This letter to Michael Gove from parents of yet another school that is being forced to become an academy, demonstrates just how governors, staff and parents are being trampled on:
Dear Mr Gove,
We are a group of parents whose children attend Thomas Gamuel Primary School (TGPS) in Walthamstow, east London.We
are writing to object to the Department for Education’s decision to
force TGPS into Sponsored Academy status, ignoring the objections of the
parents, carers, teachers, support staff and governing body
:• 95 per cent of parents returning a ballot voted against academy status (60 per cent of parents voted)• 85 per cent of teachers voted against converting
• The governing body unanimously voted against becoming a sponsored academy.
We
understand that the local authority has this week applied to
you 'for consent to constitute the governing body of Thomas Gamuel
Primary School as an Interim Executive Board (IEB) in accordance with
Schedule 6 of the Education and Inspections Act 2006'. We strongly
object to this application to dissolve a governing body that has made a
decision the local authority disagree with.
We have met with our
local MP Stella Creasy and our local councillor Clare Coghill to try and
get some answers. We now write to you to outline our major objections
and to ask that you reject the local authority’s application and allow
the school to continue on its current path to improvement:
1. We are not a failing school. Ofsted
inspected TGPS in April 2012. They rated the school ‘inadequate’,
mainly due to an administrative error, informing the governing body two
months after the inspection at the end of the summer term. Ofsted
allocated a timetable
for improvement between June 2012 and April 2013 (nine months).
Ofsted’s interim monitoring report in November 2012 (three months into
the plan) said the school was making ‘satisfactory progress’ in
implementing its improvement plan. The monitoring report specifically
noted that the administrative error which had caused the 'requires
improvement' rating in April 2012 had now been fully resolved.The
DfE states on its website that: 'When schools have been underperforming
for a long time, decisive action is needed to raise standards and ensure
that the children in these schools are able to achieve their full
potential.'TGPS’ previous two Ofsted reports (2009 and 2006) rated
the school 'good' with 'outstanding' aspects. We do not understand why
one unsatisfactory Ofsted report classes us as ‘underperforming for a
long time’
2. Teaching standards are improving. We are aware
that teaching standards in the school need to be
raised. The parents and carers are confident that this is being
achieved. The teachers and support staff, and the governing body are
confident, indeed even Ofsted is confident - as it reported in its
monitoring inspection in November 2012. Why then is the DfE forcing TGPS
to rush into Sponsored Academy status?The DfE states: 'Wherever
possible, the Department will seek to find solutions to raising
standards that everyone can agree on - as has been the case with the
vast majority of the schools that have become academies. Where
under performance is not being tackled effectively the Secretary of State
does have powers to intervene to help ensure standards are raised.'The
School Improvement Plan in place is tackling underperformance - and we
as parents can see the visible results of this. We are all committed to
this plan and want the DfE to allow the plan to run the course of its
original timetable (April 2013).As stated earlier, the parents
of children at the school have voted overwhelmingly against sponsored
academy status. The school governing body have voted against it. The
teachers at the school are against it. How is the DfE seeking to find a
solution that ‘everyone can agree on’?
3. We are not being consulted. Since
October 2012 the DfE has been consistently applying pressure to TGPS’
governing body to agree to conversion to sponsored academy status. The
Local Education Authority is now also applying pressure, regardless of
the fact that the improvement plan’s original timetable – agreed by
Ofsted – has not expired.The governing body originally voted
against making a decision without consulting parents and chose instead
to focus on improving teaching standards within the school. When they
did consult with us, they listened and voted with us. The local
authority is now planning to take away the only body that truly has our
children’s best interests at
heart.We want the original school improvement plan and timetable – ratified by Ofsted – to stand. The changes that have already been implemented need time to embed.We want to make an informed, unrushed decision about our future status. A proper consultation – with all the facts about what the change will actually mean – needs to take place. We would like a choice of sponsor. There has been a lack of transparency of the criteria used by the DfE/local authority to choose the proposed sponsor.
Thank you again for your time and attention.
Yours sincerely
TGPS Parents Say No
(Representing the voice of the majority of parents and carers at Thomas Gamuel Primary School)
(Click on image to enlarge)
