It takes just four steps to a better education model, but the models listed by CfESC are all one move solutions.  The three options listed in the policy letter all have problems, but this model ends up with all three 11-18 schools, costs less, and offers the widest choice of A-levels and vocational options by linking the schools together.

Step 1: LMDC Students move to existing estate

There is spare capacity within the existing estate to accommodate all LMDC students without exceeding the design capacity of the remaining schools:

• SSHS can take 720 right now
• LBHS can take 660
• Les Varendes can take 800 + 400 in Sixth Form.

There’s capacity of 2,180 in KS3/4 and this year there are ~2000 students. There’s a predicted bulge in 2023 of 2,271 students which would go very slightly over that mark.  No extensions required, no portacabins.  For the LMDC construction period only, a 1x 11-18 school plus 2x 11-16 school model is temporarily adopted.  This arrangement is currently recommended by teachers as the most workable.

Step 2: Rebuild LMDC

With the site vacated, it’s possible to build in the less flood prone area occupied by the existing school.  The existing school building is used to create a “flood bund” saving on costs both to transport material in, and disposal of building rubble.  The old school becomes the flood protection for the new. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle in action.  The new 960 capacity school has enough space to accommodate a small sixth form in addition to KS3/4 but would need to rely transport links to Les Varendes to offer a wide range of options.

Step 3: Move LBHS students to LMDC, and FE to LBHS

Students from Les Beaucamps would need to say a fond farewell to the building, but for some it would be merely “au revoir”, as the building would be repurposed for further education.  This provides a prestige building for the new Guernsey Institute.  This option has been previously investigated by ESC and confirmed as viable.  There is space on site for the main teaching area, but workshops would need to be built from scratch.

Step 4: Join it all together

Consortiums are tried, tested and working. Schools get Outstanding ratings. Students get to mix vocational and academic qualifications. The widest possible selection of qualifications from a single 16-18 offering, joined together by a 10-minute bus ride for some options only.

I was quite horrified when I learned on 20th January that teachers who had wanted to voice their concerns about problems with the planned expansion at St Sampsons and Les Beaucamps were treated to replies that included the advice to “be a radiator, not a drain.”

This charming piece of management newspeak doubtlessly intends to convey the idea that people can be easily divided into two groups.  Drains are negative types, while radiators are positive.  Business coach and consultant Paul Beesley explains the metaphor:

I feel you can roughly divide people into two camps – i.e. drains and radiators.

So what do I mean by people being described as drains and radiators? Do you know people that always seem to be down? Have you worked alongside someone who always sees the glass half empty? What about someone who consistently takes and never gives back? I refer to these people as drains. The more you get to know them, the more they drain your energy.

How about the other types of people? These people seem to turn on the light when they enter a room. The kind of people who are warm, full of life. I guess that you know these types of people too. These people radiate warmth and energy.

So having neatly categorised people into being either drains or radiators, which ones do you prefer to keep company with? Is it more exciting to be with a drain or radiator? If you have people working for you, will a drain or a radiator be your greatest ambassador? I think you know the answer.

It sounds a little more sinister and divisive when it’s delivered by those with responsibility for implementing major structural transition in our schools, and not by a just a business coach.  Even more so if it’s followed up darkly with hints about possible disciplinary action or job losses.  Then it doesn’t sound warm and friendly, it sounds a little cold and threatening.  No wonder then, that serious problems with the new schools about to be built were not flagged up to parents, taxpayers and voters until the last minute.

But with apologies to friends who are actual plumbers and heating engineers, it’s also a terrible metaphor.  Radiators are not always the warm and comforting things people would have you believe.  In fact, when you think about it, they often have many problems that aren’t immediately apparent.

For one thing, they’re astronomically expensive to install and run.  They’re costly to maintain.  They’re very difficult to adjust, and fearsomely complex to balance.  They are usually attached to complicated, multi-zone, staggered timing systems, that nobody really understands.  They’re inefficient, and responsible for large amounts of unnecessary carbon emissions.  As a legacy of old ideas about how things should be laid out, they’re often poorly cited, in the most inconvenient locations, making them difficult to work around.  And they’re nearly impossible to re-locate once they’ve been put in place, sometimes requiring the whole system to be ripped out and done again properly.  They are also very unreliable.  And when they break down, which they surely will, in the middle of winter, they leave you feeling cold, shivering, miserable, and cursing they day you ever agreed to install the damn system in the first place.

