Examination of Witnesses (Questions 340-359)
MONDAY 20 JANUARY 2003
SIR CYRIL
TAYLOR AND
PROFESSOR DAVID
JESSON
340. One of the things you said right at the
start was that this kind of diversity and the options were popular
with parents. I know one of the concerns which was always around
in Nottingham was that the school was there plonk in the middle
of an inner city area on the old John Player's factory site. There
it was and initially drawing in children from that area, but would
those children start to get pushed out by other people opting
or trying to get their children in from areas. As we know, in
some cities you get deprived areas sitting right next to well-off
areas, so in terms of catchment area those children in well-off
areas are not necessarily seen as coming from out of catchment.
(Sir Cyril Taylor) I am very familiar with Djanogly
and its selection procedures. They have very high free school
meals eligibility, I think the highest of all the 15 CTCs, and
perhaps not surprisingly their results have not been in the stratosphere
of 90%. They have got up to roughly 60% now. They actually give
preference to under-privileged areas of Nottingham which are given
a proportion of the admissions. They give an NFER test and they
absolutely guarantee that the ability intake of each year matches
the local average. They believe very strongly that their mission
is to provide a good education for schools from disadvantaged
families.
341. What you are saying there is that they
are achieving value added for those children as they are coming
in, but those children are still not among the top performing
ones.
(Sir Cyril Taylor) Absolutely not. If you look at
the free school meals, which some people say is not that accurate
an indication, I think it is quite good as an indicator, from
memory, Djanogly CTC has a 31% free school meals eligibility,
which is roughly double what the national average is, which is
15%.
342. We are talking about value added. Ultimately
what we should like to see is children with ability from more
backgrounds able to achieve. I am not criticising the specialist
school programme because obviously it is what children are coming
into at that stage and we would need to go further back. The other
important point on this section is this issue about the motivation
of pupils and parents and what impact that is having. If there
are fewer specialist schools around, if not all the secondary
schools are specialist, if the City Technology College which perhaps
has been there for a long time is seen as being a good option,
are the children there doing better because their parents are
motivated because they are pushing their kids to go there in the
first place? Do you have a sense or any information on that which
you can give us?
(Sir Cyril Taylor) We do not have any data on motivation.
There are 10 specialist schools in Sheffield, which I believe
you represent, and all their admission arrangements are done by
the LEA. I believe that proximity is the major criterion. Clearly
in a place like Sheffield that can work. I personally think it
is right to have some possibility, if you live just outside the
immediate catchment area, for at least some proportion of places
to be available for parents with a child who is especially keen
on that type of education. But the fact is that 60% of specialist
schools are community schools and the admission decisions are
taken by the LEA.
343. Would your view be that it is preferable
to have a situation where admissions are by the LEA rather than
to have schools able to choose themselves because of the distortion
that might have on their intake?
(Sir Cyril Taylor) There are lots of arguments on
the other side. I personally think free-for-alls on admissions
do not work. It was tried in Bromley and it was a disaster. The
answer in the long run is to have many more good schools and as
we get 2,000 specialist schools we hope that we will deliver that
objective.
Chairman
344. We went to New Zealand recently and looked
at their school system. One of the things we picked up on very
strongly was the similarity with this country and many others.
We have a strategy and a system of giving reasonable education
to two thirds of the population and it is the tail which is extremely
vital to get right. Both in New Zealand and here, as I hear you
talk, Sir Cyril and Professor Jesson, we have yet to get to that
stage and here you are in a sense reinforcing this. Is the specialist
school system still going to leave that third of under-achievement?
Are specialist schools going to work for the third of the most
under-performing schools?
(Sir Cyril Taylor) That is an extremely important
question. There are 420 schools in this country which perform
at less than 25% and they have 325,000 children in them. Each
year about 50,000 of them reach the age of 16, many of them getting
very poor results, probably a large proportion of them not even
being able to read and write properly. Sadly a lot of those go
straight onto the welfare rolls and some of them become young
offenders or substance abusers. It is a major, major issue for
this country. While I do not think we have the only answer, our
schools, especially the ones which are doing very well, are divided
into three clubs. We have the 70% club, the ones who get 70% more,
we have the most value added group, those which have added more
than 10 points of value and the ones which have improved the most.
