Agenda item

·       Update of Sevenoaks Grammar School Annex

·       Reflection on the all through schools that have an age range from 3 to 18 years

·       Narrowing the Gap

1.                  The Cabinet Member, Mr Gough, and the Corporate Director, Mr Leeson, gave their verbal updates and highlighted work undertaken since the last Education Cabinet Committee meeting which included the following:

Update of Sevenoaks Grammar School Annex

·        The decision on the 2 separate applications to provide Sevenoaks Grammar School annex provision by Valley Invicta Academy Trust, Maidstone and The Weald of Kent Grammar School, Tonbridge had been submitted to the Secretary of State in July and a determination on those applications had not been reached by the Secretary of State, Mr Gove. The position remained much the same despite the recently reported correspondence between the Secretary of State, Mr Gove and Mr Fallon, MP for Sevenoaks.

·        The key issues to be determined by the Secretary of State were; whether this was to be considered a new grammar school, which was not allowed under the legislation or, whether this was an expansion of the existing school.  Mr Gough confirmed that he too had further exchanges of correspondence with the Secretary of State when they both set out their positions again during which the Secretary of State confirmed that he had been taking evidence from the Education Funding Agency and that he hoped to reach a decision soon.  Mr Gough confirmed that despite this, progress was being made on the planning applications on the Wildernesse site for the grammar school annex and the Trinity Free School.  A determination on the planning applications was expected in March 2014.

Reflection on the all through schools that have an age range from 3 to 18 years

• There were 2 all through secondary schools in Kent; John Wallis Academy, Ashford and the Folkestone Academy, Folkestone.  A further 14 Secondary schools in Kent had Primary schools on their sites and would operate very closely with those Primary schools and in most cases those children would progress to the Secondary school on the same site.  Mr Leeson was keen to promote the idea of further links between the Secondary and Primary schools.  A number of the proposals for the Cabinet Committee’s consideration on this meeting’s agenda involved a number of other Secondary Schools accommodating Primary schools on their school sites.  Kent was also in the process of tendering for 5 new Primary Schools as part of the Basic Need Capital Programme in Kent and some of the sponsors being put forward to the Department of Education, for those 5 new Primary schools, were Kent Secondary Schools.

“Narrowing the Gap”

• There had been a welcome improvement in terms of; the number of Kent schools achieving an Ofsted judgement of either good or outstanding and in particular the overall attainment of pupils. This however, highlighted the achievement gaps for children in receipt of Free School Meals, SEN and Disability and Children in Care.  The narrowing of the gap remained a major priority for the Education, Learning and Skills Directorate.  The Cabinet Committee would have the opportunity to discuss what was being done to narrow the gap in more depth at a future meeting.

Kent had a number of projects and programmes happening around this issue including the promotion of the best uses of the Pupil Premium, which gave additional national funding to schools to support those children on Free School meals in a more targeted way on their progress.

Members noted the following points that were drawn out from reports on the agenda;

Ø      Free School Meals attainment gap in Kent did not narrow in 2013.

Ø      There had been a significant 5% narrowing of the gap in Primary Schools pupils in 2012 but no reduction in 2013 at Key Stage 2.

Ø      The Free school meal attainment gap in Kent for the end of Primary School was 22%, compared to a national gap of 17% in 2012; the figures for 2013 would be published in January 2014.

Ø      At Key Stage 4 the Free School Meal attainment gap had not closed for 3 years.  The gap was 33% in Kent compared with the national gap which was 26%.  The conclusion was that there was not enough progress in narrowing the gap. Drilling down beneath those figures there were some interesting trends and differences between schools.

Ø      177 primary schools narrowed the Free School Meals attainment gap at KS2 in 2013.

Ø      43 secondary schools narrowed the Free School Meals attainment gap at KS4 in 2013.

