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Dynamic leadership, dedicated staff and talented children are the
corner-stones of achievement in all The Sunday Times Parent Power Schools of
the Year.
“In the end success is about expectations and if you have high expectations
people will rise to them, that is the experience we have had here,” says
Katy Ricks, head teacher of Sevenoaks, our Independent Secondary School of
the Year.
If Sevenoaks were a football team it would be Manchester United. Both get
staggeringly good results from world-class individuals who thrive on great
aspirations and enthusiasm.
In its first year of offering exclusively the International Baccalaureate in
the sixth form, Sevenoaks pupils lifted the school into seventh place in our
independent secondary school league table, a rise of 18 places from 2006.
One hundred pupils got 40 or more points when the world average for the exam
is about 30 points.
There were dazzling results at GCSE as well. About 92% of the exams taken by
the 140 candidates gained A* or A grades, with 30 students left clutching 10
A*s or more each.
“The results are brilliant,” says Ricks. “We are really proud of them. There
is no sense that it is not cool to learn here. I have an incredibly talented
staff who work collaboratively. All of us realise there is no limit to what
pupils or teachers can achieve.”
Sevenoaks, a day and boarding school, is one of the oldest schools in England,
established in 1432. It welcomed pupils from abroad in 1961 and 15 years
later began accepting girls into the sixth form. It went fully coeducational
in 1983 and is one of just a few schools in the UK offering only the IB as a
leaving exam.
Today Sevenoaks educates nearly 1,000 pupils aged 11-18, including more than
300 from about 40 countries around the world. “I think what we have managed
to do here is somehow find a strength in size,” says Ricks, who was
appointed in 2002.
National and international accolades have been won by school teams and pupils
in sports from rugby and football to sailing and shooting. Off the field,
the arts play a big role at Sevenoaks. Alumni include actor Daniel
Day-Lewis, filmmaker Paul Green-grass and the band the Mekons.
In their report last year, Ofsted inspectors said: “So much of what the school
provides both inside and outside the classroom enables pupils to develop an
active involvement in the wider world”. They also praised the “dedicated,
talented and highly committed teaching and support staff”. So does Ricks,
who says: “It is teachers who make schools good.”
Consistent outstanding scholastic achievement earns Queen Elizabeth’s school
in Barnet the title of Sunday Times State School of the Year 2007. In second
place overall, this selective boys’ grammar, founded in 1573 by Elizabeth I,
is one of the most academically successful secondary schools in England.
The 79.2% of all A-levels taken this summer that secured A grades was almost
9% more than The Henrietta Barnett school in second place, with 70.4%. No
school among the 2,000 featured in Parent Power can boast such a lead over
its closest rival. Nearly 90% of Elizabethans go on to Russell group
universities and this year 20 won Oxbridge places.
“It is not just an outstanding cohort of boys that achieve this result,” says
headmaster of nine years, Dr John Marincowitz, “but something that is built
into the culture and ethos of the school. Academic achievement is an
offshoot of a culture and ethos, not an objective in itself.”
Queen Elizabeth’s, a foundation school, espouses a holistic approach to
teaching that goes beyond the classroom and focuses on the rounded
development of each boy. “My staff engage with boys in the corridor,” says
Marincowitz. “They talk to them about their aspirations and know them as
people. It is not just about delivering good lessons.”
Pupils are drawn from more than 90 primary and preparatory schools in north
London and each year more than 1,000 vie for 180 places at Queen
Elizabeth’s, which lies in 30 acres of land bordering Hertfordshire’s green
belt. Boys are admitted on academic merit. More than half come from an
ethnic minority background and nearly 40% speak English as a second language.
Our state school of the year once before in 2000, Queen Elizabeth’s receives
glowing reports from inspectors, who praise the school’s high academic
standards and strong leadership.
Alumni include Lord Bell, Margaret Thatcher’s former spin doctor, and rower
Tom Aggar, one of Britain’s hopes for a gold medal in next year’s Paralympic
Games in Beijing.
Music is a forte at Queen Elizabeth’s, which has specialist music college
status. Each year 20 places are awarded on the basis of ability in music. In
addition to the ambitious curriculum (Mandarin has been introduced this
year) participation in extra-curricular activities is viewed as a key part
of development. Boys have represented the school nationally or
internationally in sports such as rugby, water polo and athletics, as well
as Great Britain in science competitions.