On the other hand, drains are easy to overlook, but they’re actually one of the most vital components of the infrastructure we rely on.  Their creation is a modern miracle.  As a society, we take for granted how lucky we are to have them in place.  Often out of sight, and out of mind.  In a bygone age, and tragically still today in parts of the world much less fortunate than our own, people suffer all kinds of problems without them.  We are lucky, we depend on them every day to wash away the stuff we don’t want, to keep us and our families safe and thriving.  We need them to reliably drain away that which we have no use for.  It’s not the most glamorous function.  They have to take a lot of stuff we’d prefer not to handle ourselves.  And if they’re not looked after properly and maintained, they can get a little stinky!  But without them, everything just doesn’t really work as it should.  If they weren’t there, when you think about it, everywhere would be overflowing with… effluent.

We shouldn’t really divide people up, let’s keep the drains, and turn down the radiators.

TO THE TEACHERS, ASSISTANTS, PETITION ORGANISERS, PROTESTORS, DOUZENIERS, DEPUTIES AND EVERYONE WHO HAD THEIR SAY:

THANK YOU FOR BEING THERE.

In some places, people care about their built environment and actually make a neat feature of the drain covers 🙂

I found debate last week so frustrating.  It’s clear 1S2C is wildly unpopular with the community & teachers but attempts at finding alternatives on the debating floor didn’t get the investigation they deserve, so the session ended up as a talking shop.  Genuine compromise 3-school models do exist, and some configurations that deserve a proper evaluation are being overlooked.  One in particular seems to have great potential to work very well, and deserves a closer look.

The proposal would be a hybrid of the De Lisle/Le Pelly amendment with Le Tocq/Brouard amendment for a 3×11-18 school model, but crucially include an element to recover costs by moving the FE institute build to use Les Beaucamps School premises, with suitable alteration, allowing the sale of the valuable SPP school site, e.g. for affordable housing. In contrast the current proposals, which end up with vacant LMDC (playing fields too marshy, low disposal value) and LV (States don’t own playing fields) do not make good use of the available opportunities in the estate and so are not good value for money overall.

I suspect this would be cost-effective and could attract majority (at least lukewarm) support across all stakeholders, and community, and teachers, if properly investigated and if parties were willing to compromise from their “ideal” positions to a position that addresses all the identified issues, at least reasonably well.  Saddening to see the States floundering around and missing important elements.

Rebuilding LMDC gives an automatic transition plan, as the remaining three schools (LV, SSHS and LBHS) have spare capacity.  So, during the build La Mare students would temporarily move to schools in the existing estate: SSHS can take 720, LBHS 660 and LV 800 + 400 in Sixth Form.  For a couple of years only, we’d be running with a 1x 11-18  + 2x 11-16 model.  All within design limits of the schools, no Portacabins needed, and no students have their education damaged.

But with a rebuilt LMDC, a project so expensive it begat the two-school model, there’s space for a sixth form.  Original plans exist for a secondary school, primary school on site creating an “all through school”, preschool, autism unit, community centre and sports facilities that could be used outside the school day.  It improves drainage for the whole area and makes good use of otherwise troublesome land for playing fields.

SSHS with a reduced catchment to similar to the old St Sampsons school could almost accommodate a sixth-form unaltered.  Reduced catchment size has another benefit, reducing traffic congestion as a greater proportion of students would live close to their school.

Three 11-18 school model ticks many boxes but does require some specialisation at KS5.  That is poorly understood, even within the teaching profession, let alone the community, or politicians.  Not surprising really, as our current schools are built around a selective UK model from the 1970s, frozen in time as Guernsey hasn’t kept up with developments in UK school building policy since then.  Why would we, it doesn’t affect us?  Except it does when we’re trying to skip forwards 50 years and adopt “latest” practice without any experience of the intervening changes.