Ø      195 primary schools achieved better attainment results for Free School Meals pupils than they did in the previous year.  46 secondary schools improved their attainment results for Free School Meals pupils compared to the previous year. It is possible to improve the outcomes of these pupils and at the same time for the gap not to close.  If the results improved overall at a very fast rate in some schools we may find that outcomes would improve but the gap may not close or may even get wider.  There were two things that had to be borne in mind; both the actual outcomes, (i) are more Free School meals pupils at primary school achieving level 4  in reading writing and mathematics? (ii) Are more Free School Meal pupils in secondary schools gaining 5 good GCSEs with English and mathematics? And are the gaps closing for those pupils.

Ø      It was key that more pupils had a better chance of achieving the levels expected especially when they were in those key vulnerable groups.  There were other groups mentioned by the Cabinet Member including SEN and particularly the outcomes for Children in Care which had the biggest achievement gap although there was some improvement in 2013.

Ø      As a key priority a number of things were being done.  This was top of the agenda for the School Improvement Advisors in terms of school improvement and the quality of teaching and the impact that teaching had on accelerating progress for different groups of pupils.

Ø      A set of case studies of the best practice in Kent would be published in January on those schools that are succeeding in closing the gap for pupils on Free School Meals and were achieving better or the same rates of progress than the rates of progress for other pupils.

Ø      There was now a set of expectations that were understood by Kent schools that between Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2 in primary schools the rates of progress in Free School meals have to be three levels of progress and not two if those children were to catch up and between the end of primary school and Key Stage 4 it had to be four levels of progress for Free School meal pupils and not the expected three levels.

2.                  The Chairman advised that it would be appropriate for the Members at the Education Cabinet Committee agenda setting meeting to discussion when a report on “narrowing the gap” should be submitted to a future meeting.

3.                  Mr Gough and Mr Leeson responded to comments and questions regarding information given in their verbal updates by Members which included the following:

a)           Mr Gough advised that the decision on the Sevenoaks Annex was being watched outside the county as well as locally.  He explained that Mr Gove’s decision was key and rested on whether this was a new school or whether this was an expansion.  Mr Gove has been even handed and held a neutral position on this matter.  He reminded Members that the request for additional selective school places in Sevenoaks came from a very large petition presented to the County Council which was debated and voted on and carried by a large majority cross party to take this forward.  Following discussions with schools and eventually Valley Invicta Academy Trust and then The Weald Grammar School coming forward, it was right that KCC pursued this. There were significant pressures on secondary and selective places particularly in the West Kent area, which needed to be addressed.  Legal advice was sought from outside KCC’s Governance and Law Department and this had an impact on the proposal being taken forward.

b)           Mr Gough advised that to date, in response to a “Freedom of Information” request, none of the legal advice had been made public.  Mr Gough advised that he would have to check back on what information he would be able to disclose to Members.

c)            Mr Gough stated that this proposal would not have been pursued had the legal advice been to the contrary.   He understood that the cost of the legal advice had been made public.

d)           A comment was made that there had been much improvement in the attainment in the all through primary schools in Canterbury and Dover. The forthcoming promotion of all through schools was welcomed.

e)           Mr Gough advised that the relocation of Barton Court Grammar School, Canterbury, [Barton Court Grammar is an academy] to the coast was a different proposal to the Sevenoaks annex as the negotiations were with a developer.  He explained that there had been significant correspondence exchanged with local Members, which Mr Gough would share with Mr Vye.  A balanced view had been taken that there would be some merit in the idea of coastal grammar provision.  Mr Gough stated that the money available was for Basic Need and the evidence he had viewed to date regarding the relocation of Barton Court Grammar School did not persuade him that there was a Basic Need in this proposal.  Mr Gough assured Members that detailed work had been carried out on this to allow a fully balanced response to be given.

4.                  RESOLVED that:-

a)           the responses to comments and questions by Members as detailed in paragraph 3 above be noted;

b)           the Education Cabinet Committee agenda setting meeting representatives discuss when a report on “narrowing the gap” can be submitted to a future meeting;

c)            advice be sought on whether the legal advice on Sevenoaks annex can be shared with Members and the cost of that legal advice be made available;

d)           the correspondence regarding the relocation of Barton Grammar School, Canterbury be shared with Mr Vye; and

e)           the information given in the verbal update be noted with thanks.