Examination of Witnesses (Questions 400
- 412)
MONDAY 12 DECEMBER 2005
MR DAVID
BUTLER, PROFESSOR
JOHN ADAMS
AND MS
GILLIAN WINDASS
Q400 Mr Chaytor: From your experience
of parents' priorities, where does the existence of a range of
different categories of schools lie? Is that the most important
priority for parents, trying to find a place for their children?
Professor Adams: I do not think
so. The big issue always is secondary transfers, that is where
that whole crunch comes. If we are talking about the specialist
schools' agenda, I think there is an issue there where parents
can choose what they think would be appropriate for their children.
Remember, at the age of 10, they would like to join a sports'
college or a language college, is very, very early to make those
decisions anyway, it seems to me, but I can see that by and large
what many people say, and what many commentators have written,
is what parents really want is good local schools.
Q401 Mr Chaytor: Do you think there
is any conflict between the extension of the numbers of schools
that are there or could be their own admission authorities and
the principle of parental choice at the heart of the admission
policy?
Professor Adams: I do not know
if there is a conflict. I think to have 23,000 admission authorities
might not make the parental choice terribly easy. I think there
is some conflict between that and the notion of improving information
for parents and so forth. I do not think that is the clash.
Q402 Helen Jones: The White Paper
talks about school expansion and also about schools being able
to acquire sixth forms. All of us know, of course, that the difficulty
is what one school does has an effect on other schools in the
area. In your view, who should be consulted on those expansion
plans?
Ms Windass: I would say every
other school and the community. One school expanding has a potentially
significant impact on all the schools in the area. Certainly,
in terms of sixth form provision, it can also have an impact on
further education colleges and such, so every school that might
be affected by such a decision and also the local community and
parents. It needs to be widespread. Obviously, there is a difficulty
in how if you are an individual school you manage to consult.
You cannot possibly send out questionnaires to that many people,
but you could certainly make sure that your plans are well publicised
in advance and discussed. It may be that the school may think
a sixth form is a jolly good idea, but it may not be what the
local community wants. You need to make sure everybody has had
the opportunity to express a view.
Q403 Helen Jones: I wonder if David
Butler can comment on that, particularly in view of the fact that
Ms Windass is right, of course, that to send questionnaires or
whatever out to all parents would be a huge logistical exercise.
What happens in such a scenario to parents in the more disadvantaged
areas who may well have a view? Mr Butler, how do you think it
would be best to feed their views into the process? How can you
reach out to those parents?
Mr Butler: As you probably expect,
the questionnaire is not necessarily going to give you the result.
If we look at the White Paper there is encouragement in here for
the concept of schools to cluster and that is the opportunity
for us to look at the issue of expansion, particularly in the
area of the sixth form. If you look at the practicalities for
many schools, what they like to be able to do is offer a range
of subjects that pupils at that school may wish to follow. The
school that I was a governor of for a period of time had exactly
the same ambition but knew it could not meet that ambition in
certain subjects because it simply did not have enough students
to make it economic. What did it do? It talked to the school next
door or the school over the road and in so doing at sixth form
level in effect they swapped students. I think that is the way
that you will get to sensible expansion because then you will
have a reasonable cohort of pupils whom you can economically teach
in a particular area.
Q404 Helen Jones: Indeed, but that
can be done now, can it not, under existing legislation?
Mr Butler: Yes, it can.
Q405 Helen Jones: I wonder if Professor
Adams could comment on this business of presumption if a school
wants to expand. The presumption in the White Paper is for expansion.
In your view as a school governor how does that interact with
the problem of dealing with falling rolls which many areas are
going to face in the future?
Professor Adams: Problematically,
is the answer to your question. The obvious issue would be the
impact on other non-expanding schools. While there is no set appropriate
number of schools, and again my own school is currently engaged
in a merger with a school that has severely falling rolls so there
is a dynamic in the system anyway, clearly if one school was expanding
when rolls were falling it could potentially have a dramatic and
devastating impact on other schools. In other words, we could
end up with less choice rather than more.
Q406 Jeff Ennis: In response to an
earlier question, Professor Adams, you mentioned the possible
detrimental effect of the trust school situation on the Every
Child Matters agenda. Could you expand on that slightly? What
do you think are the possible detrimental aspects of that?
Professor Adams: Perhaps I did
not put it very clearly. I do not mean trust schools as such but
the implication that a majority of the governing body be appointed
not necessarily from local citizens, not representing local stakeholders,
seems to me to be one of the issues which in a sense de-emphasises
the importance of community. A lot of the Every Child Matters
agenda, the placing of difficult-to-place students and so forth,
embraces community issues and collaboration and co-operation between
schools. I do not see how that is going to be enhanced by making
schools increasingly independent.
Q407 Jeff Ennis: I know one or two
people have described the White Paper as being modelled on a London
secondary-type situation. What is in the White Paper for rural
schools in terms of parental choice and power? If there is not
anything what should be included to act as a more inclusive model
for the rural school settings?
Mr Butler: I come back to the
comment made by someone earlier: what parents want is that their
local school is a good school and they want to have an admissions
policy which is simple, fair and one that they can understand.
That is very important in a rural setting because you have probably
got one school here and the next school, the alternative choice,
might be several miles away, and whilst there is a comment in
the White Paper about providing the opportunity for transport
to these people who could go to a different school, how many parents
willingly want to see their child travel several miles, because
it lengthens their school day?
Q408 Jeff Ennis: Do you think we
ought to have a statutory admissions code for schools?
Mr Butler: A fair and transparent
admissions policy. I am not saying that if you had a statutory
one that would mean one rule fits all because there will be local
requirements and you must have the ability to flex for that local
issue.
Q409 Chairman: Gillian, do you want
to come in briefly on that?
Ms Windas: Many of our members
do not see anything very much for rural schools in the White Paper.
David referred to the bussing of children but even within that
it only applies between two and six miles and in a rural area
many children of necessity are already travelling more than that
to the only school in the area.
Q410 Chairman: Do you want any change
in the admissions policy?
Ms Windas: Some of our members
would like to see it mandatory. As you can imagine, with 350,000
governors out there, not everybody subscribes to a mandatory code
but they would all like to see fair and transparent admissions
criteria.
Q411 Chairman: John Adams, what is
your view on this? Could it not be done by just making the adjudicator
a little bit more powerful?
Professor Adams: Perhaps.
Q412 Chairman: Do we need to go for
having a mandatory code?
Professor Adams: I think so. I
have said so before and I still think so. There are no doubt other
ways to bring about a similar result but I think, as we have already
said, a fair and transparent code which is compulsory for all
schools would be the proper way to do it.
Chairman: Professor Adams, Gillian Windas, David
Butler, can I say I feel very sorry that we have not got longer.
We have learnt a lot. You have added tremendously to the value
of our inquiry but, as you know, we are doing it in a hurry and
we have had to squeeze an awful lot of oral evidence in. My apologies
for dragging you here for such a short session but we have gained
a great deal from it. Thank you.
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