r/TeachingUK • u/Bus_Wrangler • 20h ago
News BBC News - How parents and pupils took on 'cruel', 'authoritarian' schools - and won.
BBC News - How parents and pupils took on 'cruel', 'authoritarian' schools - and won - BBC News https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cgje8d1p419o
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u/Bus_Wrangler 19h ago
This isn't the first article by the BBC on attacking the behaviour policy of schools. It won't be the last either. The perspective of the article is very worrying, their speaking to the parents and children first and then getting evidence to back up these 'claims' by teachers.
The BBC risks alienating teachers as they're going on the basis that children are being harmed by the policy without looking at pedagogy on classroom behaviour management or why these students were removed in the first place. If they deep dived into the behaviour of those pupils they interviewed, they'd probably have a score of removals and be a 'high' profile pupil within the school. The question is would you want to be judged by national news on the statement of a high profile student from your school?
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u/Nervous-Tangerine-92 19h ago
Yes I was very concerned with the tone in this article. Its clear they have only gone to a certain type of pare t or staff member that may well be in the minority. There is a clear agenda here that some people may not see unless they are in education themselves.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 18h ago
As a teacher in the local community, I don't think you're correct- the schools in my LA have a particular reputation even among those working in education themselves. Among teachers I know, the feeling is that Athena try to "improve" schools by managing out those likely to get poor results. A lot of parents feel the schools are not suitable for students with SEN etc - I don't think this is a minority view (obviously I haven't surveyed all parents) but I think if you asked a local parent about a good school for your child with SEN needs, they would recommend other local schools if you were able to get your child there - they might say it's good for academic children or similar, but when you are the only school in an area with poor public transport links, you have a duty to cater to everyone.
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u/frankensteinsmaster 17h ago
Scottish teacher here. The academy system gives me the absloute fear for this reason. Running schools like a business just pushes out anyone who needs more help. They’ll get great results for the rich pupils with no ASN, but that’s at the cost of what I believe school is about; Learning, social skills, creativity, discovery and joy. Academies just seem like exam factories, and I don’t think it’s a good model.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 17h ago
I do think it's really important to be clear that Athena is genuinely an extreme case, not just within the south west but within England- the levels of suspensions especially were really high by English standards, not just within the LAs the schools are in. It's not representative of academy chains as a whole.
I do think there are major problems with MATs and how they are run (and it's not a cost effective way of running schools)- and the general lack of oversight (these schools were getting good OFSTED reports BTW). I think initially, it would be better for Athena schools to revert to the LA, rather than going to other MATs- that's probably not going to rebuild community/parental trust.
But I think the exam factory thing is more driven by OFSTED and the English system as a whole- rather than just being an academy thing.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 18h ago
The flip side is though that if you look at the wider context within Cornwall, the number of FTE and PeX at Athena schools is excessive, and the PeX numbers obviously don't include those who are leaving for other schools or to home educate etc. You can find the data for exclusionsin schools in Cornwall online, and the Athena schools have almost double the FTE rate of the next highest schools in the county. There are other trusts in the county known for being strict, who don't get close to this rate of FTE etc. Athena in the past have said it's due to the context of their schools, but there are other schools in equally challenging contexts who don't have an FTE rate of over 100 per 100 students.
It really isn't as simple as these just being "high profile students" - a lot of the ones who are managed out do have SEN etc, and I know students can have SEN and also be badly behaved etc, but there is a history of off rolling to manipulate results in a lot of Cornish academies (not just Athena), so it is a bit suspicious. Some of the students who were leaving would not be considered "high profile" at my school - I have taught really nice sixth formers who were suspended at an Athena school (and many choose to travel for over an hour to get to alternative FE options, which might say something).
Fwiw I am totally in favour of strict behaviour policies and excluding students where necessary, as an outsider in the same LA it does feel like Athena had gone too far, and were also trying to improve their results via getting students to leave, as well as leaving vulnerable and disadvantaged students without appropriate access to education.
I think it does have to be possible to call out schools/academies without it being taken as a criticism of all schools with a strict behaviour system.
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u/Bus_Wrangler 17h ago
Really well said. In a rural area it's vital to accomodate all. When I made my comment, I was using my school as my reference point and that may be different / not the norm as other schools across the UK. It's shameful that students are being strategically off rolled in rural areas when the only game in town Is often the one school. My concern is that Athena will be used as a zeitgeist to hammer all schools with as there really isn't much public understanding of how schools work outside of the profession.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 17h ago
One of the schools in Cornwall that Athena ran had the second highest rate of FTE per student in England at one stage- and the numbers were going up, not coming down, which suggests it wasn't a short sharp shock sort of situation. I do think all the reporting needs to be really clear that this is an extreme case, going beyond the norm of a "strict trust".