There are about 250 head teachers in that group. They have all
raised their hands and said they are willing to partner with an
under-performing school. We have a recent initiative where we
are going to write to the head teachers of the 420 under-performing
schools—I do not even want to use that word because it might
not be under-performing bearing in mind their intake—the
schools with less than 25%. We are going to inform them that there
is a group of head teachers who would be willing to partner with
them and help in any way that they can. We do not want to be prescriptive
because the issue is very sensitive. Who knows which two head
teachers are going to get on, which chairs of governors? You cannot
prescribe how it is going to happen, but we think there is a strong
possibility that there will be lots of partnerships. We already
have around 60 who are existing specialist schools. We now want
to move into the ones which are not specialist. One idea we have
is that each partner school which a new specialist school has
to name should be one of these under-performing schools and one
of their objectives should be to bring them up to a stage so that
they can get specialist status. If we can achieve that, we really
will have made a difference.
Paul Holmes
345. One of the flaws we have heard about the
evidence which is given on specialist schools and Professor Jesson's
statistics is that they only look at pupils with five A to Cs.
Why do you not give us the figures for the over half of the school
population who get lower than grade C? Do they not count? How
do you assess the impact of specialist schools on slightly over
half of the school population?
(Professor Jesson) An interesting question about what
is the measure which is most current in popular parlance. When
you look at the way the performance tables are published, you
will find two measures. One of these is the point score which
pupils achieve, which is across all the subjects which they take.
The other is the five or more A* to C percentage, the one you
are questioning me about now. The issue is that the point score,
in spite of its introduction seven or eight years ago, is still
misunderstood as a means of evaluating the performance of a school.
I find it still very difficult to understand what it means when
I find a point score, which is identified as being the reference
point for a school, but it bears no relation to the public debate
about how well that school has done. We have just been talking
about schools which are low performing, under 25%. Almost all
the criteria for target setting which the government sets are
expressed in terms of these special percentages. It would have
been perverse for the work which I do to have taken the less well
understood measure and used that in preference to one which I
have to say is very current, appears to be well understood and
even though it relates at the moment to only half the population
is something we wish to see increased.
(Sir Cyril Taylor) We do do both though.
(Professor Jesson) We do both.
(Sir Cyril Taylor) I can read you what the score was
last year—we have not done it yet for this year. There were
510 schools in operation in the year 2001: specialist schools
averaged 42 points per pupil, the non-specialist comprehensive
schools averaged 37 points. David also did a value added on both
point count and on both sets of data and specialist schools are
doing well.
346. One way of assessing how well specialist
schools are really doing would be to take a look at what effect
they have on the other schools within the area. Last week the
grammar schools in Kent were in the news because the Secretary
of State has just published an inspection report showing that
although the grammar schools do well, because they are selective,
the effect on all the pupils in Kent is that they are doing less
well than an equivalent county in other parts of England because
of the selective system distorting what happens to the two thirds
of the pupils who are in non-selective schools. How can we assess
whether the specialist schools which you represent are having
the same distorting effect on the schools in their neighbourhood
that the grammar schools are in a county like Kent?
(Professor Jesson) I do not know that we can at the
moment. It seems to me that the crucial point here is what happens
to pupils in similar categories. It is here that the framework
of analysis is quite clear. When we group pupils in the way that
the government's department does into five groups with low intake,
high intake and two or three other groups in between, in each
one of those grouping, individual pupils who are in specialist
schools do better. I do understand your point that it could be
the case that because these schools supposedly select pupils it
has a dire impact on the other schools. I do not think the evidence
is anywhere near to hand that that happens. It seems to me that
the important thing is to look at what happens to pupils who have
the good fortune to be in specialist schools, to celebrate their
success and to wonder how we might extend that through all other
schools who have the perfect right to apply.
