Ramsgate School.....
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katherine_m_p ...@yahoo.co.uk (Galloise65)
After reading the League Tables on the BBC Website, I see that "Ramsgate School" in Kent, is the worst school on there. Can anyone tell me, out of curiosity, what this school is like?
Because I remember a really bad secondary school near my house (I didnt go there) which was basically falling apart and everyone who went there ended up either working in factories or ram raiding supermarkets in stolen 1983 Fords, but that was only 200th from the end!
"Mungo \"two sheds\" Toadfoot" sk...@skanksville.freeserve.co.uk
It's an extremely good school, in that it is a good, large building and very well-equipped. I'll be generous here and say "some", not "most", of the pupils, though, are rude, arrogant and aggressive and they seem to disrupt a lot of lessons to such a degree that the pupils who do want to work don't get the chance to. Also it's an awful lot easier for a child to join in with the disruption than to be an outsider.
Then there is the stigma attached to the place; hardly anybody wants to send their children there because the school has had a very bad name for a very long time. Those who don't care which school their kids attend.....well, that part is self-explanatory really, so the general levels of capability and willingness to learn are low to begin with.
As with many places, Ramsgate has its problems with drugs, burglary, theft etc. but I wouldn't say that having the Ramsgate school in it has much of a detrimental effect on the area. Don't forget that Ramsgate also has two of the best schools too - Chatham House and Clarendon House.
Si
Martin Frey mar...@snipclara.co.uk
Ramsgate School is, like so many Kent schools, a victim of the selection trap - the ultimate 11+ failure. Kent says is has some of the best schools in the country, grammar schools, and that their results make up for the almost negligible scores in the weak/failing schools.
You either believe its a good idea to concentrate all the abler children in some schools, to the exclusion of all the rest and accept that this means that you also concentrate the children with the most problems, the least supportive families in others, with the middle ranks become RC or anglican for the purposes of getting the child out of the sink schools.
Or, like me you think its stupid, wasteful and belongs to a bygone age.
It is food for thought that, despite having more grammar schools than any other part of England, Kent gets less people getting university degrees and has the least educated workforce in the South East.
Cheers Martin
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Martin Frey N 51 02 E 0 47
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"Mungo \"two sheds\" Toadfoot" sk...@skanksville.freeserve.co.uk
I agree completely that it is unfair to bunch together the more intelligent children, excluding those less able and relegating them to "worse" schools, but what's the alternative? If you had a child with the potential, and the willingness, to do really well would you feel comfortable sending them to a free-for-all school where there is a real risk that the cl***es will be constantly disrupted by the few?
Seperation occurs even within schools: those with more ability are put in higher cl***es or groups. This seems, to me, a logical way to educate which will give every pupil what they need to achieve their own potential, whatever that might be. Choosing your child's school merely by postcode, for example, would surely be just as unfair to those more capable?
I take it you have reliable references from which you formed those statements? I'd be interested to see them. Do you mean that the universities in Kent perform badly, or that people who originate from Kent perform badly, regardless of which university they attend?
Does the "least educated workforce" take into account only those born and educated in Kent, which *would* give a better indication of the state of education within Kent, or does it include those who have come to Kent but were educated elsewhere? Does it include those who were educated in Kent but have gone to work elsewhere?
Also, when you say "the South East", which other parts of the South-East are you comparing Kent to?
Si
Martin Frey mar...@snipclara.co.uk
Comprehensive schools.
I did. It wasn't like that.
As long as we can't travel cheaply at the speed of light children are going to go to schools fairly near where they live. However good the schools, Kent people aren't going to send their kids to school in Bath or York etc. And, some postcodes will get poorer results than others, but not on the scale of difference we can see in Kent where neighbouring schools can vary in GCSE p*** rates by over 90%.
The learning and skills council - who have taken over all education post 16 whether in school or FE college. I can send you the document if you let me have an email that works (snip out snip for mine.) The latter - almost. I mean that a far higher proportion tend not to go to university at all. It amounts to 37% with degrees in Kent and Medway, 47% in rest of the region - the economic implications on lost earning power that this represents is beyond decent contemplation.