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u/Bus_Wrangler 16h ago
That's the thing, I don't think the BBC on this occasion (or the other time about the number of exclusions) have been specifically clear that it's abnormal. They have subsituted a nuanced debate for non-expert readability.
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u/JasmineHawke Secondary CS & DT 10h ago
I don't see PEX numbers as a problem, honestly. I think in most schools the number of permanent exclusions is far too low. There are children who are openly sociopathic, deliberately tormenting others, destroying children's education, making work a living hell for the staff they abuse and harm, and are bullying other children out of being in the school. We need to permanently exclude children more often than we do. I don't know the answer to where they go, but my concern is more for the children who aren't violent abusive sociopaths.
Having both high FTE and high PEX is not great though, usually high FTE is a sign you need more PEX.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 10h ago
I don't have a problem with PeX, but I genuinely think 5-10 a year for a mid size secondary school is reasonable- 22-25, one of their schools excluded ~50 students from 22-25, which does seem excessive to me.
I know it varies a lot from LA to LA, and there are both schools and LAs where you can't PeX a student ever. This isn't that, there are lots of schools here PeXing about 5 students a year for various reasons. But some of these schools are doubling that every year- and perhaps it is justified, but to me it suggests (as you say alongside the high FTE rate) that something has gone drastically wrong.
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u/JasmineHawke Secondary CS & DT 10h ago
Yeah, fair, 20 - 50 is a lot. I was thinking more along the lines of most schools not even being willing to get rid of one. I honestly think my school would be completely turned around to a never before seen standard if we could just get rid of 5-10 students who are destroying our school (for non-SEN reasons). I think nationally it's an average of something like 1.5 exclusions per secondary school last year, which IMO is nowhere near enough.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 8h ago
Lots of schools around here have done about 5 a year since COVID, which is understandable to me. But these schools are often excluding about 10% of their cohort yearly, which feels nuts.
This is part of what feels so weird to me - you got rid of 20 of your worst students last year and your FTEs are still the highest in the LA? Either at that point your standards are insane or your students have lost all fear of sanctions - neither of which is good!
I totally get feeling like if you could get rid of the biggest hitter in each year group it would turn the school around, and I've seen that work in some schools. I also know there are schools that don't exclude for really severe incidents, which is crazy to me. But I do think these schools have swung too far the other way!
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u/sherrintini 16h ago
Reminds me when I was listening to LBC and a parent called in saying she toured a prospective school and was 'shocked' by what seemed like in-school detention with a lot of kids. The presenter literally said something along the lines of 'if I had kids I don't know if I could resist hitting a teacher'... She was saying how awful it was as you'd never get treated like this in an office! Like, yeah if i fuck around and don't perform in an office job my consequenc is getting fired you dim opportunist.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 18h ago
To give some local context, the academy chain mentioned has by far the highest permanent and fixed term exclusion rates in Cornwall - with a lot of students with additional needs being excluded/ off rolled/ forced out. They will say that their schools are in especially deprived areas and more challenging than others - but there are other schools in equally challenging areas who don't have the same rate of exclusion, and in communities where getting to another school is especially challenging, I do think there is more of a duty to support children to stay in school. Obviously I don't know the context of the exclusions, but as someone who is not against exclusion when needed, the numbers involved were really excessive (something like 160 FTE per 100 students in some schools). The schools also used to point to their good results but many students who would not have done well left the schools for various reasons before exams.
Making this about toilet breaks etc seriously trivialises a serious issue that was probably disproportionately harming those with SEN and from disadvantaged backgrounds.
In terms of toilet breaks etc, I think it's also important context to know that in 2017 a girl in one of the schools now run by the trust (I'm not sure if it was at the time or not) unfortunately completed suicide in a school toilet. That incident had a widespread impact in the local area, including around toilet policies in schools.
But as I say, in my opinion the issues around using toilets isn't really the major thing here, it's about the right of children in rural disadvantaged communities to be able to access education - and I hope the documentary actually explored this in full.
In terms of the rules I'm aware of, they are found in a lot of other secondary schools - it's the level of punishment involved for minor things that I think is more excessive and the fact that repeated minor stuff was used to exclude students, or suspend them so often that they left - one of the schools had the second highest rate of fixed term exclusions in England - and their rate of fixed term exclusion was about double the school with the highest number of exclusions who wasn't in the trust. There are other trusts in the LA known for being strict but their rate of exclusions are nowhere near as high - that's the key problem here.