Does specialisation in schools mean kids are forced to choose their career path when they’re 10 years old? No!  Specialist schools offer a full, balanced, comprehensive education all the way through KS3 and KS4, the specialisation is on top of that.  Precisely because the policy was introduced by HM Government to a UK system that largely consisted of comprehensive schools.

Would it create a logistical nightmare, with students having to find their own way to different schools just to get to lessons?  No!  Switching campus would be for sixth form students who take options that aren’t available in their school’s option block.  It could be timetabled to a maximum of one per day.  On a scheduled shuttle bus with no stops and a journey time of around 10 minutes, door to door.  You’d spend more time switching airport terminals.  And you wouldn’t need masses of buses, six new buses (electric buses!) would do it all.  The current proposals need around 17 just to get kids in to Les Beaucamps in the morning!  And 1S2C might itself require some switching campus between the two new colleges for some combinations.

None of this was discussed in the States, there’s an understandable fear amongst politicians of approaching details best addressed by educationalists.  It’s sometimes forgotten that education policy is developed by politicians.  Our political system relies on many independent politicians, and with party system up and running has no full-time researchers to help create policy. School specialisation was originally developed by the Conservative party in the form of CTC schools and expanded by New Labour following their “education, education, education” policy initiative that attracted many moderate voters and helped contribute to their 1997 landslide.  There seems very scant understanding of the British politics driving the standards we’re adopting.

What I’d guess quite a few people would like to see, is a pause in the CfESC programme, maybe with a defined time limit, so that the strength of feeling amongst opponents might be gauged and a possible compromise found before construction contracts are agreed and risk attempts to turn around following an election, or an unhappy electorate feeling like they’ve been denied their opportunity for expression on the subject.

Failure to do so risks a democratic crisis.  Voters feel aggrieved that 1S2C was adopted by the States with little mandate.  No manifesto pledges mentioned it, some explicitly referred to a 3-school system.  We had no vote for the Labour or Conservative changes to school building space requirements, obliquely referred to as BB98 and BB103.  But we’re proposing to adopt them here regardless.  If we went into an election with irreversible education policy that has already gone past a point of no return, there might be genuine resentment.

Politicians have struggled to gauge the strength and depth of opposition.  Muted grumblings snowballed into a much larger protest movement with alarming rapidity.  The discourse has been unusual for Guernsey, more grass roots that with those of years gone by, absent the plummy vowel speeches or booming retired colonels that often dominate discussion in the island.  With good reason, families that can afford it have felt obliged to sit this one out, at home counting their pennies and putting some aside for future school fees.  Those most affected are the other 80%, unaccustomed to getting their voice heard.

When the planning designs and transport finally emerged, the optics were terrible.  Gone were the local schools of old, replaced by high volume education factories located in the middle of nowhere, crammed Tory austerity-era designs with insufficient outside space.  Rushed transport plans spelled more congestion, an island wide traffic jam with far away drop-off points and long strides through narrow roads the rain, watching on as rich kids get chauffeur driven to their colleges in town.  And an empty Grammar school building, an institution once held out as a beacon of shining hope to educate the working classes, standing empty and abandoned, it’s future use uncertain.

Ploughing ahead and denying the people a say risks damaging our democracy and the social cohesion of the island.

Listening to the education debate in the States today was depressing, as Jonathan Le Tocq noted with some jocularity early on.  Deputies were floundering with operational details of the education system, trying to guess where teachers can work and what they could teach.  Only David de Lisle seemed to have reasonable, though maybe a little dated grasp of these.  Sadly his proposal was far too expensive to be viable, largely as he included a separate sixth-form college, requiring an additional site over other three-school models.

Of all the depressing moments, one in particular stood out for me.  One of the high points  of Amendment #6 was the rebuild of LMDC, which is long overdue.  At one point in his long and spikily defensive speech, Matt Fallaize costed various features with very approximate, and likely slightly exaggerated monetary values.  One of these, was the cost of “updating” the plans for rebuilding LMDC, from the old BB98 standard to the new BB103 standard.

He guessed the cost to update the plans at around the £2million mark. This estimate went unchallenged, and was not mentioned in any subsequent remarks, by anyone. It was, after all, acknowledged that these guesstimates were produced in some haste for the debate.