It is a long term endemic problem to Kent and Medway. Given the recent immigrations I think it means that the employment opportunities in Kent/Medway are predominately for the less qualified and that the immigrants tend, on average, to be less qualified than the region they left. As growth and new investment are for higher qualifed, again it gives cause for concern.
The L shaped region from Bucks down to Isle of Wight and across to Kent - exludes greater London, East Anglia.
Cheers Martin
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Martin Frey N 51 02 E 0 47
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"Kenty" nos...@btinternet.com
then you get people like me who went to a comprehensive, didn't go to university but earn a decent wage, believe in selective schools because the ones who don't want to learn DO stop the brighter ones learning and drag everyone down to the lowest common denominator.Bring on more Grammar schools I say, make the comprehensives selective as well and stream them on ability as well with the brightest at the top !!
And what has immigration got to do with it ??
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Martin Frey mar...@snipclara.co.uk
My mistake - sorry - by immigration I meant newcomers to Kent. Some are from overseas - the overwhelming majority are from the British Isles.
Cheers Martin
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Martin Frey N 51 02 E 0 47
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"Mungo \"two sheds\" Toadfoot" sk...@skanksville.freeserve.co.uk
In theory, yes, but even in comprehensives children are streamed according to their ability. They may well be in the same building but they are still seperated.
Well I'm afraid, in a lo of schools (ask a few teachers) it is now. When I left school in 1979 there was still respect for authority but sadly, as you must be aware, that is now in decline.
My wife and I removed our daughter from her school, Ellington, last year because of the constant disruption in cl***es. Pupils were blatantly ignoring teachers because they have become aware that they can indeed "just say no". At her junior school our daughter was hard-working and willing to make a real effort to learn but because she didn't "fit in" at Ellington, i.e. she would actually work when asked to, she was bullied almost constantly, along with others like her, and she became withdrawn and uncommunicative. I hasten to add that this was not *just* because of her age :o) We now educate her at home and she has reverted to her normal, outgoing, self and is doing extremely well.
This is true, there is a vast difference in achievement. Bringing all the children together into a comprehensive school though, I feel, will only average the results and may well lower them as more studious pupils find they are made fun of for wanting to do well.
Having said that, it *would* be nice to see some of the more archaic Thanet schools replaced by a modern building - perhaps closing the Ramsgate School and a few other comprehensives and mixing them up into a brand new "Thanet School" would remove the old "Ramsgate School" ***ociations and give the new place a better start? I do think that the grammar schools should stay though, at least until the theoretical new school started to achieve equally theoretical good results, in which case perhaps people would be less inclined to send their children to grammar schools anyway?
I would be interested to see the document. I don't disbelieve you but I wonder what is taken into account when the figures are compiled.
My reply address does work.
And it's impossible to say that the closing of grammar schools would improve those figures. We can't judge a whole county's education system by the number of people who decide to go on to university anyway.
That's true, but we can't all be directors. Somebody has to know how to actually *do* the things that make a place run, rather than how to get others to do it for them ;o) Si
"Mungo \"two sheds\" Toadfoot" sk...@skanksville.freeserve.co.uk
There still remains the problem of what to do with the lower end of the scale, but if they're not going to make any effort wherever they are.......boot camp? ;o) Si
Martin Frey mar...@snipclara.co.uk
Some stream - most set - so a child can be in top set for maths, bottom for french. Lunch, break, registration, PE, RE, art, etc are less rigorously setted or streamed, if at all.
I meant I sent my children - a bit more recent than the mid 70's Not a comprehensive - it takes only those who fail/don't take the 11+.
If we had a comprehensive system, the more able/hard-working would be in present in sufficient numbers to resist the taunting, and the taunters, distributed more evenly among schools find themselves subject to upward pressure. Selection concentrates the best and the worst.
This does not seem to be the experience in areas where all schools are comprehensive.
Ramsgate will close and reopen as an academy. May make a difference but I'm not holding my breath.
