(posted 7448 days ago)Guardian: Education
School Letwin 'would rather beg' to avoid gets glowing report
Staff and agencies
Friday November 28, 2003The comprehensive school that found itself at the centre of a political row after a senior Tory said he would rather beg on the streets than send his children there is to get a glowing write-up from England's education watchdog, it emerged today.
Ofsted inspectors who visited Lilian Baylis School in Lambeth, south London, earlier this month judged it a "good school" where 98% of lessons were satisfactory or better.
The shadow chancellor Oliver Letwin apologised after his declaration at the Conservative Party conference in October sparked a furore and led to renewed debate about the quality of inner-city state schools.
Mr Letwin, an Old Etonian who was shadow home secretary at the time, has twins aged 10 and lives in Kennington in Lambeth during the week, returning to his west Dorset constituency at weekends.
Although he did not name the school, it quickly became apparent that it was Lilian Baylis he had in mind. He told a fringe meeting at the conference that middle-class parents paid to go private to avoid such schools.
"In Lambeth, where I live, I would give my right arm to send them to a fee-paying school.
"If necessary I would go out on the streets and beg rather than send them to the school next to where I live."
Ofsted refused to comment on the contents of its report on Lilian Baylis except to confirm that it was due to be published in January.
But it is understood that when inspectors met the school's governors and senior staff to give them oral feedback on their findings, they said that 64% of lessons they had seen were good or better and all but 2% were at least satisfactory.
The proportion of pupils gaining a minimum of five GCSEs at grades C or better has almost trebled in a year from 6% in 2002 to 17%. Ofsted's report will say that "Lilian Baylis provides a good quality of education," where both the teaching and leadership by the headteacher and his senior staff is also good.
Attendance has improved to stand "at or above the national average," inspectors are believed to have said.
"Overall, Lilian Baylis is a good school. It has made very good progress since its last inspection.
"It does well by its students, identifies their diverse needs and provides them with effective support," inspectors added.
Their judgment contrasted with Ofsted's last report, in 2001, which said: "Lilian Baylis has a troubled history.
"It has suffered from instability in its leadership, a high turnover of staff, uncertainty about its future and a poor, at one time deservedly so, reputation."
Mr Letwin said: "If this is true, I'm absolutely delighted to hear of this massive improvement. I'm hoping in due course to visit the school and I congratulate them on their achievement."
Lilian Baylis head Gary Phillips has asked Mr Letwin to come to visit the school. Mr Letwin has not yet responded to the invitation.
Ofsted reports are supposed to stay under wraps until they are published and Mr Phillips could not comment on the specifics of the latest one on his school.
But he confirmed it was going to be positive and said: "The whole of the school community is ecstatic.
"It really vindicates the choice of parents to send their children here."
Lilian Baylis School has recently undertaken a number of partnerships with local businesses, one of the reasons for the drastic improvement at the school, according to Mr Phillips.
"The City of London Mercers supported the school immensely by setting up a state-of-the-art IT system. The partnerships have given the pupils direct access to IT-professionals, as well as opening possibilities for pupils to do work experience with international companies such as IBM. The kids come back from those internships a great deal more motivated to learn," said Mr Phillips.
Employing four advanced-skills teachers also helped improve the pupils' performances, he said.