My sadness was not with the estimate’s accuracy. It was that premise of doing such an exercise is completely nonsensical. It’s the perfect illustration of the lack of understanding of the role the States has in setting Guernsey’s own education policy, that we instead rely on UK “standards” and the lack awareness of the enormous UK political shifts that produce these. They are instead parachuted in uncritically, as if we’re a local authority accepting the dictates of the British government passively.

A commenter  Rowan  on a press article captured this perfectly:

Similarly, Deputy Fallaize blithely stated that because the old schools were built to UK building Bulletin 98 standards and new buildings would have to conform to the more recent Building Bulletin 103 standards, that would cost over £2 million more.

Firstly, in no way is this a statutory requirement in Guernsey, and secondly, equally importantly, he and his advisors clearly do not know that the more recent Building Bulletin 103 was a cost saving bulletin by the UK government designed specifically to cut the costs of new schools by restricting space in the schools.

My point is that these assertions are incorrect and it illustrates that these two deputies have a tenuous knowledge of the expensive business of Education. It also shows they are not being reliably informed by their staff and consultant advisors. This really must be a time for pause and expert review.

To which I replied, that I laughed out loud when I heard that the existing LMDC design would need to be “upgraded” to the latest BB103 standard, as if it were an out of date version of Windows!

Maybe that should be cry instead though.

Not sure if it was deliberate bluster or just genuine misunderstanding, either way, it’s depressing to realise our education policy is so directly influenced by UK standards developed in Whitehall, and yet, those discussing it here in Guernsey have so little insight into what has motivated education policy developments in British politics.

Secondly, and even more important, are the standards to which we are now building. While environmental criteria have been improved over [New Labour policy], area allowances have been reduced. When Building Bulletins (BB) 98 and 99 replaced BB82 in 2004/6, they increased area allowances for secondary and primary schools by 18 and 25 per cent respectively. They did so for good reason, in recognition of changing educational needs and the inadequacy of the earlier guidance. BB103, however, reversed these improvements, this time by 15 and 5 per cent. In doing so it is inevitable that functionality is sacrificed, limiting pedagogic practice and putting additional pressure on social spaces and circulation in particular.

The result is a very real risk that at least some new [Coalition policy] buildings will be unfit for purpose, now and forever. If so, then this is a crime even worse than the extravagancies of [New Labour policy]. To spend more money than necessary on something worthwhile is a poor investment.  To spend anything at all on something that is dysfunctional is no investment at all but, instead, a complete waste of scarce resources.

The really sad realisation is, we have had no discussion at all in the States of Guernsey about whether we want our education building policy to resemble New Labour, or Tory party standards.  We didn’t vote in any UK elections, but we’re getting the policy without our representatives even knowing about it.

Worse, our current two-school model is effectively producing some of the most depressing examples Conservative/Lib-Dem “‘functional big box” schools, but due to the inefficiencies in the proposals, we’re paying premium New Labour prices for them.

Much has been made of the advantages of larger size schools in Guernsey, in that there is greater ability to stream classes by ability, and greater flexibility for curriculum options at both GCSE and A-level.  One key plus point provided by CfESC is the statistically higher ranking of larger schools:

“Of the top 200 non-selective comprehensive schools in England (2018 validated data), 159 of these were 11-18 schools with an average student body of 1350 students, very similar to the size of the future colleges.”

Parents in Guernsey aren’t used to looking through schools rankings, as the education system has historically meant that children, on completing their primary schooling, go to the school that they have been assigned to.  The mantra “you’ll get what you’re given” rings true for school choice.  Parents in the UK however have more options available.

At any one time, there will be thousands of parents all over the UK poring over Ofsted reports and school reviews, trying to determine the best school for their children.  It could simply be the closest one, where they will likely stay with their group of friends from primary school.  If the local school is good, that’s often the best choice.

Alternatively, it could be one further afield, which would mean more travelling time but might be a better fit for their abilities or aspirations.  The change in school system with the removal of selection gives parents in Guernsey a once in a lifetime chance to have some input on the schools their children might go to.

