Displaying items by tag: Abbey

In 2015 Government introduced Phase Two of the Priority School Building Programme, to rebuild or refurbish individual blocks of accommodation at 277 schools using capital grant and are scheduled to hand over by the end of 2023. 13 of these are in Kent and a further two are in Medway. This article looks at progress of the project in the local schools to benefit, which were as follows. Kent Primary schools: Barton Junior; Benenden Church of England Primary; Colliers Green Church of England Primary; & Platt Church of England Voluntary Aided Primary School. Kent secondary schools: The Abbey School; Dover Grammar Boys; The Folkestone School for Girls; Hartsdown Technology College; High Weald Academy; Mayfield Grammar; Pent Valley Technology College; Simon Langton Girls' Grammar; Swadelands. Medway secondary schools: St John Fisher Catholic Comprehensive and The Howard School.

Key words in the project are: ‘using capital grant’, as the previous programme of Building Schools for the Future relied heavily on commercial loans under the now largely discredited Private Finance Initiative. Whilst many schools benefited hugely from this project, the financial implications are crippling, as can be seen in several previous articles on this site, including here, with a full analysis by ShepwayVox here.  In this second phase more schools qualify under ‘a block replacement based on poor condition.  Only in exceptional circumstances will a whole school be replaced’ . At least three of the projects described below appear to come into the ‘exceptional circumstances’ category. At the foot of this article is a list of all the previous successful BSF Schools in Kent.

 The Abbey School, Became a Converter Academy August 2011. Faversham. OFSTED May 2017 - Good. Has been picking up in reputation over past five years, although performance in 2017 and 2018 has fallen.  

Had been picking up pupils from Whitstable, but with improvement there, first choices have fallen away. 

2014 - 2019 no appeals for school admission

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Angley School, Cranbrook. Now closed and re-opened as High Weald Academy. 

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The Archbishop's School, Canterbury.  Foundation School. Was the Canterbury school of choice ago but apart from the 2016 Good Ofsted has been sliding downhill ever since. Its reputation lingered until 2018 when it was still oversubscribed, but by 2020 had 66 of 84 Local Authority Allocations in Canterbury District and 30 fewer first choices than any other local school. Sudden decline in GCSE performance 2019 fits the pattern of decline. The headteacher left the school mid-June 2019, deciding to 'step away', presumably paying the price for poor performance. 

A third of the 140 offers in 2019 found other schools before the October 2019 school census, probably not starting in September. The previous year, 21 of the cohort left after allocations. 

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Astor College (A Specialist College for the Arts), Dover.  Became a converter academy in June 2012. 10% of places awarded on ability in the visual arts if it was oversubscribed, which it hasn't been since then. . The school is the lead school of the Dover Federation of the Arts, in conjunction with Shatterlocks Infant School, Barton Junior School and White Cliffs Primary College of the Arts.  OFSTED March-July 2015, after a controversial series of events, when the school was initially placed in Special Measures, it was found to Require Improvement, down from Good.  Given full warning by the government as to its performance in October 2015. Run by controversial Chief Executive Chris Russell, although he retired from his seconded position as Executive Principal of the Duke of York's Royal Military School, also an academy in Dover, in December 2016 and has now retired leaving the school in a difficult place. Suffers from the Dover grammar schools running their own selection tests, which took an additional 148 children away from the non-selective schools. I detect some improvement since then in terms of reputation. Good staying on rate into the Sixth Form 2020. 

2018 58 LAAs; No admission appeals. 

You will find the coverage of previous controversy here. Suffers academically from additional pupils being selected locally for grammar school through the Dover Test. Progress 8 sixth-lowest in Kent in 2017, Attainment 8 Sixth lowest. Similar in 2018 and 2019. 

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Aylesford School - Sports College. Completely rebuilt around 2010 under a PFI scheme. Has struggled with performance and hence popularity, but has been improving over the past two years following Management takeover by Wrotham School which appears to have been of benefit. 2020, oversubscribed for the first time for many years. Previously dependent on numbers from Medway, coming down Bluebell Hill, but these have been squeezed for 2020. Looks as if a new Ofsted Inspection would be welcome!    

Once above government floor standards for GCSE, the school slipped for 2014 and  2015. Progress 8 and Attainment 8 both third lowest in Kent in 2017, as popularity has slumped.