Agreed - but semi-skilled, unqualified clerical - these are not growth areas for employment.
Sorry I didn't try your email - it looks fairly unlikely as a goer though. Am trying it now.
Cheers Martin
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Martin Frey N 51 02 E 0 47
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Martin Frey mar...@snipclara.co.uk
Not true in my experience or that of many people I have met.
I think the idea that 75% of your peers are pond-life is one of the most harmful, divisive, unproductive and just plain silly ideas that grows in the minds of too many recipients of grammar school education.
There are people who have succeeded in all types of school, and even none and there are people who have failed from all types of school and none. Personal experience is not a good guide and the attempt to preserve the circumstances of one's own experience is futile. The world moves on.
Cheers Martin
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Martin Frey N 51 02 E 0 47
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"Brian Reay" brian.r...@bigfoot.com
So you advocate a 'leveling down' approach I take it? Can you explain how punishing the more able children (and their supportive families) helps the less able, please?
This argument is full of holes. Here are a few: 1. A education isn't just about getting a degree- there is more it than that (and I have 2 so I'm not speaking from bitterness).
2. The more educated workforce (by which I ***ume you mean graduate) tend to move to areas with jobs that require them. Kent isn't at the top of the list of areas with high tech industry. (Compare it with the M4 corridor, for example).
3. Many people move away from 'home' to go to University and then set up home elsewhere.
4. Kent is close enough to London to suffer commuter effect.
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73 Brian G8OSN www.g8osn.org.uk
Martin Frey mar...@snipclara.co.uk
Most of what you say applies equally to all the counties in the region. It is interesting that the M4 opened up a high tech, high qualification, high waged corridor. Strange that the easing of access to Europe has left Kent the backward, low qualified, low waged part of the South East. Could it be that poor education has led to lack of investment because the qualified labour ain't there?
Cheers Martin
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Martin Frey N 51 02 E 0 47
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"arache" arache...@zoom.co.uk
The Ramsgate School doesn't ever turn away pupils, and does almost specialise with problem pupils. There's a large influx of foster children from London Boroughs to the area around Ramsgate, and this is were they go.
Bear in mind such apparently brilliant schools as the CH's rapidly dump pupils at the slightest whiff of a difficulty, not least to keep their scores up.
cheers,
"Brian Reay" brian.r...@bigfoot.com
On what do you base this? Have you 'done the rounds' looking at post 11 year old schools?
I have and found the exact oppersite to what you suggest.
I also saw my old school 'go comprehensive' in the mid 1970s. The last 2 years I was there- with just 2 years none selective intakes was enough.
That isn't what I said at all. You seem intent on punishing those that do well.
You don't seem to have the idea how companies grow and expand. They rarely say "Oh lets open a new factory/office, where is a place with a work force?". They generally grow organically or by acquisition. OK, you may get (say) Honda or Nissan opening a new 'green field' factory but much has to do with physical facilities and grants etc. The big Nissan factory near Sunderland opened on an old airfield site- no fuss over 'environmental concerns' (even though there is a bird reserve within a mile or so) or the other 'crap' we have heard over development around here. Look at the Dockyard in Chatham- it closed nearly 20 years back and it took years to get their act together. Now Medway council are blocking an airport that could revitalise the area.
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73 Brian G8OSN www.g8osn.org.uk
"TitaniumWulf" w...@ukc.ac.uk
I would say parts of Kent. Look at Pfizer in Sandwich. They have a large staff and a significant proportion of them are highly qualified (Masters, PhD etc). Canterbury is another. My friend was ***istant manager at the book shop in the high street (Methevins or whatever).
He explained to me that all his staff had at least a degree, even though the wage was pants. Why?
Well the hours were flexible so they could fit them round their further studies. Also, it's useful to have people who read a lot of books, and understood them.
He was reluctant to employ anyone with just GCSEs or A levels because they were not up to scratch.
Saying that, once I obtain my MSc I doubt I will be staying in Kent.