(Sir Cyril Taylor) One or two studies have been done
by individual city CTCs, for example the Corby CTC has analysed
the results of all the schools in the Corby area since they started
in 1990. They claim—I have not actually verified the data—that
the rate of improvement in the other schools is actually better
than the rest of the schools within Northamptonshire. Their thesis
is that the presence of a high performing school pulls up performance
generally, especially if it is a comprehensive school in its intake,
because the other schools start to say "If they can do it,
why can't we do it?". The collaboration which specialist
schools have with the other schools in their area helps that.
347. When you are comparing the five A to C
scores between specialist schools and non-specialist and you are
saying that they are doing better in the specialist schools, do
you include in your table of figures intermediate GNVQ, which
is worth four C and above passes and would tend to be studied
more in the non-specialist schools than the specialist schools
in my experience as a teacher?
(Professor Jesson) But of course. Yes, the extension
of the curriculum to embrace vocational subjects has been one
of the great successes of the specialist school movement. I was
quite surprised when I looked into this in this year's results
to find that in fact the total number of entries in GNVQ across
the nation is only just something under 60,000. That does quite
surprise me because sometimes pupils might take two of the shorter
courses, so 60,000 is not the number of pupils and that is less
than one in 10 of the whole pupil population. It is more extensive
in specialist schools, but it is clearly not the key to the improvement
which specialist schools have made. It is one point of importance
and I would hope that the issue of specialist schools and vocational
qualifications is quite important. We want to see that kind of
opportunity for pupils who perhaps find the total academic curriculum
not quite to their taste, offering them something which is more
appropriate, both to themselves and to the society of which I
hope they will become a fruitful and productive part.
348. May I just pursue a point which was raised
a little bit earlier around a free school meals comparison? Evidence
we have been given in previous meetings, including that from Ofsted,
has said that on balance, across the country, the figures do show
that specialist schools and faith schools take fewer children
with special educational needs and fewer children who qualify
for free school meals than non-specialist and non-faith schools
do. Whatever might be the case for one particular one which you
quoted, across the country the figures do show that you take fewer
children with special educational needs and free school meals.
(Sir Cyril Taylor) I would dispute that.
349. The Ofsted figures show that.
(Sir Cyril Taylor) We have verified data from analytical
services which say that the total national free school meals eligibility
for the current year is 14.9 and specialist schools is 14.6. That
is the entire cohort of 550,000 secondary school pupils in each
year group multiplied by five for the five years.
350. The most current Ofsted figures were last
year's which they gave to us about three Wednesdays ago. The Djanogly
College in Nottingham have 31% free school meals which is twice
the national average. What do the other schools in that surrounding
city area take? Talking about faith schools brings to mind Canon
Hall who quoted two schools next door to each other in one northern
city and he said that the faith school did very well and one did
really badly and was not a faith school. When you analysed it
you found that the faith school took about 18% free school meals
and the failing school next door took 71% with free school meals.
What percentage of free school meals are the schools in the inner
city around specialist colleges taking?
(Sir Cyril Taylor) I think Djanogly is 31%, a very
high level. I do not know all the other schools, but the average
for Nottingham is much lower than 31%.
351. For Nottingham inner city or the whole
city including very leafy suburbs?
(Sir Cyril Taylor) It is a very interesting point.
The point has been raised about whether GNVQ IT, which is equivalent
to four A to Cs, accounts for the better performance overall.
David Jesson is going to break out the numbers this year, excluding
GNVQ IT so they will be interesting to see. We do have this preliminary
data which we are happy to give to you. We personally think that
maths, science and English, the core subjects, are very important
and we are somewhat astonished that none of the league tables
focuses at age 16, although they do at Key Stage 1, two and three,
on maths, science and English. If you take the 650 specialist
schools in operation this last summer, they average close to 41%
good grades in maths, science and English; the other schools were
about 34%, something like that. We are not proud of 41%, or slightly
less than 41% but it is better than for other schools.