As the size of the schools has emerged as a key consideration, it makes sense to compare options in Guernsey with equivalent schools in the UK.  All the Ofsted data listing UK schools and their latest inspection results are available in Excel format for download from this page:

State-funded schools statistics

Schools are graded on a four-point scale, with 1 being the highest:

• grade 1: outstanding
• grade 2: good
• grade 3: requires improvement
• grade 4: inadequate

Looking at the August 2019 dataset and latest inspection result gives an indication how school size affects the grading, bearing in mind that for some schools the latest full inspection may have been some years ago and not match their current state.

This chart shows latest grade by school size, for all non-selective schools with a sixth form but excluding a very small number of new schools that had no grade, or had not yet been inspected:

This does indeed show a progression by size, but it would be a mistake to assume that simply by creating a new school at 1400 or 1500 capacity, an “outstanding” grade will automatically follow, as there are many factors that can influence a school’s overall grade.

Creating a large school might be lucky for Guernsey and turn out to be two schools like the much admired Cotswold School with 1376 pupils and ranked outstanding.  On the other hand, if things didn’t work out so well, we could end up with a Bexleyheath Academy with 1539 pupils and given the lowest rating of inadequate recently.

There is a lot at stake to be left to chance.  In addition, Ofsted have warned that some schools are themselves attempting to “game the system” and achieve higher rankings, using techniques such as “sham qualifications” and “off-rolling” to improve their rankings.

School ranking, particularly the “outstanding” grade, does need to be taken in context and sometimes treated with caution, but can still be a useful guide.  Comparing percentages for the sizes of school with a 3x 11-18 model, against two-schools proposed by CfESC, the percentages are indeed better for a two-school model but not dramatically so:

Whilst the difference in percentage of “outstanding” schools is noticeable in the smaller school size (18% vs. 30%) it is actually improved for the size of school that could exist at Les Varendes (31%) and overall, much less noticeable when looking at counts of “good” + “outstanding” rankings combined.

It is also worth considering that there are numerically many more schools with sixth forms of a similar size to three 11-18 schools in Guernsey, than in the 1400+ category created by a two-school model:

This shows there are more “good” and “outstanding” schools with a sixth form in either the 801-900 range or the 901-1000 range than in the 1401-1500 range. Clearly, if the conditions are right, it is at least potentially possible to create good schools, with sixth forms, at almost any size from 800 pupils onwards. In some, but not all of the smaller schools with sixth-forms, there are tiny numbers of students in the sixth-form, some as low as 30 places.  In many cases, this is achieved with the help of specialisation and partnering with larger nearby schools to provide additional options.

This can happen if there is a desire to do so, and the confidence amongst teaching professionals that launching new, additional, sixth-form courses at SSHS and LMDC need not diminish the already excellent sixth-form offering at Les Varendes.

Whilst it is of course understandable to design a school system to “play the percentages” and give the best chance of creating outstanding schools, there are many more factors to consider in a future school system than the size of schools.  The 3x 11-18 model, which maintains the existing provision at Les Varendes and launches additional, new sixth-form courses at two other schools, has close match to the school estate in Guernsey, locations close to where people live, parity across the entire system, parental choice, smaller schools in their communities, offers specialism in academic areas, and could aim to live up to a definition of an outstanding school provided by the SSAT with more positivity:

“focusing single-mindedly on performance measures gets you so far. But being outstanding in every sense of the word – for your students, teachers, parents and community – requires a bigger, more courageous vision. It means having your own plan based on what you know is right for your own students. It means subjecting that plan to constant challenge and innovation. Above all, it’s about liberating your teachers to perform brilliantly in the classroom.”

Three 11-18 schools could rationalise the current catchment areas and provide a local school close to many households.  Even with some schools having a specialism, all schools would meet national curriculum requirements and deliver a broad and balanced education to all pupils

The current secondary school catchment areas are shown on this Digimap map:

The two-school catchment areas have yet to be released.  Clearly, these would be two large areas where many households are not within walking distance of their assigned school, and require an increased use of school busses for transport.

