The Gladstone story highlights risks attached to Brent's free school policy

The Brent Cabinet probably approved an officer report on school places provision this afternon at their Crest Academy meeting.  The report advocates providing the additional secondary places needed via free schools.

It may be worth looking at the example of the Gladstone Free School  in assessing the risks attached to this policy. The proposal goes back to  2014  when the DfE approved the application. There was a chaotic 'consultation' meeting inJanuary 2014 when it appeared the school wanted to build on playing fields agjacent to Gladstone Park. LINK

There have been huge problems in finding a site. In April 2014 the school advised parents of pupils who had been enrolled for a place in September 2014 that they should seek another school. It again failed to open this September.

The school has this week written to parents to say that after talks in 'high places' they have the support of Nick Gibb MP, Minister for Schools. They claim that he made it clear to ' DfE officials that he wanted this project to work'.

They claims that officers  from Brent Council are working directly with the Education Funding Agency and two estate agents to find the school a site. They say, as they have said before, that they understand there are several sites that 'may prove possible options'.

Gladstone state that once the EFA find a permanent site the school will be found a temporary site for the 'year or two' that it will take refurbishment, remodelling or rebuilding to be completed.

Desite this uncertainty the putative school announces that it is still open for applications: 'Gladstone School - Your Extra Choice!'

They assure parents that as Gladstone is its own admissions authority they can still make 6 choices through the Lacal Authority applications system in  addition to Gladstone. They have extended their first round admissions to February 2016 and ask parents to let others who are concerned about school places know about Gladstone.

In March this year Gladstone announced the day after children had been allocated their places that they would not be opening in September LINK

I asked at the time whether the DfE support for the school should be withdrawn to avoid the confusion and disappointment caused by enrollment but failure to open in 2014 and 2015. It ap;pears there is still a risk for September 2016 despite the active recruiting.

Another proposed  free school,  Gateway,  did not proceed after difficulties in finding a site LINK and it would be interesting to hear how Brent Council expects to get over this problem

Apart from the site uncertainties there continues to be concern  over Gladstone financial issues and the amount of money spent on the school without one child being educated. There are also suggestions of potential conflicts of interest. LINK

There are 6 current directors and 8 previous directos.

source: companycheck.co.uk

To read about other issues of concern over free schools follow this LINK








 

Met's message on 'hate crime' following Paris attacks

The Metropolitan Police have sent this message following the events in Paris. The Football Association has advised fans attending tomorrow's England France friendly at Wembley Stadium to arrive early to allow time to get through additional security checks. They are also asked to be in their seats by 7.55am to take part in post-Paris preliminaries.

Wanted: Chair of Brent Scrutiny Committee

Following the sad and premature death of Cllr  Dan Filson, who had made a good start at making Brent Scrutiny Committee more effective, a new Committee chair is needed from amongst the Labour group:

WANTED: INDEPENDENT MINDED, SCRUPULOUS COUNCILLOR GOOD ON DETAIL BUT AWARE OF THE BIGGER PICTURE

Speaking to some of the Labour group it is clear that there are some impediments to the challenging scrutiny of a Council with such a large majority and where the leader is controlling and intolerant of criticism.

The new Chair will thus need to be someone who has not got an eye on future preferment by the Council leadership, including the position of Mayor, and with the strength and tenacity to follow issues through without caving in to pressure.

The new Chair should have a proven public record of contributions to Full Council Meetings which are more than planted questions to Lead Members to showcase the Council's achievements. They should have raised pertinent questions on policy decisions  and detail at Full Council or committee meetings.

Some in the Labour group are of the opinion that the position requires such a high workload that it should not be undertaken by someone who has a full time job in addition to being a councillor. That obviously raises significant issues about equality of opportunity. Those putting forward the argument suggest that a 'part time' Scrutiny Chair will become over-dependent on Council officers who themselves should be subject to scrutiny.

Lastly the new Chair should not be compromised by close friendships and relationships with Cabinet members that might affect their independence. This could extend to representing the same ward as the leadership.

The Scrutiny Committee's role can be found HERE

 Just a reminder of what Barry Gardiner MP said reacting to Labour's election  result last May:

I’m thrilled, of course I’m thrilled but we need to be very careful.