Chairman: We had better move on, otherwise
we are not going to give due time to the Secondary Heads Association's
evidence. Let us look at evaluating the impact of school specialisation.
Valerie Davey
352. One area I am particularly interested in
is the impact on primary schools. You rightly said that the specialist
schools now, as opposed or by contrast to the earlier City Technology
Colleges, have a remit to involve their feeder primary schools.
I think that is a huge and important development. Do you have
any evidence yet of the impact on primary schools which the specialist
school movement is making?
(Professor Jesson) I personally do not. This perhaps
is one of the areas where the kinds of data we collect could be
more informative, because we do need to look back at the primary
course from which pupils come. It would be a very valuable thing
to do and it is something which perhaps needs to be on the agendas
for the future. I do not have any evidence on that at the moment.
(Sir Cyril Taylor) Anecdotally we have some head teachers
who have said that whereas five years ago the number of pupils
who had severe reading problems when they arrived at school could
have been approaching 50%, for example, the John Kelly Girls'
School in Brent had a figure like that, they think now, partly
as a result of their efforts with the group of 15 primary schools
they work with, that number has improved dramatically. Whether
it is anything to do with their work, nobody knows, but the fact
is that it has improved, as the key stage two results have gone
up. They have gone up dramatically this last year. It was an average
of 25 and is now almost a 26 point count.
353. I have just one detailed piece of evidence
from my own constituency where I was delighted to find a primary
school within a specialist grouping now a beacon school in the
same area of work which is the arts. This was encouraging, but
I should like to hear it happening more widely and to see that
work going on. The key word coming out, and I am delighted to
hear it, particularly from Sir Cyril is collaboration. My background
is that I come as a councillor from the area where you set up
the last of the City Technology Colleges, John Cabot, which was
brand new, which had more capital going into it than the whole
of the Avon County Council put together, so it was a bitter experience,
I have to admit, from that point of view. The fact that it is
now collaboration, the fact that things are moving on, I am delighted.
Can you tell us whether you think it is that process of designation,
becoming a specialist, which is providing the impact, the impetus
for improvement or is it the specialism itself?
(Sir Cyril Taylor) It is very hard to assign one reason.
NFER just did a major piece of research for us and I have a copy
if you would like to look at it. They identify about 10 reasons.
We think the bidding process is very important, because many schools
are not successful in their first bid; they bid twice or even
three times and some even four or five times. The process of really
identifying how to improve standards is a very difficult one and
the process of bidding helps the schools in that. Certainly there
is huge pride in getting the status and there is also a high motivation
to keep their status. Even though comparatively few schools lose
their designation, a lot of head teachers keep a wary eye out
that they are not going to lose their status.
354. So it is a bit like some of the medical
things where a catalyst is going on, things are improving, but
you cannot quite put your finger on why. Is that what you are
telling us?
(Sir Cyril Taylor) NFER found 10 sources of improvement:
leadership, crucial; character of the head teacher; being able
to attract and retain good teachers, very important; individual
targets for each pupil by year group, by subject; data, databases
so that you know what is going on; training of teachers in the
use of ICT, very important. It is a very interesting report.
355. I am sure we will look at that. Having
said all that, is the fact that the sports schools do not seem
to be achieving the same level of improvement academically significant
or not?
(Sir Cyril Taylor) You must look at David's value-added
results. On the value-added basis they are doing just fine, if
you look at the intake of ability. Their absolute level of performance
is behind the other eight specialisms but if you look at the intake
ability . . .
(Professor Jesson) This is really the key point and
just emphasises the importance of value added studies in general.
I would just say one further thing, if I may, about the role of
the kind of data we are talking about in helping schools not simply
rest on their laurels, but look critically, use the kind of data
which the department kindly provides to help schools look critically
at their performance in each of the subject areas that they take
and help them identify those areas of weakness which then become
the focus for further improvement. That should be something which
should be available to all schools, certainly if the trustees
take it up and major on it.