With three schools, catchment would divide primary schools to their nearest school.  Using CfESC figures for primary school forms, and adjusting down by 15% to match the island total of 20 form-entry for the two-school split between 2x 10 form entry schools, would assign primary schools to the following three secondary schools:

This creates a slightly larger entry at Les Varendes, approximately in line with existing school building capacity and the proposed 960 place for a rebuilt La Mare de Carteret school, example pupil figures for 3000 total school places

• St Sampsons, 6FE, approx. 900 places
• La Mare de Carteret, 6FE, approx. 900 places (in secondary school)
• Les Varendes, 8FE, approx. 1200 places

..Which would give catchment areas as follows:

Parents could choose to apply for an out-of-catchment area place if desired, and an acceptance criteria would be needed if any school were oversubscribed for a particular year.

One criticism often leveled at the idea of having three schools offering sixth-form education in Guernsey is that the numbers at each school would be too small to offer a wide curriculum.  For this reason, the two-school model is currently favoured by CfESC, as two 1,500 pupil schools are said to be capable of offering a broad curriculum at each site.

Yet many smaller schools do manage to have a sixth form and offer a broad curriculum successfully. For example, if two of the three schools specialised in specific academic areas, and combined with a consortium approach, as many UK schools do.

This allows students to have a main school but optionally take an option from another site, and travel once per day by shuttle bus. It enables smaller schools to offer a wide curriculum. Locally, the colleges also take a similar approach – EC and LC have a combined 6th form, so it is possible to run with a smaller cohort – EC has only 123 students in their 6th form.

The distances between the three schools sites (LMDC, SSHS ad Les Varendes) are actually quite small (around 10 mins by road) less than in this UK example:

Central Sixth – Moseley Park – Wolverhampton, West Midlands

And here too, where coincidentally Laurie Ann Baker worked, Guernsey’s on / off new Director of Education:

4H Consortium – London Borough of Hillingdon

And also here in Islington, which has the benefit of tube transport to move between four schools with small sixth forms:

iC6 – Islington Sixth Form Consortium

In comparison, the travel distances for Guernsey are relatively small, as shown here with straight-line distances and travel time for the closest actual route by road:

Secondary schools in Guernsey have been part of a federation since 2014 where timetable times are synchronised, allowing teachers to move from one school to another.  A consortium, on the other hand, is for sixth-form students to take an additional option that is not available at their school.

These as examples help to show how 6th forms can potentially be viable at smaller schools and still offer a broad curriculum, it’s not intended to create a carbon-copy of an existing consortium that exists elsewhere in the UK.  There are a variety of size school, as one comparable example Ruislip High School, has 1,066 pupils and is rated Outstanding by Ofsted, at about the size an 11-18 school in a 3x 11-18 model in Guernsey would be. Moseley Park in Wolverhampton has 980, and is also rated Outstanding.

Running costs would likely be somewhat higher that with two schools, but if it’s approx. £20m cheaper for construction costs of the 3x 11-18 model, even allowing for CoFE refurbishment costs to LBHS there would still possibly be enough change left over to break even compared with two schools for a few years – and maybe altogether, as some costs (such as “active travel”) would not be required when more people live near a school.

Constructing schools in Guernsey is an expensive business. Comparitive school construction projects in the UK often seem considerably less expensive than local equivalents. Just picking a couple of recent examples demonstrate this:

• Queen Margaret Academy in Ayr, Scotland cost £25 million for an 800 capacity secondary school that replaces a 40-year old building from 1977 with a leaky flat roof
• At the other end of the scale Three Rivers Academy in Surry came in at £34 million for an 1,800 capacity school, funded by selling surplus land for 296 dwellings

But in Guernsey, the costs of building schools has been considerably higher. The original cost in 2014 to rebuild La Mare de Carteret as a 600-pupil high school (with an attached two-form primary school, pre-school and autism centre) was £59 million.  The project was defended at the time as “not gold plated” but it failed to gain approval. 

Another attempt to to rebuild the school was made in 2016, this time with an option to upgrade the capacity to 960 pupils included, but minus some of the original features such as a pre-school and community centre.  The estimated cost had risen significantly to £108 million.  The rebuild was broadly welcomed as long overdue, but it was partly the high cost that led (along with a proposal to combine all post-16 education on one site at Les Varendes, replacing the existing Grammar School with a college offering A-levels and vocational education on the same site) to the rebuild being rejected.

