First free school failure

daveyjp

How long can this expensive experiment (£1.5bn up from £450mn) go on for? Schooling isn't like buying a dodgy car which you can replace, our children get one chance.

The parents of the children at this school will now have to find a new school for the last term of this school year and no doubt the local authority will once again have to tidy up the mess, trying to find spaces for them all.

A parent on 5 live is saying the Head was not only an unqualified teacher he didn't seem to have any ideas what his responsibilities were. Surely a certain level of competence should be demanded before anymore can be allowed to open.

Madmel

I agree with you completely Davey. As a qualified (but experienced therefore expensive to employ) teacher myself, I find it incredulous that this government can allow almost anyone to set up "free schools". I have a colleague in my department who is in her 2nd year of teaching - she is qualified too. Her classroom management is improving, but when I enter the room, the kids go very quiet and she keeps saying that she wishes she could do it herself. She'll get there as she is keen and has great ideas, but she is also prepared to seek and act on advice.

I feel so sorry for those kids where the staff have nobody to turn to. It only takes a couple of unruly ones to disrupt learning, and if inexperienced and unqualified Heads and teachers are in charge, I can only imagine the chaos. What a waste of public money!

fluffnutter

Set up whatever wacky half-arsed 'school' you like. Just don't expect it to be tax payer-funded. I remain as opposed to this ridiculous idea as I always was. If it wasn't for the poor kids who are suffering (as per usual) I'd say it serves the precious parents right for choosing one of these aberrations in the first place.

daveyjp

And it also appears if a parent has concerns about a free school the only option is to call the DFE. Unlike LEA schools which operate under control of a local Authority there appears to be no local mechanism for dealing with concerns about how the school operates. Even the local MP couldn't find out how problems are dealt with and this in a Dept his colleague is in control of. In an interview you could tell in his answers he was trying to support free schools, but his frustration with the failings was evident.

How many other products or services that we pay for is there no formal mechanism for complaints?

The other issue is free schools can teach in a way they decide on. If these 60-70 children now go to a LEA school they could well be a long way behind those who are following the national curriculum.

I hope the parents affected are considering legal action.

peachyprice

Why on earth did any parents send their children there in the first place? Surely they must have realised what a ludicrous idea it was?

neverdespairgirl

daveyjp wrote: »

A parent on 5 live is saying the Head was not only an unqualified teacher he didn't seem to have any ideas what his responsibilities were. Surely a certain level of competence should be demanded before anymore can be allowed to open.

I'm not sure that teaching qualifications are essential. I went to non-state schools, which unlike most state schools don't demand their teachers have a PGCE. Most did, but some (including some fantastic teachers) at my school didn't.

Not everyone is a good teacher. I'm not, myself, and I think quite a lot of being a teacher is innate, or learned by experience, rather than being taught it in a course.

SuzieSue

peachyprice wrote: »

Why on earth did any parents send their children there in the first place? Surely they must have realised what a ludicrous idea it was?

Because the alternatives were probably a lot worse. The sooner they bring back grammar schools the better.

Brighton_belle

SuzieSue wrote: »

Because the alternatives were probably a lot worse. The sooner they bring back grammar schools the better.

I'm guessing you didn't fail the 11+ and experience feeling written off at 11?

FBaby

SuzieSue wrote: »

Because the alternatives were probably a lot worse. The sooner they bring back grammar schools the better.

More likely that they make promises of a fantastic school that they just can't keep up. One such school has opened in my area, less than a mile to the local secondary school (and only 3 miles from another secondary school) in a medium size town. These two schools are good ones, both rated 2 OFTSED, yet a large number of people have fallen for the rubbish they've been sold, mainly that the classes have less then 15 pupils, and they use different education methods known to be extremely successful in who knows which country. They more or less sold themselves as a free 'private' school and many parents have fallen for it. The fact that they can't cater hot food, don't have IT facilities (but will get state of the art systems by next September), no library (but will get a state of the art library by September) etc... seem not to have phased them.

What annoys me is that it means a reduction of pupils at my kids' school, when they were already quite low on numbers because of the proximity of the other school, and so are now at risk of losing quite a significant amount of income (but on the plus side, will have even smaller classes!). As a result, the two other schools are looking to start a 6th form, which could be good, but it still annoys me that a free school full of hot air can do what they want where they want with not a care of how they might be destabilising the local schools next to them.

Lunar_Eclipse

daveyjp wrote: »

Schooling isn't like buying a dodgy car which you can replace, our children get one chance.

True. And as a parent, I don't automatically assume that the government and "qualified" teachers in my local school are best for my children. What about freedom of choice?

Poor kids affected in this scenario though.

securityguy

peachyprice wrote: »

Why on earth did any parents send their children there in the first place? Surely they must have realised what a ludicrous idea it was?

In the case of the failed school (Montessori) and the one that's about to get the same treatment (Muslim fundamentalists) it would take a man with a heart of stone not to laugh. The parents, the governors, the staff: useless all. The parents put ideology ahead of education, the governors were woo-nutters and the cast of Citizen Khan respectively, and the staff were unqualified fantasists and/or washed up incompetents who couldn't get a supply gig. There was no shortage of places in either Crawley or Derby, and the parents should have known exactly what they were getting into.

Poor kids. But everyone else should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves.