way resident, says, “This scheme will cause huge disruption to the community for years to come. Hundreds of homes will be destroyed, with residents not knowing where they will be moved to. Home owners, many of whom have lived in the area for years, will be offered shared equity deals if they wish to stay locally, but details have not been worked out.

“The area is bounded by major roads - the North Circular, A5, A41 and Cricklewood Lane - that already experience frequent traffic congestion.  Adding 7,500 new housing units and 27,000 jobs will lead to complete gridlock.

 Boris Johnson who ridiculed protesters

“The concentration of new housing in such a small area is ludicrous. The only way you can get 7,500 homes into the area is to build enormous blocks of flats all over the place. Who on earth would choose to live in a tower block overlooking the North Circular?”

Navin Shah, Labour party Assembly Member for Brent and Harrow says, “The scheme fails to conform to a significant number of key planning policies. It is unambitious, and wastes the opportunity for a successful, green, long-lasting alternative to the car-orientated Brent Cross plans of the 1960s, by exacerbating that outdated vision.

“The planning process has been a complete shambles from start to finish, and required a much closer scrutiny by Barnet Council, the Mayor of London and the Secretary of State. This has not happened, and as a result the residents and stakeholders of Barnet, Brent and Camden have been left exposed to a bleak future.

“The green light for the project means a huge letdown for my constituents in Brent and Harrow, and thousands of residents in other parts of London. Every single authority responsible for the assessment of the planning application has abjectly failed. Barnet Council’s entire process was a complete mess.

“Super-hub projects such as this are condemned in the recent London Plan amendments, but Mayor Boris Johnson rubber-stamped approval of the application, and the Coalition Government too has shown no vision, and let people down by not calling a public inquiry.

“My constituents are now left facing the prospect of hugely increased traffic and congestion, and an incinerator with a 140m high chimney, equivalent to a 50-storey tower block on their doorsteps.” 

Eric Pickles

Dr Shahrar Ali, Brent Green party spokesperson for Environment and Planning says, "Secretary of State Pickles, Mayor Boris and now Barnet Council seem determined to put the building of giant shopping malls ahead of the future sustainability of the planet. This decision betrays the short-termist political ideology of local, regional and coalition government. Local residents will renew their campaign to kick this over consumptive fantasy into the long grass!" 

Demolition of the Whitefields Estate, Clarefield Park, Claremont Way and the Rosa Freedman Residential centre, one of the biggest day care centres in Barnet, is part of phase one of the development, due to commence in 2014.  Many residents face a highly stressful future because of the developers’ failure to offer adequate compensation for the demolition of their homes and the cost of relocation.

The Coalition will continue to fight the plans building by building to ensure a sustainable scheme – one that the local community wants – is put in its place.  The developers have now suddenly stated that they want “meaningful engagement” with the local community and the wider area. This is laughable, because it should have happened years ago, before the plans were set in stone.   Instead, we face the existing housing and modern sports centre, and the modern parts of local schools, all being demolished.   We face future light railway and cycling routes being destroyed, with major increases in road congestion instead.  And we face toxic chemicals being emitted every day by the Brent Cross domestic waste incinerator.

To date, there has been no press release about this £4.5-billion redevelopment from Barnet Council.  Given the enormous impact on the Borough, and the rather minor nature of SOME of their releases, this is amazing.  After all the justified criticism perhaps Barnet is now too ashamed to publicise its folly.

Beyond Brent's Brain

The Brent BRAIN Community website closed on 24 September 2010. This Saturday a FREE course starts at Willesden Green Library which will teach voluntary organisations and others interested in how to set up a FREE community website. The courses are on Saturdays 6th and 13th November 2-4pm or Saturdays 20th, 27th November and 4th December 2-4pm. Ring 020 8937 3400 to book a place. 

The first 4 sessions are to show people how to create a general community website using word press. The last session in December is on how to add posts and community events to the new site. Kathy Ferris (former Brain manager will run this session in a personal capacity as a tutor~)
http://brilliantbrent.wordpress.com/

  
Relevant community information for Brent has been migrated onto the Brent Council Website www.brent.gov.uk.
 
To help you find the relevant pages here are some handy links to the new services and projects that are available on the council and B My Voice websites: 

• www.brent.gov.uk/communitydirectory - Community and Voluntary Directory
• www.brent.gov.uk/brentgoinggreen - saving energy monitors project
• www.brent.gov.uk/wwwp - learning disability photo library
• www.brent.gov.uk/voluntary.nsf/Pages/LBB-19 - link to Grantnet funding finder
• www.brent.gov.uk/partnersforbrent - local strategic partnership pages
• www.bmyvoice.org.uk/brentinspires - London 2012 Games youth project 

All other projects, interactive and information areas on BRAIN are closed and no longer available.

Protest Works - Just look at the proof

Excellent article by Johann Hari in today's Independent he reflects on the success of the Vodaphone protests over the last few days (stimulated by a comment he made about Vodaphone's tax avoidance in one of his columns):

"Protest raises the political price for governments making bad decisions. It stopped LBJ and Nixon making the most catastrophic decision of all. The same principle can apply to the Conservative desire to kneecap the welfare state while handing out massive baubles to their rich friends. The next time George Osborne has to decide whether to cancel the tax bill of a super-rich corporation and make us all pick up the tab, he will know there is a price. People will find out, and they will be angry. The more protests there are, the higher the price. If enough of us demand it, we can make the rich pay their share for the running of our country, rather than the poor and the middle – to name just one urgent cause that deserves protest."