One school suspends quarter of pupils in year

Mar 18 2008

By Jenny Clover


MORE than a quarter of all pupils suspended in one borough came from one school, according to Government figures.

Strict bosses at the Harris Academy in Peckham suspended nearly 30 per cent of its pupils - 319 youngsters - in one year.

In the same 12-month period, Southwark's eight council-maintained secondary schools suspended a total of 721 children.

But Harris bosses say their no-nonsense approach was necessary to get the former troubled Warwick Park School under control.

The total number of students given fixed-period exclusions at the Peckham school represent 28.36 per cent of its population - the national average was 10.4 per cent.


The Department for Children, Families and Schools figures relate to 2005/06 - the latest year for which figures have been released.

That year, the academy permanently excluded 13 pupils, or 1.16 per cent of its pupils.

The Harris Federation, which runs six schools in South London, has spoken about it strict discipline rules.

But the other four Southwark academies that were open at the time only expelled 106 pupils.

The City of London Academy on Lynton Road, gave 21 fixed-period exclusions, or 3.66 per cent of the school population. The Harris Academy in Bermondsey excluded 56 pupils and the Harris Girls' Academy in East Dulwich suspended 29.

Michael Davern, joint secretary of Southwark National Union of Teachers, said: "Instead of looking at the causes of this bad behaviour and making time to talk to the children to find out why they behave like this, it seems they are just taking the easy option and excluding them.

"This zero-tolerance approach doesn't allow for individual circumstances and you can't run a school like that."

Dan Moynihan, CEO of the Harris Federation, said a zero-tolerance approach to bad behaviour was necessary in the first few years of taking over the difficult Warwick Park school.

He said: "The school had to set out its stall in terms of discipline to make it clear to youngsters what was acceptable.

"In the following year, 2006/07, the number of fixed-term exclusions dropped hugely to 124.

"Peckham is a very challenging area and here is a school that is actually doing rather well.

"Its GCSE attainment levels are improving and Ofsted said it was a good school."

He said the 28 per cent figure included pupils suspended more than once.

Can only think the criteria meriting expulsion is relatively trivial compared to back in the day. Disturbing reading none the less. Expulsion should be seen as a deterrent, it defeats the object when those expelled number enough to create their own society.

I am sure if someone bothered to do some research they would find that nearly all Academy's regardless of area will have high exclusion rates. Particularly in the early years.

Weeding out all those children that will be of no use to the schools development...Welcome to the future of education

Published Date: 10 January 2006

Location: Yorkshire

New academy suspends one in ten pupils

Trinity Academy at Thorne, near Doncaster:


Shocked parents to launch campaign against school's disciplinary policies after children sent home
Paul Whitehouse

ALMOST one in 10 pupils have been suspended from a new educational academy in the first term since it took over from a conventional state secondary school.
One pupil has been permanently excluded from the £22m academy, another teenager is the subject of an appeal but could also end up excluded and a girl was sent home in a row over the uniform.
Some parents say they have been shocked by the severity of the discipline regime at the Trinity Academy, near Doncaster, which has replaced Thorne Grammar.
It is semi-independent and funded by the Vardy Foundation, which finances a similar academy in Middlesbrough that has also attracted controversy.
Dissatisfied parents have formed the Thorne and Moorends Parents and Students Support Group and have organised a public meeting in a pub at Moorends tomorrow evening to try to launch a campaign against the academy's policies.
Organiser Pauline Wood said the idea snowballed out of a conversation between unhappy parents.
Now they are trying to enlist the support of parents of children at feeder schools in the area and want the issue to be raised nationally.

"We need to let people know nationally so that others don't end up in the position which we are in now," she said.

"Maybe, if we get enough people together and enough support we can stop things from getting any worse. We believe we have already stopped some children from being excluded, because of our presence."
Members of the National Union of Teachers are among those expected to attend the meeting.
The boy appealing against exclusion was ejected from the school for smoking, Ms Wood claimed, but had not been caught on school premises. Instead, he was reported by another pupil and then interviewed by a teacher and, although he originally denied guilt, he eventually admitted it.
"He was told he would be treated more leniently if he admitted it, so he did so and they excluded him. A lot of kids smoke and, although it is wrong, it is not the worst thing they could do," she claimed.

Academy staff had suggested to some parents that they voluntarily withdraw their children, she claimed, but the group was advising parents against that because it left them legally responsible for their child's education.
"If parents choose to take their children out it looks better for the academy because it does not go down on the figures as an exclusion," she said.
Ms Wood's own daughter, Catherine Hodgeson, 15, spent two days out of school as the result of a row over school uniform, which is provided by one specific outfitter in Doncaster.
Trousers supplied to Catherine were from a different supplier because she takes a larger size than many pupils and they have a different appearance.
Because of that, she was accused of wearing non-uniform trousers and was sent home, resuming her studies only two days later after the business confirmed to the academy that her trousers were an official item that it had supplied.

