Headteacher Katharine Birbalsingh has said Bridget Phillipson had ‘no interest’ in finding out why Michaela Community School was so successful.
Speaking on GB News, Katharine Birbalsingh said: “Academies have raised standards in England so enormously that on international league tables like Pisa, we’ve moved from 27th to seventh in maths. Or on Pearls, we are now considered to be best in terms of reading, having been way down the international charts 15 years ago.
“All of these reforms that happened in the last decade and a half, making schools into academies, are responsible for that success.
“We get 800 visitors a year at Michaela from all over the world, and so do lots of really good schools in England because of the amazing work we’re doing, thanks to the freedoms we’ve got.
“That’s what makes an academy. The school leaders have freedoms that allow them to give a bespoke and tailored offer to their particular community.
“Bridget Phillipson is now going to take those freedoms away from our academies, which essentially makes them into schools.
“So when she claims to say, ‘I love academies’, but then, at the same time, is taking away the freedoms from academies that makes them academies, she’s essentially turning us into schools.
“So it’s just not true, she doesn’t love academies.
“[The meeting] was very disappointing. She wouldn’t name a single top school that she’s been to visit. She said that the record of her school visits was for public knowledge, and you could find it. I can’t find it.
“I don’t know what school she’s ever been to, and I don’t know why she couldn’t just say, ‘I’ve been to these top schools.’ I presume it’s because she’s never visited any of the top schools.
“She seemed quite proud of the fact that she’d been to schools that were underperforming and I have no problem with her going to those schools.
“But I’ve invited her three times to come and see Michaela. Why not come and see what we’re doing and learn from what we’re doing?
“My deputy, who was with me, spoke about how last year, we got 52% grade nines, and how Eton got 53% grade nines. So we’re basically matching Eton.
“At no point did she probe and say, ‘Tell me, what is it you did exactly? Was it your teaching methods? Was it your strictness, because you’re known as the strictest Headmistress? Is it your values?’
“There was no interest at all in what we’re actually doing and finding out what are those key ideas that could be rolled out across schools.
“We talked about the curriculum, and she said ‘it’s a floor, not a ceiling.’
“And I said, ‘So which school is it that does not meet your floor core curriculum and does not offer a core curriculum to children?’ She couldn’t name that school, because I don’t believe that school exists.
“All schools offer a floor core curriculum. So what is the problem she’s trying to fix?
“What she wants is uniformity across the school system, which is owned by central government. When I call her a Marxist, what I mean is she’s taking the few freedoms we’ve got as head teachers and as school leaders and is returning them to government.
“Because she, as Education Secretary, knows better what my children need than I do, and I disagree with her. We offer the tailored approach with regard to our curriculum, with regard to the way in which we hire teachers, with regard to our pan (pupil admission numbers).
“We have 120 kids coming into our school every year. If the local school next door is not very good and has 100 kids instead of 120, with the changes she’s making, she could take 20 of our places and put them with that other school.
“I said to her, ‘What would you say to a mother who is desperate to get her child into a good school that used to have 120 places, but you’ve now made it 100 places in order to help out that other school that isn’t very good. What do you say to this woman?’
“Well, the answer she gave was completely inadequate. There is no other answer. You’re reducing the number of places in good schools.
“The point is that these ideas do work for everybody. Having good discipline in your school works for everyone. Having teachers lead the learning works for everyone.
“I understand different intakes are different, and it’s precisely that that I’m arguing. But there are certain basics that work.
“And the only way you can get those basics happening everywhere is not by her telling people what we should do from central government, it’s by giving school leaders freedoms, so they have a sense of responsibility and ownership for their schools, and then they can be held accountable for what they deliver.
“If, on the other hand, she makes us all be exactly the same, there is no accountability and there’s no sense of responsibility.”