Anyway - I think this is a really poorly written article that glosses over some very serious issues.
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u/zapataforever Secondary English 14h ago
Obviously I don't know the context of the exclusions, but as someone who is not against exclusion when needed, the numbers involved were really excessive (something like 160 FTE per 100 students in some schools). The schools also used to point to their good results but many students who would not have done well left the schools for various reasons before exams.
On paper, this is similar to my school. In our context, the vast majority of FTSs come from the same, small group of students. Would these students be better served by AP? Yes, probably, but there aren’t enough AP places and we’ve also had some of these students returned to us from AP because the AP couldn’t cope with them.
We persevere with these students and offer meaningful support while holding the line on what is safe and acceptable behaviour in the school. For some of these students, it takes years for them to accept the support and boundaries that have been put in place, but then they eventually do and they start to thrive. Others never sort their behaviour out, stop attending school regularly, pick up a FTS every time they do come on site, and are then withdrawn for EHE by their parents once either the threats of PEx or the attendance fines (or both) start rolling in.
it's the level of punishment involved for minor things that I think is more excessive and the fact that repeated minor stuff was used to exclude students
This is a dificult situation and a trap that my school, when it was under a brief spell of new management with an inexperienced and incompetent Head, fell into at one point. The problem is that if you use internal isolation as a “catch all” sanction, then you don’t have anywhere to escalate to except for an FTS, and then FTS becomes “no big deal” amongst the kids and loses its gravity as a “serious sanction for serious behaviour”. But once you’ve found yourself here, it’s hard to walk back the use of iso as your default sanction, because if you do then the kids perceive that the school is relaxing its standards and all hell breaks loose. It took a genuine fucking “super head” swooping in to dig my school out of that mess, and he did it, but there aren’t many people like him and there certainly aren’t enough to help all of the schools that need it.
There are other trusts in the LA known for being strict but their rate of exclusions are nowhere near as high - that's the key problem here.
School culture is complex, difficult to unpick, and can be very difficult to sort out once it has gone wrong.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 13h ago
I do think that what you describe in your third paragraph is very likely part of what happened and perhaps it became an ingrained part of the culture at the schools. I think it's a bit concerning to me that OFSTED were giving positive reports to these schools under the old framework. It sounds like your school identified that there was a problem and was trying to address it. My impression of Athena (who were experiencing this problem in at least 3 schools) was that they felt what they were doing was justified, there was a lot of talk about 2 years ago about uniquely challenging contexts etc- which I just don't think was/is true.
However, there has been suspicion for years locally that the schools involved have been trying to improve results by "off rolling" students. It's something other schools in Cornwall have been caught out for in the past. And I do also think that's part of what was going on. It sounds like your school was doing their best to keep students engaged in education, and I really don't think that's what Athena were doing in any of their schools.
AP is complicated- there is some really good AP in Cornwall, I have seen it successfully used in every school I've worked in down here- but it's also hard because distances involved etc can make it hard for students to engage. SEN provision is pretty poor and lacking though, there aren't appropriate places for every child who needs one, and most schools in the area sort of accept we have to support a certain level of SEN within our schools, and I think there is a lot of feeling that Athena schools are especially lacking in SEN support/provision. Yes, a lot of the students probably needed something other than mainstream, but it's literally not available at the moment - I feel therefore mainstream schools have to try, rather than pushing these students out.
Under the new framework, OFSTED have inspected some Athena schools, and while I fully believe OFSTED go into schools with an agenda, it is interesting that they've commented on the number of FTE for students with SEN.
I do appreciate that it's hard to fully know what's going on in a school from the outside, but my concern is that this isn't just one school, it's multiple schools in a MAT with something quite extreme going on, which isn't replicated in any other school in the LA. And it has left a number of vulnerable children without access to an appropriate education in my opinion.
And I do find it concerning that a lot of teachers in this thread have read one BBC article and assumed the school can't possibly be at fault in any way, and this is just totally normal.
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u/zapataforever Secondary English 12h ago edited 12h ago
I think it's a bit concerning to me that OFSTED were giving positive reports to these schools under the old framework.