(Sir Cyril Taylor) We are going to do subject break-outs
this year because we think it is very important.
Mr Chaytor
356. My recollection of the NFER report and
the Ofsted report on specialist schools was that the characteristics,
some of which you have listed, were described as characteristics
which apply to all good schools. Really that was a description
of the characteristics of the school, not an explanation of the
reasons for any given school developing those characteristics.
What the Committee would be interested to hear is whether there
has been an evaluation by anyone which separates out the different
constituent factors, the nature of the specialism itself, the
concept of status, the additional funding, the pre-existing performance
of the school, nature of the head teacher, the support from the
parents. My recollection is also that Professor Jesson's submission
to the Committee said that it is not possible to say that the
specialism itself is the cause of good performance in specialist
schools.
(Sir Cyril Taylor) This is an important area. I believe
James Tooley wrote a paper on the seven habits of effective schools.
He came up with the same conclusion as the NFER people which was
that the interesting point about the schools they looked at was
that they were using all of the improvement techniques, not just
one, and that these improvement techniques were together creating
this ethos of achievement. That was the end result of it. You
cannot just go out and say you are now going to create a high
ethos of achievement; it is the end result of lots of years of
hard work. We ought to do more research on the importance of the
specialist subject and maybe David could come up with a proposal
on it. I have some anecdotal evidence of what we describe as the
locomotive effect. If you look at St Paul's Way school in Tower
Hamlets, an extremely disadvantaged area, 85% free school meals,
mainly Bangladeshi, non-English speaking at home, they had a fantastic
graphic arts department and they persuaded the outstanding head
teacher they should make a graphic arts specialist bid. Their
overall results are now broadly double where they were before
they started. The head teacher will say to you that being able
to tell the other teachers, the maths, science, English teachers,
to look at the graphic arts department who is getting 100% As
and starred As amongst pupils taking graphic arts, that locomotive
effect of pulling performance up in the other subjects, once they
believe they can do it and get into specialist status, makes them
very proud. We think there is some evidence but we do not have
any analytical statistical data. What we do know is that results
in the specialist subject are very, very good, much higher than
the overall results are. We think that the possibility of pulling
is important.
357. You are saying that there has been no systematic
evaluation as to exactly which ingredients of the whole process.
(Sir Cyril Taylor) No.
358. I suppose the follow-up question is: had
the school in Tower Hamlets not had the additional funding, would
the head have been able to drive the graphic arts forward as a
motivator for the rest of the curriculum?
(Sir Cyril Taylor) Obviously extra money is always
helpful, but nowadays we are getting rumbles from some of our
schools that the specialist school funding has not been increased;
it has only been increased once since1994. It is much easier to
get additional money which does not have all this extra work attached:
Leadership incentive grant of £125,000 for example has no
requirement. It depends just on location.
359. Do you think the performance of specialist
schools would have been at the level it now is without the additional
funding, had there simply been the process, the designation?
(Sir Cyril Taylor) I do not think people would have
done the work without getting at least some extra money. It is
important to be able to invest in IT equipment and to hire an
extra couple of science teachers. Although as a proportion of
the current funding it is now only 3 or 4%, nevertheless it is
discretionary and it would be silly to say it was not important.
Of course it is important, but whether it is of critical importance,
I do not know. I do not think so. It is one of the factors.
(Professor Jesson) May I just make one point here?
This is the third study we have done of value added in specialist
schools and when it turns out that you get a particular positive
result on one occasion, they may say it was a straw in the wind;
twice may be two straws in the wind. The scripture has a word,
does it not, that a threefold cord is not easily broken? I wonder
how long it is before we actually identify not simply that this
is happening, but celebrate it and begin then to take up the issues
about what it is that the schools themselves are saying about
what helps them improve. I think that is really an important part
of the dialogue which schools have with those around them.
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