"It seems to us that they are just trying to break the spirit of the children who attend the academy. They are not allowed to question anything," she said.
But the Vardy Foundation, which operates the academy, is unapologetic, insisting that suspension and exclusion rates are no worse, and in some cases better, than the rates recorded at the old grammar school. Many of the suspensions were for shorter periods than expected under the grammar school regime and wereconcluded by a meeting which a parent was expected to attend.
A spokeswoman said: "The academies are set up to make a difference and raise standards. We have made no secret of the fact that when we were chosen as sponsors we would have very high expectations of behaviour and attendance."
The only confirmed permanent exclusion so far was of a girl who had been found carrying a knife.
Trinity Academy is not the first Vardy Foundation-backed school to face criticism. The exclusion rate at the similar establishment in Middlesbrough was 10 times ahead of neighbouring schools when it first opened.
The spokeswoman said that situation was a blip caused by the changeover and it had now settled down.
Parents in the protest group had not approached the academy principal and had declined an offer of a meeting, she added. "These seem to be parents of children who have fallen foul of the rules."

Tahliba.. they have two academies near where i live and i nearly considered sending my child there..but i had the feeling then that the exclusion rate would be high...and to be honest I was NOT sueduced by the Hype..that was the primary reason why i didn't plump for it in the end... Now it seems i was dead right, I think BLACK people had better wake up to this issue, because with more and more of these schools on the horizon more and more of our school will end up permenantly excluded.

The thing is is that these school are answerable to no one, they don't even have school governors, and they one they have are powerless... I suspected then that these academies are a back door method of circumventing the appeals system on exclusion that most local authorities have...

These schools as you call them are set up as companies limited by guarentee, but with charitable status. whilst running cost are funded with our taxes.

Check this out.


Angry reaction to plan to ban school exclusion appeals

A national report – headed by Northampton Academy's chairman of governors and calling for a ban on pupils excluded from the Government's flagship schools being able to appeal – has been criticised by education figures.
Richard Tice, who is in charge of the county's first privately sponsored state school, said children expelled from academies because of unruly behaviour should lose the right to appeal against their exclusions.

The proposal on restoring discipline in failing schools, part of a package of radical educational reforms, was put together by the independent think-tank Reform, as part of a study on the academies scheme.

But union leaders have warned that the move would allow Labour's flagship schools to remove pupils without being held accountable.

Gordon White, the county secretary for the National Union of Teachers, said: "If academies exclude pupils, someone has to pick up the tab to maintain the child's compulsory education.

"The Government has created these academies as a great drive forward to raise standards, but academies are excluding far more pupils than mainstream schools.


"These academies have been set up in deprived areas, where issues such as exclusion and behaviour are expected to arise.
"It sounds like justification for removing kids out of their system because they can't deal with them, which isolates youngsters instead of dealing with the issue."His comments were supported by Terry Pearson, the chairman of the Northamptonshire Association of Governing Bodies.

Mr Pearson said: "It's appalling. If you take away the appeals process, it's effectively allowing any school to throw out whoever they want with no redress. It's exclusion not inclusion."

The Chronicle & Echo revealed last year that county taxpayers had spent nearly £150,000 putting permanently excluded pupils from Northampton Academy back into state education.

Northamptonshire County Council, which is responsible for education, paid out the money from its schools budget, to help 32 expelled pupils secure a place at surrounding secondary schools between 2004 and 2006, because of a funding loophole.

According to the local authority, it costs about £4,500 a year to educate a child. Council-run schools which exclude pupils must provide funding to pay for the youngster to attend an alternative school or referral unit.

Academies are under no obligation to do this, leaving taxpayers to pick up the bill.lei.chan@northantsnews.co.uk< /a

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Well Im not so sure. I'm all for more discipline in schools especially regarding uniform as a way of countering this consumer mentality between schoolchildren. Child is smoking on school premises then that cannot gwan. Should they turn a blind eye? Should standards of discipline be less lax in inner city schools than in Eton? How about if your child is one who is interested in learning and is being disrupted by the many children out there that have serious issues (which they need help with). Should that help be at other childrens expense.

For the record tax payers should pick up the bill for excluded children. Excluded children develop into societies problem down the line. So why shouldnt they pick up the bill.

You're right but on the flip side..they issue now has become the threshold for which pupils are suspended and expelled.....and if you as a parent have no right of reply..then you're stuffed!!!

Kunjufu

Hand on heart. Is that threshold higher than when you were going to school. If you were continually suspended from school wouldnt that end in exclusion. I think right of reply is a mute point. If children are getting excluded for one time offenses then that a different pot of soup. If however you child is being suspended more than one time then you as a parent know you've got a problem. Either with the school/ with your child/ or both/ as often is the case. This appeal business to me is too often a way the parent legitamises and shows the child wrong and strong mentality. Now I know they handle our youths differently and have harsher exclusion practices against African youth. But my attitude is if your child is being continually suspened from school there is a problem whcih needs to be addressed. If the school chooses to address it unfairly and not uniform with all pupils then does it really serve any good purpose to have your child re-instated in said school. Horse already escape the paddock.