Planned LMDC rebuild, from Coe Design

An alternative proposal for education in 2018 featuring “one school with two colleges” involved using two existing sites for 11-18 education and a rebuilt Guernsey Institite to house a combined offering of existing CoFE, GTA and Health & Social Care education.

The 2019 policy letter from CfESC detailed costs of the proposal to cease use of the existing LMDC and Les Varendes sites and extend St Sampsons and Les Beaucamps for twio 11-18 schools, and a purpose built FE college at les Ouzets, the former St Peter Port school site.  Construction costs are listed as:

• £69 million – redevelopment of St Sampson’s High & Les Beaucamps High
• £13.5 million – redevelopment of the Mare de Carteret Primary School (two form entry for comparison purposes)
• £47 million for the Guernsey Institute at Les Ozouets campus

Giving a total for construction of £129.5 million.  There are additional non-construction costs allocated for for alternative transport, technology and transformation project costs.

Three 11-18 School Costs

Could Les Beaucamps be used for further education?  In terms of the gross space requirements, LBHS is a close match to the proposed new build at SPSS proposed by the CfESC business case:

• Les Beaucamps total gross area: 9,881 sq. metres (PMc report)
• Guernsey Instutute space requirements: 10,480 sq. meters, made up of
  • Performing Arts Centre,  2,200 sq. meters
  • Main Educational Space,  6,217 sq. meters
  • Vocational Workshop Buildings, 2,063 sq. meters

If so, the redevelopment costs for LMDC are less than the construction cost requirements for the 2-school model.  The 3x 11-18 would consist of:

• Les Varendes, 11-18 school, x8 form entry
• St Sampsons, 11-18 school, x6 form entry
• La Mare De Carteret (redeveloped) 11-18 school, x6 form entry
• Les Beaucamps: Guernsey Institute (CoFE, GTA, Health & Social Care)

Without accounting for building cost inflation and before refurbishment costs to transform Les Beaucamps from a secondary school to a higher education facility, the initial construction cost for the 3x 11-18 model is £21.5 million less then the two-school model.

A model for secondary school education in Guernsey featuring three schools, covering ages 11 to 18, with each offering both GCSE and A-level qualifications, seems to be viable if specialisation is accepted at A-level for two of the three schools.

This would produce three schools with equal status: there would be no school that could be considered “superior” to the others, as had been the case with the 11+ selection in place, where the Grammar School offered a wider curriculum choice and was often considered to offer a better standard of education in general.

All schools would offer a broad and balanced education at GCSE level.  For A-levels, two of the schools would have specialisations, and that could also add areas of additional strength into the GCSE provision for those schools.

This would also not feature the perceived inequality of the previously presented three school model, with one 11-18 school and two 11-16 schools.  In that model, a perfectly valid criticism against it was that the two 11-16 schools would inevitably have lower status, and consequently educational standards.  Whilst it is perfectly possible to run 11-16 schools that offer a high quality of education, and examples of highly regarded 11-16 schools exist, critics frequently cite UK statistics demonstrating generally poor performance of 11-16 schools in Ofsted reports.  These can be explained by several factors, among them, the reluctance of some teaching professionals to be limited to teaching to GCSE level only, and the absence of positive role models continuing their education to sixth-form level within the school.

The 3x 11-18 model has none of these issues: it is three, non-selective schools of equal status, offering the same standard of education to all.  The only caveat, the requirement for specialisation at sixth form level at two sites, can be simply accommodated within the existing school estate.  This specialisation cannot be considered a disadvantage, in fact the reverse.  The experience in the UK is that parents seek out specialist schools, which are often considered as more desirable than standard comprehensive schools, and often oversubscribed as a result.

Moreover, the three school model happens to fit perfectly both with the currently available school sites, with the population distribution in the island, and including the requirement to provide new accommodation for the FE.  The current CoFE operates in substandard buildings and is long overdue an upgrade.

For secondary schools, this has the effect of minimising travel distances, and maximising the opportunities for travel by foot, bicycle or bus to a local school.  This is in stark contrast to the two-school model, with two poorly located schools, that would require very substantial structural changes to the transport routes for a large majority of pupils.

Since the road transport network in Guernsey is not well developed, in order to operate at all, the two-school model has a fundamental requirement for an unprecedented level of controlling regulations in order to minimise car use.  The 3x 11-18 model has none of these problems: schools are located on existing sites, close to population centres where people live.

