Agenda item - School Organisation

Report of the Corporate Director, Families, Children & Learning (report to follow – this will be circulated separately as an addendum to the meeting papers).

13.1 Cllr Jacob Taylor presented the report on school organisation to the committee.

13.2    Curtis James and Beth from Class Divide spoke to the committee about their campaigns on education inequality. Curtis set out the campaign that Class Divide has run since 2019. He said that research has shown that diversity in schools improves outcomes for the poorest students, and that mixing children from different backgrounds creates a richer learning environment. Curtis said that Brighton & Hove ranked 53^rd out of 144 local authorities for school segregation. He said that he wanted the city to do everything possible to avoid losing another school. Curtis spoke about some of the concerns that he had received from parents. Beth spoke about her lived experience as a mother in Whitehawk with 3 children, highlighting the lack of choice for parents, and the expense of travel for children getting to school. 

13.3    Professor Stephen Gorard, Director of the Durham University Evidence Centre for Education, spoke to the committee. Professor Gorard said that internationally and nationally,  poorer children clustered together is strongly linked to an attainment gap. The most disadvantaged students do worse in areas where they are most clustered together in schools. By not clustering, it raises the level of attainment of everybody. The most disadvantaged gain the most, but there are no losers. Brighton & Hove is thinking of doing things along the right lines, but it needs to be done with the least disruption. It would be good to move to a system where it didn’t matter which school children went to. Making schools more representative and raising the attainment level for all will help move to a system where it doesn’t matter which school children go to.

13.4    Dr Ellen Greaves, Lecturer in Economics at Exeter University, spoke to the committee. Dr Greaves has carried out research on school admissions in England and said that most local authorities across England have a geographical based admissions criteria which tends to produce clustering efefcts. One model to mitigate this is a pupil premium basis, which BHCC is doing. Another model is to have a percentage allocation for pupils outside of the catchment area. A less widely used model is random allocation as a tie break. Dr Greaves said her personal view would be to evaluate the free school meals (FSM) intake before changing too much else. The FSM policy will go some way to address educational disadvantage. The issues of pupil admission numbers (PAN) and attainment disadvantage should be kept separate so as to be able to evaluate the FSM policy. The main driver of school segregation is at residential level. Many parents would like to make a school choice but cannot due to transport distance. She said that changes should be made in a reasonable time with the minimum disruption to all involved.

13.5    Cllr Shanks asked a question about governance processes. Cllr Taylor responded that changes to catchments would need to be agreed at full Council before February 2025. Only changing PANs would not require full Council approval,  but would require statutory consultation. Cllr Taylor said that he was happy to take criticism if the basis of the current engagement exercise was not communicated clearly enough, but it is important that the city has this conversation.

13.6    Cllr Sheard asked a question about the percentages of pupils eligible for FSM in the proposed options.  Cllr Taylor responded that the estimated FSM numbers for each option are indicated. Option B provides the most rebalancing. We don’t yet know what impact the new admissions policy around FSM will have.

13.7    Jasmine Oquosa-Withers from the Youth Council asked a question about the risk that adopting some of the options may lead to rising house prices as more families move into the catchment area of higher performing schools. Cllr Taylor responded that demand for schools and housing are linked and it is possible that demand for schools could increase demand for housing. However, moving to a system with a more equitable distribution of pupils across city schools should reduce these pressures by addressing the disparity between schools’ performance that is a consequence of unbalanced intakes.

13.8    Cllr Czolak asked  questions about transport as a potential barrier to pupil mobility and and whether we would only hear from the loudest voices in any consultation. Cllr Taylor agreed  that transport was an issue both in terms of routes and affordability. Ideally,  all transport for children in education Would be free, but this is not affordable. Cllr Taylor also agreed that we need to hear from more community voices, and noted that efforts are being made to do this.

13.9    Cllr Mcleay asked when the data on the  impact of the FSM policy would be available. Richard Barker responded that this was anticipated around March 2025. Cllr McLeay also asked what can be done to work with academy or religious schools where the council has no direct ability to determine PAN. Cllr Taylor said he is working well with head teachers and has spoken with Cardinal Newman about them voluntarily reducing PAN.

13.10 Cllr Helliwell asked a question on the minimum intake numbers for schools to remain viable. Richard responded that no school is being asked to go below 180 pupils, or six forms of entry, which is enough to deliver the core curriculum. Dr Greaves said very few schools had PANs of less than less than 180 pupils; falling numbers means retention of staff is worse and in turn fewer parents wanting to choose it. Prof Gorard said that smaller schools on average have worse staff retention.

13.11  Cllr Helliwell asked about Government plans to give councils more control over PAN and catchments for all schools. Cllr Taylor responded that a Bill was anticipated. We will need to see the detail of proposals before we can be sure what additional latitude this may give the council going forward.

13.12  Cllr Helliwell asked a question about school segregation. Curtis responded that it is impossible to justify a situation where some schools in the city have FSM rates as low as 15% and others rates at 50% of pupils.      

13.11 Jo Martinadale asked about different ways of engagement outside of formal consultations, noting that The community and voluntary sector across the city can help with engagement. Cllr Taylor agreed and said the council hadn’t got engagement right over many years.

13.12 Cllr Meadows agreed that everyone wanted children to have a good education. She spoke about the long distances traveling to school and the impact on friendship groups and the stress on children. Parental choice is something that parents should have, especially as schools specialise. Cllr Meadows emphasised the costs of transport even if families are not on FSM, and urged caution because of the need to evaluate the FSM policy before changing anything else. Beth agreed with the stress of transport to school and spoke of the three buses to Longhill that arrive within three minutes of each other. Cllr Taylor thanked Cllr Meadows for her comments, and agreed that transport was important. He did not think that choice was the most important factor, but said that everyone should have good service.

13.13 Becky Robinson said that the information on offer was light regarding SEN children, and asked if the council will work with PACC. Cllr Taylor said that if any proposals were taken forward, they would engage with them.

13.14 Dr Anusree Biswas Sasidharan said that she agreed with everything that had been said. She felt a consultation wasn’t always the best method as middle class residents were typically more likely to respond than other groups. She suggested going to talk to people where they were. Choice of schools should not be such an issue as every local school should be good enough. She also expressed concerns about families who just miss the FSM eligibility.. Cllr Taylor said it was a good challenge and is an issue the whole city needs to tackle. Events in communities is a way to keep the conversation going.

13.15 Cllr Cattell asked Cllr Taylor what the outcome would be if nothing was done, particularly the PANs. Cllr Taylor said on the PANs 3 or 4 schools would remain very large with healthy budgets whilst other schools would experience falling numbers, would struggle to have the breadth of offer and would have to cut costs. Cllr Cattell asked if the do-nothing option was therefore not an option. Cllr Taylor said that was his view. 

13.16 Cllr Simon asked a question on timescales, and also if the council could look at other local authorities with problematic distribution of secondary schools. Cllr Taylor responded that any decision on catchments needs o be made by the end of February, and working back from that there are deadlines for engagement and consultation. The experts might know about local authorities with comparable geographical problems. Brighton & Hove has similar economics to London boroughs and has inequalities like everywhere but we have geographic concentrations of deprivation that London boroughs do not typically experience.

13.17 Cllr Shanks asked whether there was evidence of negative impacts on middle class pupils attending schools with high rates of FSM. Prof Gorard replied that as long as disadvantage is spread amongst schools it doesn’t affect the attainment of middle class children.