The methods used at Blackpool's best-performing secondary school
PLUS: Former Ma Kelly's boss evaded paying millions in tax with help from his dodgy accountant
Hello and welcome to The Blackpool Lead.
Today’s edition focuses on the use of controversial teaching methods - now deemed too strict even in the US - at what is Blackpool’s best-performing secondary school.
The results at the school would appear, for many, to justify the use of Slant and Katharine Birbalsingh has become something of a Daily Mail/Telegraph darling due to the reported success of having returning old-school values like politeness to the classroom.
But one parent believes it is micro-managing pupils to the extent that they are uncomfortable and that the most strict elements of it are not necessary for pupils to be successful.
Elsewhere, it’s election week but Blackpool is one of the authorities that won’t be voting tomorrow (1 May). I’ve seen quite a bit of misinformation on why Blackpool isn’t voting - with some suggestion that the authority has opted out giving residents the chance. That’s not the case - Blackpool Council votes every four years, and if it still exists then the next one will be in 2027. That plan hasn’t been disrupted by the plans to reorganise local government.
And finally, we report on the former boss of Ma Kelly’s who has been convicted for his role in rather significant tax fraud.
Concerns raised over controversial teaching method at Blackpool’s best secondary school
By Michael Holmes
A mother has criticised a controversial teaching method being used at Blackpool’s best-performing secondary school, saying it treats pupils like “robots” and is affecting their mental health.
The woman, who asked not to be named, has spoken out about St George’s School’s use of Slant, an acronym meaning ‘sit up straight, listen carefully, ask and answer questions, never interrupt and track the teacher.’
She alleges that, during a recent fire alarm that saw youngsters evacuated to the sports hall, teachers made pupils practice the method for about an hour - while timing them on a mobile phone and telling them they were not as good as children elsewhere.
She told The Blackpool Lead: “It’s like a control method and I don’t feel like that’s necessarily a good thing for the children.
“I find it quite disturbing, to be honest.
“It’s dressed up as preparing these young people for adulthood but I don’t see that.
“It’s micro-managing them to such an extent that it’s uncomfortable.”
The school has hit back, however, saying those who disagree with the method can send their children elsewhere and its rapid improvement over the past 10 years speaks for itself.
Said to originate at the Michaela Community School in London, Slant is being replicated across the country by headteachers in a bid to tightly control pupils’ behaviour.
The method has even featured in an article in The New York Times headlined: “You can hear a pin drop: The rise of super strict schools in England”.
The publication wrote: “While some critics call (Michaela headteacher Katharine) Birbalsingh’s model oppressive, her school has the highest rate of academic progress in England, according to a government measure of the improvement pupils make between age 11 and 16, and its approach is becoming increasingly popular.”
Birbalsingh insists “children crave discipline”, adding: “What you need to do is pull the fence tight.”
But the mother of the pupil at St George’s, in Cherry Tree Road, Marton, which has 1,028 children aged 11 to 16, said her child has complained of physical discomfort after being forced to sit up “so ridiculously straight all the time and follow the teacher (with their eyes)”.
“The (academic) results are great but these are children, not robots,” she said, adding that senior teachers at St George’s recently visited Michaela.
St George’s, an academy run by the Cidari Multi Academy Trust, and which holds detentions on Saturdays, according to its website, has its behaviour policy publicly accessible online.
It says: “At St George’s we follow Slant in every lesson. This is a key habit that will help pupils succeed in school and in life. When pupils are in Slant they learn more, they remember more, they develop more self-control and they demonstrate that they are a polite person who shows respect to their teachers and their classmates.”
The Blackpool Lead asked the school to evidence these claims.
The behaviour policy continues: “St George’s is built on mutual respect. We speak to one another politely at all times, and our body language and facial expressions are polite too. Slant is a key part of showing mutual respect and courtesy.”
When pupils read, they are expected to “always follow the text with their ruler, with both hands on their ruler”, while they are told to “listen to every single word their teacher says very, very carefully”.
When “tracking the teacher”, children should “keep their eyes on the teacher whenever he or she is talking”, according to the policy. “Pupils should avoid turning around and being off-task. Pupils should not lose focus. Pupils should deliberately concentrate on what the teacher is saying at all times.