It is a huge responsibility because a majority this big for any party means that we have to look within ourselves for the sort of scrutiny that we need of the policies that we ourselves are proposing.

All of these people got elected because they managed to persuade voters they wanted to represent them in the civic centre on the council. They must remember their job is to represent the people to the bureaucratic (sic) of the council and not to represent the council bureaucrats to the people. 

We are here to be a critical voice to say where things are wrong and to set policy to change Brent for the better.

Who will be that independent critical voice for Brent residents?

Any nominations?

Local government cuts and offering alternatives to those attracted by ISIS

Guest blog by Scott Bartle
 

Friday 13^th was an eventful day as it was in the morning that David Cameron explained how he’d worked ‘hand in glove’ with the USA to execute Mohammed Emwazi in Syria, where we are not ‘at war’. This was a man that walked the same streets as us in Brent, perhaps buying food from the same checkouts and was described by those that knew him as a ‘nice guy’ before adopting the moniker ‘Jihadi-John’. Meanwhile, in the afternoon over at Woolwich Crown Court 19 year old Yahya Rashid from Willesden who had left the country to join ISIS was found guilty of terrorism charges. As the guilty verdict was given to Yahya, in France final preparations were being made by ISIS to attack Paris. After the mass-murders French Gendarme conveniently found a passport upon a perpetrator matching one shown by someone who identified as a refugee in Greece. However, other reports from the media indicate that the majority of others involved in the Paris attacks were more like Yahya Rashid, considered ‘home-grown’.

It’s beyond most of our capacity to do anything about a foreign policy so reliant upon fossil fuels we’ve contributed towards conflict over its supply since WW1. From the Baghdad Railway, to the overthrow of democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mossaddegh of Iran in 1953 to the wars in Iraq and the funding of ISIS to topple President Assad in Syria, it can feel pretty stuck. However, within our grasp we do have the power to offer alternatives to people from our communities who may be leaving our communities to get involved with ISIS. We must recognise that ISIS is merely a gang for those in a multi-cultural world who are better connected. 

The myth of the ‘five star jihad’ is pervasive as recruits like those from Birmingham leave clutching their copies of ‘Islam for Dummies’ from Amazon. On social media images are posted of a hiphop lifestyle of five-star hotels, hanging with their friends, driving smart cars offering a perception that there will be more opportunities with the ladies. This is the allure of stuff, people looking for material things, love or a sense of community and belonging. These are life-goals shared by many that people have become disaffected in their ability to reach, and see joining ISIS as a more achievable way to meet their needs. What to do about these things hasn’t changed since 1936 when Winifred Holtby highlighted Local Government as the ‘first-line of defence thrown up by the community against our common enemies – poverty, sickness, ignorance, isolation, mental derangement and social maladjusment’. 

What’s changed is the ability of our elected representatives to recognise this and that cuts in the short term equate to costs – both financially and socially in the long term. 

More often than not adults who make choices to get involved with crime have had behaviour considered ‘anti-social’ or ‘challenging’ since childhood. Research aggregated by Professor Martin Knapp of the London School of Economics estimated that the cost of conduct related crime in England to range from £22.5bn to £60bn a year, and £1.1-1.9m over the lifetime of a single offender. 

These costs on the public sector are distributed across many agencies and are around 10 times high than children with no behaviour problems. Yet research has found that gross savings over 25 years from an intervention provided from services can exceed the average cost of the intervention by a factor of around 8 – 1. We need to recognise that despite this money being spread across many agencies it is still our tax money that is being lost. Local Government needs to recognise it’s likely to be around for ever and start operating on long term plans. As last month’s decision by the Labour run council to engage in ‘savage’ short-sighted cuts to youth services See LINK  or destroying places like Stonebridge Adventure Playground could cost us all dearly. 

Scott Bartle stood as The Green Party Parliamentary Candidate for Brent North in 2015 and is a behaviour psychologist who works in forensic services. 

Children to take over Brent streets? (occasionally)

They could be updated photographs from the 50s LINK but these are from an experimental 'Play Street' in Kempe Road, Queens Park.