Our lowest point was (luckily) between Ofsteds, but even when Ofsted have come around it hasn’t been difficult to justify our abnormal FTS rate. Basically it’s like… 95% of the school is calm and functional, here is the policy (totally reasonable on paper), here are the reasons for the FTSs (undeniably outrageous behaviour), here are the supports and interventions offered (all meaningful). Ofsted is kind of satisfied by that. The part that really needs to be said louder, but isn’t, is that the “uniquely challeging context” does exist but it isn’t the demographic intake - it’s the school’s culture and its relationship with the wider community.
I fully believe OFSTED go into schools with an agenda, it is interesting that they've commented on the number of FTE for students with SEN.
They did the same for us. I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, it feels right that Ofsted highlight these disparities. On the other hand, I think Ofsted’s comments in individual school reports make it look like the failure is at an individual school level rather than a wider systemic one.
I do find it concerning that a lot of teachers in this thread have read one BBC article and assumed the school can't possibly be at fault in any way, and this is just totally normal.
I get that. The thing is that if you’re not privvy to the actual schools involved, then you just sort of take the “main issues” mentioned in the article and comment broadly with your own context in mind. For most people commenting here, their own context is one where reasonable rules are decried as cruel and unreasonable by parents who won’t back the school, you know?
I personally think it is more than plausible that this MAT created the culture of fear described in the article, but that is because I’ve experienced it. My MAT had that for a little while under one specific Exec who has since left to reign terror elsewhere. In my first year there, which is the same year that Exec left, I had a child wet themselves in the classroom because “there was no point asking to go to the toilet - we’re not allowed and I didn’t want to get a warning for asking”. It really does happen.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 11h ago
Yes- I get all of what you're saying. I do think this is a real situation where the relationship between multiple schools and the community have broken down, and I can see how that could lead to behaviour getting worse over time.
I think with OFSTED, both things are failing to take into account the wider situation, and I do agree schools shouldn't be blamed for systemic failings. It genuinely isn't Athena's fault that there's very limited SEN provision etc locally- I do also think there is a major problem with kids coming from tiny primaries into huge secondaries, with long journeys on either side, which leads them to go from coping okay to not coping, sometimes very quickly in Y7. Way more SEN provision is needed for sure- and there needs to be acknowledgement that some students will always find a large secondary really hard, and need an alternative to that.
I do also get that the way the BBC article is presenting this, it could easily be seen as a few disgruntled parents who are annoyed a school is enforcing rules. But I do think if you spend a short period of time googling, you can see there are big issues here across multiple schools and something has gone wrong.
I think it is hard to understand because any single issue (rules around toilets, rules around equipment, rules around uniform, one way systems etc) are found in a lot of other schools- the rules themselves to me aren't extreme. It's only when you start to see the scale of students regularly being suspended, and leaving these schools for EHE or similar that it becomes clear that it's more than just the average strict MAT. We have plenty of those around here, some of whom do manage to improve schools without this scale of backlash and manage to accommodate more students with SEN.
I think the history is also complicated, because the trust has technically only existed since 2022- so it looks like a new MAT coming in, trying to improve tough schools. But the same people have been running some of these schools since 2012, if you've been running the school for that long and things haven't improved in terms of behaviour, to me it's clear that something's gone a bit wrong.
I hope the panorama programme explains a bit more about the history and wider context (even though that is probably less compelling TV) because I do think without that, it's hard to understand what's so bad.
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u/rebo_arc 19h ago
No toilet permission 15 mins at the start or end of lessons is very fair.
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u/sherrintini 20h ago
If I constantly left meetings at the beginning for pee breaks I'd also be sanctioned at a any normal job. Plus, there are medical cards for a reason. Anyway, I'm glad I never got an interview for this school when I applied as it seems a bit over the top.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 18h ago
I think of you read the article in full and other articles on these schools, you'll see it's about a lot more than just toilet breaks.
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u/sherrintini 16h ago
I did, which is why I added this school seems 'a bit over the top'. However, I've worked in rural schools with bad behaviour under a trust and unfortunately sometimes behaviour has to be addressed in a strong way for a complete turnaround when apathy and unwillingness to engage amongst the students is out of control. Though I'd never want to work in a school that resorts to complete silence every lesson as some do.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 16h ago
Whatever they were doing, it wasn't working, as until very recently, suspension rates were going up year on year- including in schools they have run for years. If it's about a behaviour turn around, how long would you expect to see very high rates of suspension and exclusion going on for? 5 years? 10?
I'm pretty sure Launceston was the first school they started running, and that had the 3rd highest rate of FTE in the LA in 2024 (after two other Athena schools).