This diagram approximates some of the main populated centres in Guernsey (though it doesn’t capture the housing build spread out in the North of the island around St Sampsons) but does illustrate the main built up areas of housing:

Population Centres in Guernsey (Illustrative)

The 3 x 11-18 schools would be located close to those population centres, on existing school sites.  All the schools are close to population centres, which would form the greater part of their catchment area.

Location of three 11-18 schoolsThe College of Further Education could then be located in the existing education building at Les Beaucamps, providing a modern, purpose built building that can be refurbished or extended to adapt to the needs of further education.

Location of three 11-18 schools and new Guernsey Institute

Plans to redevelop the buildings at Le Mare de Carteret already exist, and can be updated and adapted for use as a new 11-18 school, rather than the originally planned 11-16 secondary school.

Academic Specialisation

In order to offer the full range of curriculum options across three sites, a moderate specialisation is required in two of the sites.  This would mean that the existing 11-18 school at Les Varendes, the former Grammar School, could continue to offer a range of subjects and options, keeping the “jewel in the crown” provision that has served the island well.  Unlike the two-school proposal, there is no need to “split up” or divide the current SFC into halves or thirds.  This provides a central site with a broad A-level offering, with particular strength in traditional academic subjects.

To compete at the other two sites, specialist subjects at A-level only could be chosen that reflect the popularity of subject areas studied in the island.  At GCSE level, all three schools would continue to offer a full “broad and balanced” comprehensive education.

The UK has extensive experience with specialist schools, following the introduction of the Specialist schools programme in 1998.  Under that mechanism, specialisms are generally quite narrowly focused, but importantly, all schools continue to offer the full National curriculum such that educational provision at GCSE is not reduced for pupils who do not take up the extended offerings provided in the school.  The following chart shows the expansion of such schools in the UK since their introduction:

By Kanguole – Own work, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6005945

Due to size limitations in Guernsey, many schools with a narrow specialisations such as these are not possible.  However, schools can combine more than one specialism.  It is possible to select specialisms that match the demand in Guernsey and create world class schools in those areas.  Using a consortium approach, these would be backed up by the strong provision already in place at Les Varendes.  With a broad an balanced GCSE curriculum at all schools, there would be little requirement for any students to seek an out-of-catchment school placement, though this would be available for those that wanted to for any reason, including a desire to take advantage of the extended options at GCSE that could be made available.  At sixth form, a change of school might be required to achieve the subject combination sought by each student.

In practice, this would mean that Les Varendes would continue to offer a broad range of A-levels, which as a former Grammar School, it already does.  All the teaching staff, facilities, skills and support are already in place for this offering.  The amount of relocation is minimised as in many cases, the staffing requirements remain unchanged.

To offer the same options at Le Mare de Carteret & St Sampsons, it is first necessary to assign an A-level specialism to each.  All three schools would be required to continue to offer the National curriculum subjects at GCSE, the specialism would be in addition to that offering, and match popular option choices in the island, e.g.

• Les Varendes : Wide range of subjects available and IB
• La Mare De Carteret : Specialises in Sports and Business
• St Sampsons: Specialises in Music, Technology and Media

The actual specialisms would need to be introduced with consultation of teaching professionals, and with the knowledge of the likely popular option combinations that can be predicted.

Clearly with this arrangement, for some sixth-form students at Le Mare and St Sampsons, achieving their desired combinations at A-Level would require switching school, either full time or for a single option.  This could either mean switching from one to the other, or switching to Les Varendes.  The latter option would also be required for those students that wish to choose an unusual combination of subjects that could only be combined at a school offering a more general range of subjects.

The upside is, the specialisms at LMDC and SSHS could produce exceptional schools in those areas that match the best available nationally for those subject areas.  This would be combined with the already excellent sixth form centre at Les Varendes, where the 2019 inspection noted ‘the percentage of students achieving A* to B awards is now significantly higher than in the UK’

With the newly created FE institute situated at Les Beaucamps, a further option to combine vocational courses with A-levels becomes available.  With all these elements in place, the model could offer the best of all worlds.