“If someone deliberately tries to distract pupils in class, they (the distracted pupils) are expected to raise their hand and tell the teacher.”
The school was asked about reasonable adjustments it makes to the policy for neurodiverse pupils or those with special educational needs.
Warnock, its headteacher, said such children “thrive with routine and consistency”.
But the unnamed parent said: “This school continues to display extreme discipline measures that would not be acceptable in the workplace.
“Children are being made to keep eye-contact with teachers at all times or face sanctions. They are forced to shake hands with teachers every morning or be punished for it.
“It is affecting children’s mental health and wellbeing.
“Students are encouraged to stand up at lunchtime and give daily gratitude - however they can only give gratitude towards a named teacher.”
Cidari took over St George’s a decade ago, according to documents from the education watchdog Ofsted, which has tracked the secondary school’s progress.
In 2016, the school was told it requires improvement. Three years later, it had boosted its ranking to good.
During a recent visit, which was not graded, inspectors said they gathered evidence to suggest the academy “may have improved significantly” since 2019.
Their report said youngsters “benefit from a highly ambitious culture where they are supported to learn, develop and achieve exceptionally well”, with teachers promoting “the highest aspirations for pupils”.
Children “benefit from an environment where respect, courtesy and politeness are daily norms” and “pupils understand, and live up to, the exceedingly high expectations for how they should behave”.
St George’s, which believes it would have been labelled outstanding if the recent Ofsted inspection had been graded, has also been shown to be the best performing secondary school in Blackpool.
Exam results show that seven in 10 school-leavers left with at least five GCSEs, including English and maths.
Every other secondary school in the resort achieved results below the national average of 45.9%, it was revealed earlier this year.
St George’s was also the only secondary school in the town with a positive ‘progress eight’ figure, which measures the progress youngsters make from the end of primary school to the end of their GCSEs in year 11.
Warnock said the “secret to success” is “nothing but good, old-fashioned values”.
He said: “We expect our pupils to attend on time every day, listen to their teachers and work hard.
“Our school is one of the warmest in the country and pupils love to attend.”
Warnock added: “Eight years ago, we were one of the worst-performing schools in the country. Supported by the recent transition to the Cidari trust and inspired by the example of Michaela, we developed an educational philosophy centred on the belief that all our children can achieve excellence.
“There’s nothing revolutionary about sitting up and listening to the teacher when they are speaking. These are short periods of focused explanation where we want our pupils to absorb vital information, or what we call the ‘gold dust’ of the lesson.
“We don’t ask pupils to sit ‘ridiculously straight’ but we do expect them to look at the teacher when they are speaking - a very reasonable expectation.
“I think our results, attendance data and behaviour data speak for themselves and demonstrate how well our approach works.”
He continued: “We show thousands of visitors around every year, mainly from other schools across the country and from parents wanting a place for their child. We receive more than 600 applications for 210 places, which I think says a lot about how the community feels about our school.
“We are very open about what we do and at every open evening I explain all our practices to prospective parents, when even practicing some of them, so there are no surprises or hidden expectations.”
Warnock added: “We are humble enough to recognise that a few people may not agree with our traditional values and that’s perfectly fine. Blackpool offers a range of schools and parents have the freedom to choose the environment that best suits their child.
“It makes me laugh when pupils are called ‘robots’ for simply being polite - it’s how many of us were raised and something we believe is important to maintain in society.
“A lot of our staff choose to send their own children to St George’s, which speaks volumes for what we do.”
While The New York Times wrote last year about the increasing use of Slant in England schools, it said there had been a “reckoning in the sector” in the US.
It reported: “In 2020, Uncommon Schools, an American network of charter schools and one of the pioneers of the ‘no excuses’ approach, announced it was abandoning some of its strictest policies, including Slant.
“The organisation said it would remove ‘undue focus on things like eye contact and seat posture’ and put greater emphasis on building student confidence and intellectual engagement.”
But Birbalsingh from Michaela wrote on social media: “A titan in the world of education falls to progressive pressure. Uncommon you have just let hundreds of thousands of children down.”
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