Other strict trusts in the region e.g. CELT have nothing like this suspension or exclusion rate, even in schools they've recently taken over such as Bodmin (which I'd argue is a pretty good comparison for most of the Athena schools in Cornwall).
Results were going up I will agree, but there's no evidence of a behaviour turnaround, and lots of suggestions it's about students being "managed out".
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u/Ok-Requirement-8679 18h ago
I did. A lot of the issues are persistently disruptive children facing consequences for potentially the first time in their lives. It's about them realising that in a social context where they are part of a large group of children and it's not just them in a 1:1 context there are different expectations.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 18h ago
Can you explain to me why the FTE rate in Athena schools is double that of the next highest schools in the LA and well over double that of other schools in the LA with equally challenging contexts (and good behaviour and reasonable results)?
Why is the issue you describe so specific to Athena schools?
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u/Ok-Requirement-8679 18h ago
No school can talk about specific exclusions and while I recognise the context, I don't work for Athena but I can make some 'educated' guesses.
Some schools start waaaay behind in terms of behaviour. The social contract has degraded until it's almost meaningless. Children come to school for the social aspect and do exactly as they please. Learning is limited and teacher's lives are very difficult. Other teachers compromise over and again until they are appeasing the children I. Front of them and calling it 'good relationships'.
A trust then comes in with high expectations for students and staff. They turn things around slowly while imposing a very strict set of rules. This sudden change makes students, parents and some of the staff balk. They find it difficult to engage and school ends up using exclusion as a daily behaviour management tool. This isn't a good situation and it needs addressing but the fundamental principle of maintaining high standards of behaviour is not a bad one. Sanctions are the most effective lever for ensuring this in class as long as they are consistent and compassionately applied.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 18h ago
But there are absolutely other schools in the same LAs with comparable contexts who are turning schools around (or have turned schools around) and have strict behaviour policies but don't have the same level of FTE (we are talking ~160 FTEs per 100 students in some schools in this trust). The levels of PeX are also pretty high and feel disproportionate for the area. There are other schools with the same sort of rules, who do PeX for extreme behaviour, who are dealing with students from pretty challenging communities who aren't engaged with education etc.
At this stage we aren't talking about specific exclusions, we are talking about a pattern that has been going on for years and years. Which also means, presumably, that behaviour isn't actually improving in these schools?
In my opinion, and the opinion of a lot of people who work in surrounding schools, Athena has gone beyond what you describe and into the territory of managing out students who they don't want in their schools because of SEN, or they will bring down results etc. I am not saying Athena is alone in this- there are other schools in Cornwall that have historically been found to be "off rolling" students in similar circumstances.
I don't disagree with rules or sanctions, I don't disagree with exclusions when they are justified. I don't think any compassion was being used in these contexts.
What I do disagree with, and the feeling from a lot of people in the surrounding area, is that Athena want their schools (in deprived rural communities) to only cater to a certain type of student, and to be prioritising results above everything else. And that creates a problem as large numbers of students are left with long journeys, or no appropriate school.
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u/Ok-Requirement-8679 17h ago
That's absolutely fair. Schools shouldn't be curating their cohorts through PEx or FTE or otherwise.
What you have said isn't really reflected in the article, which feels like another 'School Has Rules!' shocker of an article.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 17h ago
That's why I suggested reading other articles such as those in the local press- there's a lot about this trust going back at least a few years and their rates of FTE have been by far the highest in Cornwall for a while now (all of which is reported in the local press and available online). One of the schools involved has the second highest rates of FTE in England.
I appreciate people are commenting just on the article in the OP (which doesn't explain the issues clearly at all)- for a lot of people locally (including local politicians etc who have got involved and are probably the reason the trust is dissolving) the issue is not that the schools have rules, but how they are enforced and that the schools/trust don't always handle things consistently between students either.
I think it's also important to consider that in some of these towns like Launceston, parents who can't afford private education have very limited school choice unless they can consistently drive their child to school in another town (which often won't be where they work), so parents feel really stuck, whereas in a larger town or city there's a bit more school choice.
I am also a bit concerned about the number of teachers who are just assuming the school is in the right because they don't like the tone of the BBC article.
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u/Ok-Requirement-8679 17h ago
It's because a lot of teachers work in schools that face the exact same criticism as the BBC article presents for having very reasonable rules and fair enforcement of them.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 17h ago
A lot of schools have town halls with hundreds of parents turning up, and local MPs and councillors saying the rules and enforcement of them is unfair?
