Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
The Oak School: proposed Steiner-Waldorf school in Crouch End
I've just learnt that a parent-run group is proposing a new free school in Crouch End, to be called The Oak School:
http://www.theoakschool.org.uk/
They are calling for people to register their interest via a Demand Survey.
Anyone have any views/inside knowledge/outraged political opinions on this? Or any experience of Steiner-Waldorf schools? The only thing I know about them - and it is based on a Steiner school in another hemisphere several decades ago - is that they don't let children start to read before their baby teeth have fallen out. (Now I type that, it sounds like an urban myth, but I swear it happened to a family I knew.)
Tags for Forum Posts: free school, schools, steiner-waldorf
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by ant on
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My child Amelia went to that one in Hornsey last year when she was 2. It was really good and she loved it there, she'd still go now if the hours they did for preschool were longer. It has a great outside play space, they do activities like making their own bread for lunch, and every afternoon they'd have a story told to them, not read from a book but someone just talking. It all just seemed very nice and wholesome.
Its not that they "don't let" children start to read they just don't teach it at school till later and instead focus on other things. They told me by then most kids had picked it up themselves anyway from having books at home and being read to by parents, and they were fine with that. I've never heard of them not teaching science properly or being a cult, doesn't seem true from what i saw.
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Permalink Reply by Asher Jacobsberg on
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This is precisely why people are suspicious of Steiner schools: they cover up the fact that their pedagogy is based on Anthroposophy - the religion/'philosophy' founded by Rudolf Steiner.
If they were clear about why they were doing what they were doing people could access its value and accept or reject it knowledgeably. I would recommend to anyone considering sending their children to this type of school that they do a bit of reading, especially on Steiner and Anthroposophy and then ask the teachers about them and how they influence what goes on in the classroom. If they don't know then what makes it a Steiner school? If they do then it's up to you to assess whether you think that's a good thing to base an child's education on.
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Permalink Reply by David Barry on
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They were unsuccessful in their application. This notice has appeared on their web site
News About Our Application
We received word from the Department for Education today that our free school proposal has not progressed any further.
We would like to thank everyone for all the hard work, support and effort that they put in to this application.
The Department for Education highlighted some aspects of our application as particularly strong. One of these strengths was the high level of parental demand and community engagement. If we were to re-apply, this demand survey data could be carried forward for any new application.
We do have the opportunity to re-apply in a couple of months time, for a 2015 opening. This is something that we will consider in the next week or so as we reflect upon the feedback from the Department for Education.
Thank you,
The Oak School Team
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We know learn that although this bid to use the old Ashmount School site on Hornsey lane failed the other bid to use the site succeeded.
It has been confirmed to me (reliably) that the Education Funding Agency has chosen to requisition the old Ashmount Site from Islington Council, which they have the power to do, without paying any compensation to the Council.
The site is to be transferred without charge to private ownership; the site will be given to Bellevue Education Limited. Bellevue Education Ltd is a commercial (for profit) company, which runs a chain of nine for profit fee paying schools here, and in Switzerland. ) Bellevue made profits last year of £1.5m on a turnover of £3.7m, so its what I believe one would call "a nice little business". Although if you want to rush out and buy some shares you cannot at the moment as they are not publically listed. Instead the investors are venture capitalists based in Switzerland using Russian money. Perhaps there will be a flotation at some point in the future. I am sure we will be all poised to add a bit of diversity to our share portfolios.So of the two bids, the one organised by parents, albeit adherents to a philosophy not every one agrees with, failed, but the one organised by a commercial company has succeeded.
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Without wanting to read too much into two decisions, there is a distinct whiff of back door privatisation about this policy as a whole.
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Permalink Reply by Michael Anderson on
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This is disgraceful. Land owned by the council tax payers of Islington has been given away for free to a company to run a fee paying school. You really couldn't make it up.
They run Wandsworth Prep School and this is from the school website
The fees listed are per term from September 2013 (fees are reviewed no later than 1st September 2014).
Autumn Term 2013, Spring Term 2014 and Summer Term 2014 all incur the same fee.
- Reception – Year 2 (4 – 7 year olds): £4,015
All fees include school lunches.
So £12k a year but lunch is included
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The New Schools Network, the charity/quango that supports free school applicants, regularly sends out alerts that state that there is a Local Authority (LA) wanting to set up a school. That it has to set up an academy or free school. That the LA will build the school and then transfer it to the academy/free school sponsor.
So a new school built by the LA (which could have a value of £25m) rather than being an asset of the community, is given to a private organisation.
Crazy.
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"Land owned by the council tax payers of Islington has been given away for free to a company to run a fee paying school"
I entirely understand why you might think this as Bellvue Ltd are a highly profitable company running a large number of fee paying schools, basically that is what they do. However what they are doing in this case is proposing to run a "Free School" which is government funded and, under the current rules, will not charge fees. But the land is being given to a private company. So the capital account for Islington schools is now short by 3 million pounds. This was the, rather conservative figure, that Islington had assumed would be available from selling the site, at a special low price, to a housing association. It might well have been more. Consequently all Islington schools will experience a further cut in capital allocations. This is, in accounting terms, a straightforward transfer of capital resources from all the community schools in Islington to Bellevue Education Ltd.
But not for them to run a fee paying school at a profit.
yet.
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As the paper version of the Islington Turbine barely gets up the hill from Archway most on HOL will not see it. But it turns out to be on the interweb! Warning contains an image of me.
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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Imagine if a left-wing Council was merrily handing over public land and buildings - for example leases for 125 years at a low or even peppercorn rent etc. Although, this was the nonsense which Haringey did get up to and was rightly criticised for.
Isn't the fundamental issue - whatever political party is in charge - that this land and buildings are owned by the Community? It is, to adopt an old expression - Common Wealth. In respect of which elected politicians should act as wise trustees. It should not be the spoils of election battles, paraded and given away by the victorious parties to their friends and allies as loot.
As for Asher's point about a "distinct whiff" of privatisation, my impression is of a full blown fetid stink. Is there anyone with the slightest respect for evidence who genuinely believes that Mr Gove does not have the eventual aim - preferably sooner than later - of taxpayer supported fee-paying schools replacing free State education?
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All Alan Stanton's worst fears confirmed?
Read the article folks, and see if you think they are.
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Thanks for spotting this, David.
It made me feel sick. Not least because of the Coalition Government's dishonesty in failing to disclose the underlying aims of this policy so there can be a clear and open national debate.
Also because of the way that in Haringey Cllr Claire Kober and then first Cllr Lorna Reith and now Cllr Ann Waters - "cabinet members" for Children & Young People's Services - have shown themselves totally inadequate, unfitted, and apparently uncomprehending, when it comes to offering an even vaguely left-wing lead on this vital Education issue.
I'm no education expert. So when I was first trying to make sense of this Tory policy, among the people I asked was a friend in the U.S. who used to work at the National Education Association (NEA). He described the parallels with their charter schools and how this was part of the right wing Neocon agenda in the U.S. He suggested I read a book published in 1997: Reinventing Public Education. (The excellent Big Green Bookshop got a second-hand copy for me.)
Our friend explained that in the U.S. making such fundamental change was far more difficult because education was controlled at State level.
Here, with no electoral mandate and no proper public debate on the longer-term implications, Michael Gove has granted himself hundreds of prescriptive new powers over English education.
As Peter Wilby asked in an article last year, would even Mr Gove be happy to see a future Education Minister - Labour, LibDem (or possibly even UKIP?) - whose "word would be law" and "position Napoleonic"?
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