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Richmond upon Thames Liberal Democrats:Covering the constituencies of Twickenham and Richmond Park |
Parents being 'misled' on sixth form proposal [letter to the RTT Dec 30 by Cllr Elloy]
January 2, 2012 12:49 PM
• [Dec 30] Cllr Jeremy Elloy writes: FIRSTLY I should declare a personal interest. My wife teaches at Richmond College, and two of my daughters studied there. At a recent Council meeting we debated the likely impact of the Conservative Administration's plans to spend £25m on borough schools to provide sixth form accommodation. My main concern is that the Administration has misled the borough's parents and children on exactly what is proposed, and the debate did nothing to reassure me. In fact, judging by the misleading statements coming out of their spokespersons, I think that residents of the borough have grounds for serious alarm.
The Administration is conveying the impression that what they expect to be on offer in borough secondary schools is the Sixth Form associated with traditional Grammar Schools that I and my generation attended over 40 years ago. These offered a full curriculum: Classics; Latin; Literature; Modern Languages; the complete range of Mathematics; the Sciences and the Humanities.
Well, they may wish to think that, but they are completely wrong. These Sixth forms will have very limited funds available and will be able to offer only a few core subjects, and those children who do attend them will find their options severely constrained. Any parent who felt that their child was going to get a traditional Sixth Form education at these schools would rightly feel extremely cheated and unhappy.
When you compare this with Richmond College which offers over 50 A level courses, the International Baccalaureate, provides outstanding support to get children into Oxbridge and the Russell Group universities, as well as getting able students into our Medical Schools, you have to wonder what this administration hopes to achieve by reducing the range of subjects and opportunities available to our children, and why they seek to do it by diverting students from the College which is one of the borough's most successful educational institutions. The other major benefit offered by Richmond College is that is that it offers post GCSE education for all the borough's children with a huge range of vocational courses ranging from carpentry, to IT, to hairdressing.
If Secondary Schools do introduce Sixth Forms the College will be forced to reduce its intake, and this will inevitably mean reduced opportunities for the boroughs' post GCSE children. Indeed, the College is already planning to reduce its intake.
The Administration also skates conveniently over who it expects to attend these Sixth Forms. Speaking as a parent I know that my children had had enough of school by the time they had finished their GCSEs. While one might wish one's offspring to do one's bidding there is no guarantee that they will oblige you, and most parents will agree that little is achieved by sending your child to an institution against his or her wish. I don't see that there has been any meaningful consultation of our schoolchildren about how they should be educated - post GCSE - and this really is an unforgivable error and shows an utter disregard for the opinion and good sense of our young people.
Instead of undermining one of our best education institutions and reducing the opportunities for our children the Administration should concentrate on doing its duty and spend the £25 million on ensuring that our Secondary schools have the capacity to educate our growing 11-16 year population.
* Councillor for Fulwell and Hampton Hill
• New sixth forms in Twickenham and Hampton academies are one step closer to reality [RTT Feb 06]
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