Wyatt
"JackH" jackhacket...@yahoo.co.uk
Yes... and how many of them are what you could reliably refer to as 'locals'?
Most of my mates that bothered to go and get a 'propa' education have ended up living in other parts of the country because of their jobs etc.
<SNIP> Hey, they don't call Kent 'Royston Vasey' for nothing, you know... ;-)
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JackH
Martin Frey mar...@snipclara.co.uk
I am very sorry to report that Ramsgate school has just returned to special measures: the plan to inject new money into it by making it an academy cannot now proceed.
It is time to reconsider the selective system that causes the problems that create schools like Ramsgate, schools that are so burdened with problems that they cannot provide an environment parents must be expected to enter their children on pain of punishment if they do not.
Home education is not an option for most parents.
Cheers Martin
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Martin Frey N 51 02 E 0 47
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"Brian Reay" brian.r...@bigfoot.com
How is it the 'selective system' that "creates schools like Ramsgate" ?
Moreover, how does inflicting the problem on other children cure the situation? That is the politics of envy. You are just looking for someone else to blame and fix the problem.
I'll warrant the problems of the school are largely discipline and the parents need to sort this out with the school.
Brian
Martin Frey mar...@snipclara.co.uk
On what do you base this warrant? What do you know of Ramsgate School?
Cheers Martin
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Martin Frey N 51 02 E 0 47
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"JackH" jackhacket...@yahoo.co.uk
I've been there numerous times over the years... can't say I've been that impressed with it.
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JackH
"Brian Reay" brian.r...@bigfoot.com
You still have explained how making the more able suffer helps the less able. Why do you keep avoiding that question?
Well either you are a teacher in a school like Ramsgate or you have a child there.
If Ramsgate school were 'doing ok' would you be making these posts?
Money probably isn't the fundamental problem. If you were given ??1m this morning how would that help?
I ask again, how does throwing good kids into the bad school help?
Well some people, including me, do see benefits to selection.
I don't know Ramsgate school but I have seen others. If nothing else, apply a bit of common sense.
From what you have said, Ramsgate school is for those who failed the 11 plus. Now, failing the 11 plus is not a sign of being 'thick'- maybe just a bit less able than others. Nor is the 11 plus in itself some filter for 'social behaviour' - being a well disciplined pupil is not related to academic ability.
So, why do schools like Ramsgate have a problem? They still have quite a wide spectrum of academic ability and there are still things to learn, maybe in different areas or depths, but still an education. OK you get good an bad teachers but you don't seem to be claiming that Ramsgate school has no good teachers able to teach to he required academic level. Teaching pay scales are also fairly 'fixed' so a teacher of a given 'grade' in Ramsgate school probably earns as much as one on the local 'good' school.
What does that leave, discipline. Unruly kids, disrupting lessons, bullying, ......... etc etc.
You have this naive view that throwing in some 'good kids' will sort this out. It won't- they will just become the new victims. The unruly don't magically say "Oh let us be good now as we have a swot in the cl***." more like "Let us kick the sh** out of the swot." Now, I do empathise with your problem- I have children myself I dread them going to the local equivalent of Ramsgate School- but dumping the 11 plus won't solve any problems were that to happen.
The solution lies in the hands of the parents and teachers. Get tough. If the Head won't take notice go the governors, the press, anybody until he does. Isolate the trouble makers- suppose it means having half the school suspended- so those children that will behave and are prepared to learn are given a chance. Show no mercy. I make a point of getting along to the parents evenings at our childrens schools and I have never heard so much cr** and excuses as to why there are problems in a Junior school with a 'good' catchment area (not a deprived area for miles and no shortage of moeny either). Still the school CLAIMS to have 33% of 'special needs' children. Why, because they get extra money for it. It is actually in the schools interests to have some unruly kids- so they can claim the money.
Solve the problem and the money is cut. A few minutes talking to my own children and the odd 'unguarded' comment from teachers and it is clear that "special needs" means "needs a but of discipline". Of course, special needs can also mean a bright child- but magically they never seem to get to see the extra money they may generate. It is spent keeping the trouble makers happy.