The Brent Cabinet will this afternoon at their meeting at Crest Academy (2pm) be considering a paper adopting a procedure for occasional closure of local streets along similar lines. LINK

This comment from one of the organisers sums up what is to be gained for the community:

Apologies for the belated thank you! I wanted to extend our heartfelt gratitude and thanks for the first ever play street in Brent. As you can see from the photos it was a whopping success - old and young mingled and laughed and got to know each other. As one of my elder neighbours said, she’d lived on the street for 30 years and hadn’t met several neighbours until that day. The children played for hours, and invented their own games and enjoyed the freedom of not stressing about cars. I knew they would love it, but I hadn’t quite realised how much the adults would love it too. I’ve received many emails of thanks, and have acquired a long email list of neighbours who want to be included in the next one.

The report outlines the wider advantages:

Although Play Streets do no replace the need for Green Spaces they have the advantage of:

• Allowing children to play near home while remaining the responsibility of their parents
• Reducing obesity
• Giving children the space to play energetically
• Increasing the sense of community by bringing neighbours together  both in setting up and managing the play street but also in taking part when the street is in operation

The caveat about Green Spaces is vital. Play Streets are a great idea but mustn't be used as a substitute for green spaces, including pocket parks,  or  supervised play activities as used to be provided by Stonebridge Adventure Playground.

Join the Hunt protest on Thursday

Sympathy and Solidarity with Lycee Winston Churchill, Wembley

Some of the school's students

The students from Lycee Winston Churchill have become a familiar sight in Wembley since the school opened in the former Brent Town Hall earlier this term.

Principal Mireille Rabate will face a daunting task tomorrow morning when she brings the school community together after the Paris attacks.

Wembley Matters sends sympathy and solidarity to staff, pupils and their families.

Wembley Stadium Today

John Roan shows the way in challenging 'exam factory' schools

The current action by teachers at John Roan School in Greenwich has significance well beyond that borough. There is increasing recognition of the impact of a high stakes testing system both on teachers and pupils. As teachers' workload increases their stress levels rise and the fixation on grades and fear of failure produces stress in their students.

John Roan staff are taking the initiative in challenging what the NUT have called factory schooling.  (Exam Factories? The impact of accountability measures on children and young people NUT June 2015).Yesterday a number of organisations, working under the banner Reclaiming Education, came together at Hamilton House, the NUT HQ, to discuss some common aims in that campaign. Green Party teachers were among those who took part.

This is the message that John Roan staff have sent to supporters today:

Dear Supporters,

We thought we would update you on our campaign to defend our working conditions and the traditions of our comprehensive school.

Our strike day on Tuesday 10 November 2015, received phenomenal support from NUT Associations, other trade unions, parents, students and teachers from as far as New York Miami and Nigeria! We think this is because we are speaking up for teachers who are defending education and the conditions in which it can flourish. We want our students to do well in their qualifications but not at any cost; not at the cost of those who find exams difficult and feel they are failures, or the ones who want to do so well they work into the night, bent over books with the stress of heightened expectations and future failure.

Teaching should be something that brings fulfilment and reward, not exhaustion and demoralisation. They are destroying our vocation and turning it into alienating toil. We must stop this and our campaign is the start for us. We hope we have encouraged teachers everywhere to do the same.

We understand that a negotiating meeting has been called this week and we hope that The John Roan Management come to their senses and adopt policies that recognise the valuable contribution we make to our students' learning.  All we ask is that they respect that our workload should be reasonable and that we should be trusted to teach without excessive scrutiny and monitoring.

If we do not get agreement, we will have no choice to but to continue our strike on Thursday 19 November 2015. Our pickets are from 7.30am until 8.45am and we welcome everyone in joining us to support our strike.

Please continue to spread the word and if you would like us to speak at a meeting then reply us with details of when/where you would like us to come. We are all working teachers so we will do our best, but we have part-time and retired teachers who could speak too.

Thanks again and solidarity forever.

The John Roan NUT
www.thejohnroannut.org  johnroannut@gmail.com  Twitter @thejohnroannut