“Boys should grow up to be able to stand up for themselves in the world, but
also to stand up for causes greater than themselves,” says the head. “I
think to produce clever boys would be a limited ambition. We need to produce
clever boys who are going to do good. At our school not only is it cool to
do well, but it is cool to do good.”
When Ofsted inspectors visited the 2007 Sunday Times State Primary School of
the Year earlier this year they wrote a letter to its 270 pupils. “It was
like visiting a big family. Well done,” inspectors told the children.
Of course, national test results at the North Cheshire Jewish primary school
are impressive. It is one of only six schools in the country where all the
children have achieved perfect scores at the national key stage 2 Sats
(standard assessment tests) in the three years (2004-6) on which our Parent
Power rankings are based.
In English, maths and science all of the children taking the tests have scored
at least a level 4 (the level expected of 11-year-olds) since 2004.
(And in 2003, its copybook was blotted only by a 99% score in English.)
“By the end of year 6 standards in English and maths are some of the highest
nationally with science not far behind,” noted the inspectors in this year’s
glowing report, which commended the school as “outstanding”, the highest
category of praise.
But test results are only a fraction of the success story of this Jewish
voluntary-aided faith school, as head teacher Norma Massel is keen to
emphasise. The school attracts four to 11-year-olds from across Cheshire –
the furthest a child comes is from Nantwich, a 70-mile round trip – drawn by
a school experience underpinned by the Jewish faith. Perhaps remarkably, the
school, founded in 1970, is not oversubscribed, despite being the only
Jewish primary in south Manchester. This enables it to offer classes of 20
to 25 children.
Although there are only one or two children on free school meals, there are
about 10 statemented children and the school excels at teaching those with
special educational needs, including dyslexia. They attain the same high
results as the others when they sit the national tests, aged 11.
When Royal Grammar School headmaster Roland Craig walks through his school at
8am, half an hour before the day officially starts, the place, as he puts
it, “is alive with the sound of music”. Children are warbling away in choirs
or tuning up in the orchestra. “Some are so eager they turn up before 8,”
says Craig. “They shouldn’t, but they are so keen.” Swimming, fencing,
rugby, chess, gymnastics, judo and dance are also all available before and
after school.
The avuncular Craig, 55, has been head at the junior branch of the school in
Jesmond, Newcastle upon Tyne, since 1999. The fee-paying school, founded in
1545, has climbed steadily up the Sunday Times Parent Power league table of
the best independent preparatory schools, based on the performance of its
11-year-olds in key stage 2 Sats.
The junior school, where a place costs £7,062 a year, has risen from 26= in
2005 to 18 in 2006 to 10 in 2007. The rankings are based on an aggregate
Sats score at level five (the level expected from a 13-year-old) from
2004-6. This year’s results saw 94% of RGS’s 11-year-olds achieve level five
in English, 89% in maths and 100% in science. “The school’s ethos,” noted
Ofsted in 2004, is one of “striving to succeed”.
Nearly all the junior pupils move up to the senior school. Two children
compete for each of the 40 places available for rising sevens. Competition
at the age of nine is fiercer, with just one in three children gaining one
of the places available at this stage.
Classes are small and staff are enthusiastic, often coming in during holidays
to plan lessons.
Craig is robust about Sats, criticised for putting too much stress on
youngsters. At RGS they are regarded as a team challenge. “Sats are a great
focal point for the children here, who are ambitious, bright, competitive.
They regard Sats as being a team target.”
Children, says Craig, enjoy being measured. The key is to make sure they
understand what is happening and why, and to use the tests to further their
learning.
THE SUNDAY TIMES SCHOOLS OF THE YEAR
Independent secondary Sevenoaks School
State secondary Queen Elizabeth’s School, Barnet
State primary North Cheshire Jewish Primary School, Cheadle
Independent preparatory Royal Grammar School, Newcastle
Scottish independent St Mary’s Music School, Edinburgh
Scottish state secondary Gryffe High School, Houston
Northern Ireland secondary Antrim Grammar School