Leave the KCC to sort out the problem cases. Once some of the wayward parents see that trouble is brewing for them at least some will bring their children into line. If necessary, let KCC fill the prisons with parents who fail to send their kids to school and ensure they behave.
Making excuses and wanting to spread the pain won't help. Nor will moaning on here.
Regards Brian
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73 Brian G8OSN www.g8osn.org.uk
Martin Frey mar...@snipclara.co.uk
I didn't start the thread, started because Ramsgate has the lowest GCSE p*** rates in England.
I agree - I have already said the problem is selection.
Schools have a tendency to fall into hierarchies - this is a peculiarly English problem. Internationally, the countries at the very top of the educational tree have the least differences between schools and the least difference in attainment between children with different economic circumstances. Selection makes this hierarchical tendency worse - Kent has the largest selective system in the country and the highest proportion of schools in special measures and serious weakness.
Warrant is a strong word to use about a school you don't know. There are bad schools - no question, all over the country, but there are also valid reasons for some to appear bad without it being entirely the fault of the head/teachers/governors.
Ramsgate is a sec mod, for 11+ failures - it is also, as happens in a hierarchy, the only school in the area with vacancies. It therefore has nearly all the asylum seekers, all the children excluded from other schools, 80% of the looked after children and approaching 80% with special needs, mostly behavioural but also very slow learners.
Well disciplined is hard/impossible to achieve under these circumstances - putting all your difficult eggs in one basket means there is almost no peer pressure towards discipline.
You'll find that, in schools like Ramsgate there are more posts of special responsibility which comes to more money while remaining within the standard scales/pay structures There are critical points where, with a sufficient proportion of swots, it is the others who get the shit kicked.
I don't personally have this problem - but have witnessed a school turned round. The swots now number 15 to 20% and can look after themselves and get their top GCSEs, A levels. With the problem children in a minority, they are less of a problem - and some of them get decent GCSEs too.
This is all fine - I agree. It just doesn't work when the problem children outnumber all the rest by 2 to 1. Suspending half the children is not an answer - there aren't enough governor hours in the week to handle the hundreds of man/weeks required to go through the procedures, not to mention handle the social and media flack that would ensue. I've spent about 50 miserable hours on the exclusion of just one sadistic bully - and I was only a very small part of the human committment that the process can take.
KCC have been trying to solve these problem schools (at least I hope they've been trying ...) for 50 years. Very little sign of success.
Repeated long term failure means it's time to consider whether the problem may be systemic.
Why not? But diagnosing the cause is not making excuses. And moaniing is in the ear of the beholder.
Cheers Martin
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Martin Frey N 51 02 E 0 47
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Martin Frey mar...@snipclara.co.uk
The overall p*** rate in Kent is around 27%.
Pay attention at the rear. If the effect of selection was to leave the 73% who do not p*** evenly spread among the remaining schools, they would have a broadish spectrum and manage. It doesn't work out like that - the spectrum in schools like Ramsgate and a dozen other schools in Kent is, if anything, even narrower than it is in the grammar schools. This is the core of the problem.
I absolutely do - it is what works in most of comprehensive England.
Who said 80% are problem causers? Get a grip.
Good fortune. We are 7 miles from the nearest grammar school so although many parents who could get their kids through the test took on the journey, the proportion has been diminishing steadily and, about 3 or 4 years ago, p***ed what I would call the critical point.
The swots, as you call them, are now in sufficient numbers to look after themselves. They are a great influence on many of the rest -
less able but working just as hard and the problem children are a dimishing force. The school has reached the point where education is by far the most important activity - as opposed to controlling/containing. But it helps being at a distance from the selective system.
Who said we did? If we had 80% problems - then the system would be unworkable. We don't (and nor do most schools - its the bottom dozen for which your solution has been tried along with other solutions and all have failed to have an impact.
After exclusion comes appeals to an independent panel of (in my opinion) twits.
Cheers Martin
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Martin Frey N 51 02 E 0 47
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