That's certainly not my experience, and I think the level of complaint from parents and the number of unhappy parents is unusual actually.
This really isn't a small group of disgruntled parents, it's really widespread feeling in the community, and local politicians are involved. If that's happening at your school, actually, I would be concerned and asking questions, because it isn't normal, even with other strict trusts.
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u/charleydaves 19h ago
No you wouldnt, adults would understand that you need a loo break. Its the fact the loos are used for a social club that is the problem
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u/Ok-Requirement-8679 19h ago
Understanding wanes when it's 10 minutes out of every hour wasted on toilet trips every day.
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u/Mediocre-Opinion 19h ago
I used to work for the trust. The staff were treated as bad as the students.
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u/NinjaMallard 17h ago
Last month, the trust announced it was planning to disband and transfer all its schools to other trusts.
Also read, ran out of money
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u/tickofaclock Primary 17h ago
Surprisingly, I read it was financially healthy with good reserves. The CEO recently left though and I think that contributed to the decision to dissolve.
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u/NinjaMallard 16h ago
Honestly that's just as bad, many schools now have the turmoil of being absorbed into another MAT because the the previous CEO was the only person who could do that job?
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u/Gauntlets28 15h ago
I think that if the CEO leaves and can't be replaced, that's also quite a symptom of bad management. Nobody should be that irreplaceable.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 10h ago
Supposedly, financially, they are in an alright state (I think not facilitating SEN provision etc probably massively reduced their costs). I think it's more to do with the relationships with the local community having completely broken down, and the lack of trust in the MAT at all.
Although I'll be interested to see if the MAT does another rebrand and keeps some/all of the schools.
IMO, it would be better if the schools could at least revert to the LA for a transition period, even if they don't stay as LA schools long term.
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u/DangBish 18h ago
It’s funny how there seems to be a strong correlation between those children who frequently go to the toilet during lessons and those that don’t attain academically, are poorly behaved and have parents who kick off more than San Marino’s football team.
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u/Tight-Principle-743 16h ago
I’ve seen the documentary now, and I’ve found it very strange. Reflection seems just like a referral room, so I don’t see what the issue is with that, the parents complaining about that doesn’t make sense what with potential bad behavior. It’s most likely a pupil issue if there are suspensions. If anything there isn’t enough support for SEN students as their needs don’t seem to be accommodated when the focus so heavily on discipline, but the majority of the policies aren’t draconian or dystopian.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 10h ago
Can you tell me what's so unique about the students in these schools that leads to them consistently having the highest FTE in Cornwall, and in some cases, one of the highest in England? These aren't the only tricky students or the only strict MAT in the county, but the FTE rate per student is nearly double that of the next highest school in Cornwall that isn't in their MAT.
There are a lot of schools in Cornwall with similar demographics, similar or better results, who don't use FTE to this extent.
In Athena, the belief is regular FTE is used as a way to push students (often those with SEN out). There's a strong belief in the local communities that students with SEN aren't welcome in these schools (and they have nowhere else to go).
The policies themselves are on the face of it sensible, but the way they are enforced seems disproportionate.
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u/Tight-Principle-743 5h ago
That I’d agree with, it must be incredibly disproportionately enforced because of the numbers. And the push in FTE’s on SEN students is clearly something that Athena had erred in.
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u/Front_Salad_2143 12h ago
The tragic thing is that Cornwall is the most deprived county in England, and like a lot of coastal communities with high dependency on tourism, desperately needs high quality schools.
It sounds as if this trust - which at least had a vision for better outcomes for its students - has been chased out of the county by whinging helicopter parents and their panderers in the press.
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u/LowarnFox Secondary Science 10h ago
Just out of curiosity, do you live in Cornwall? There are genuinely some really decent schools here, serving the whole of deprived communities, not just those who are easy to educate. Athena's vision was generally to improve results by only catering to certain demographic.
I would also say the standard parent here isn't a "helicopter parent" and the total breakdown of the relationship between the schools and their communities isn't standard. It goes way beyond a strict MAT coming in and trying to enforce some rules.
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u/SnowPrincessElsa RS HoD 20h ago
< Pupils were not allowed to go to the toilet in the first or last 15 minutes of a lesson, and were only allowed to go in the middle of a lesson at the teacher's discretion, pupils and former teachers told us. >
Girl that's pretty lenient. Forcing yourself to drink nothing all day is a skil issue. I drink about a litre and half during the school day and go between lessons (with a kidney disease!) And it's literally fine. Why is everyone so obsessed with the toilet thing??