Britain’s oldest “free school” fails to get free school status

Posted on Tuesday, August 16, 2011 by Ian Edwards
Tags: Services

St. Paul’s School, in Balsall Heath Birmingham, one of Britain’s first free schools, has just heard that its application to join the government’s free schools programme has been rejected. Founded in 1972, it is now the oldest in the country, having survived against all the odds in one of Birmingham’s most deprived neighbourhoods.

The school caters for alienated and excluded young people, many having behavioural and emotional problems. Its exam results and Ofsted reports show that it succeeds where most other schools fail.

‘I can’t believe it’, said Chair of Governors, Patrick Wing. ‘It was a great application, setting out a fantastic track record, which was supported by about fifty other schools. But we received what was, to be plain, a perfunctory letter which suggested to us that our application had not been read. So we wrote explaining that the ‘omissions’ which the DfE said caused the rejection, were in fact points addressed in the application. This produced only another rejection – and again, I’m not sure they read what we said’.

In recent years, it has been visited by no less than six Cabinet Ministers who have praised the provision and sent others to see it. ‘This is confirmation that we are in line with government policy, as well as being what the parents and young people want and need’, said Mr. Wing.

Balsall Heath is recognised as a ‘Vanguard Area’ by the coalition government. The activism and initiative which have enabled residents and voluntary organisations to create a self-helping community brought this about. It has been identified as the epitome of the Big Society. ‘This doesn’t mean we expect or want special treatment’, said Mr. Wing. ‘What it means is that there is widespread and informed judgement that we know what we are doing, have vast experience of doing it, and have been committed for many years to helping both individuals and the neighbourhood to move on and up.’

The School staff and Trustees feel the DfE’s ‘competition’ to choose the latest batch of Free Schools cannot have been fair. They challenge the DfE to identify the applicants who were better at meeting the criteria than St. Paul’s.