Published: Janaury 27, 2012
by ANDREW JOHNSON

A CONTROVERSIAL academy school which saw a bitter battle over its status five years ago has posted the worst GCSE results in Islington and is one of 107 schools nationally to fail to reach minimum government targets.

The government released league tables of school performances yesterday (Thursday).

Campaigners jumped on the failure of City of London Academy School in Angel – formerly Islington Green School – which now has worse results than before it was judged to be failing and “forced” to become an academy.

They called on Lord Adonis, the Labour architect of the academy scheme who lives in Islington, to apologise publicly to pupils of the school.

Just 31 per cent of its pupils achieved grade A-C in five GCSEs, including maths and English. The government’s benchmark is 35 per cent. This figure will rise to 40 per cent next year.

Islington’s average is 50 per cent – still below the national average of 59 per cent.

In 2007, before the school became an academy, 34 per cent were achieving five A-C grades. The 2011 figure has plummeted from the previous year, when 43 per cent gained the necessary qualifications.

Teachers and parents mounted a furious campaign to prevent the school being effectively privatised. They claimed at the time that Ofsted overruled inspectors so that the school could be described as “failing” in order to push through academy status.

Author Francis Beckett, in his book The Great City Academies Fraud, said that the school was ‘marked’ because it had landed then Prime Minister Tony Blair in political hot water for failing to send his children there.

Parents and teachers claimed the school was deliberately run down, that the academy consultation process was flawed and that the scheme was approved only after a chaotic voting system. The school was financially backed by the City of London and City University.

This week, Alistair Smith of the anti-academies alliance, called on Lord Adonis, the Labour peer responsible for the academy project, who lives in Holloway, to publicly apologise.

“I believe that Lord Adonis, who was the architect of the academies programme under New Labour and the prime mover of the City of London Academy, needs to be brought to account,” said Mr Smith, who is president of the National Union of Teachers in Islington.

“He’s let down the children of Islington Green and put politics above the needs of local children. He refused to look at the evidence that this was an improving school. He should come and explain how it is that he spent all that money, time and effort to shut down Islington Green School. It is a tragedy.”

Mr Beckett, whose book revealed much of the backroom politics about Islington Green, said he was not surprised that the school was now worse than before.

“Successive governments deliberately destabilised a fine Islington school in order to create this academy,” he said. “They sneered at the school’s achievements and manipulated Ofsted results to provide an excuse to put in place a school without a past to be proud of, or a future to look forward to.”

A spokesman for the City of London said it would be working hard to boost results in future.

“The governors are well aware and are extremely concerned that the academy has seen a serious dip in results this year, which is why they have taken decisive action to improve results for pupils,” he added.

“This action includes the appointment of a ‘National Leader for Education’ to support the principal, who has agreed with the governors to enact a range of measures on behalf of pupils. These measures include increased one-to-one mentoring, additional homework clubs and individual tutoring for some pupils.

“2011’s GCSE results relate to the government’s benchmark of 5 A-Cs and therefore do not represent the full picture at the academy. However, governors and sponsors recognise these are vital core subjects, which is why they have taken such strong and decisive action and will take any further action necessary to ensure outcomes for our young people are significantly improved.”

Last night (Thursday) Lord Adonis had not responded to a request for a comment.

Table-topper shows the way forward

THE row over City of London Academy overshadowed Islington’s other GCSE results, collated into league tables by the Department for Education.

Although the borough’s average for the government’s benchmark of pupils achieving five A-C grades, including English and maths, was, at 50 per cent, below the national average of 59 per cent, union officials said this was still a remarkable achievement.

Ken Muller, assistant branch secretary of Islington National Union of Teachers, said that as the borough had the second worst child poverty figures in the country, the results were “extremely good in the context of the disadvantage in the area”.

He added: “Fifty per cent of kids achieving these results when many of them come from poor backgrounds is a credit to teachers and other school staff.”

Labour’s education chief, Councillor Richard Watts, highlighted the results of St Aloysius’ College in Archway, which came top of the borough’s league table with an astonishing 74 per cent of pupils hitting the top marks.

He said he would be calling on other schools to examine the methods of St Aloysius, which monitors each of its pupils and intervenes early if one seems to be slipping below expectation. “St Aloysius’s results are spectacular,” he said. “The governors of other schools need to start asking what they are doing there. We are not far away from the government’s benchmark in every school.

“Within three or four years I’d like to be able to say we are in the top 10 per cent of performing schools in the country. What makes a school good is outstanding leaders and outstanding teachers. It’s not about the funding model.”