Item 4 1st February 2018 Glasgow City Council Education, Skills and Early Years City Policy Development Committee Report by Executive Director of Education Contact: David McEwan Ext: 74775 PROPOSAL TO CONSULT ON MAINSTREAM SECONDARY SCHOOL ENTRY CRITERIA Purpose of Report: To advise the committee of the current mainstream secondary school entry criteria and to seek the views of the committee on a proposal to undertake a city- wide consultation to unify the entry criteria of all secondary schools within Glasgow to a single system. Recommendations: The Education, Skills and Early Years City Policy Development Committee is asked to consider the contents of the paper and to agree that the proposal should be developed further and taken to the City Administration Committee seeking permission to undertake a formal consultation on the proposal. PLEASE NOTE THE FOLLOWING: Any Ordnance Survey mapping included within this Report is provided by Glasgow City Council under licence from the Ordnance Survey in order to fulfil its public function to make available Council-held public domain information. Persons viewing this mapping should contact Ordnance Survey Copyright for advice where they wish to licence Ordnance Survey mapping/map data for their own use. The OS web site can be found at <http://www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk> " If accessing this Report via the Internet, please note that any mapping is for illustrative purposes only and is not true to any marked scale 1 Background 1.1 The entry criteria for a primary school or secondary school is determined by the local authority. Local authorities throughout Scotland and other countries adopt a range of differing entry criteria. For mainstream primary schools in Glasgow, the key entrance criteria for a particular school is based on a defined geographical catchment area, and those families living within the catchment area will have a “right” to expect that their child can be enrolled in that particular school provided that there is room to accommodate the child. 1.2 Some primary schools have shared catchment areas whereby parents residing within these areas may choose between two or more local schools. These shared catchment areas exist as a legacy of many years of demographic change, school closures, housing developments and other factors. 1.3 Every postcode within the Glasgow boundary will be within a catchment area (or shared catchment area) for both a denominational primary school (or schools), and a non-denominational primary school (or schools). 1.4 The secondary school estate, however, is slightly different. For 13 of our mainstream secondary schools, the key entry criteria is similar to that of our primary schools, i.e. defined by a geographical catchment area, this is known as a “delineated” secondary school. The 13 delineated secondary schools are: Bannerman High School Bellahouston Academy Eastbank Academy Glasgow Gaelic School/Sgoil Ghaidhlig Ghlaschu Secondary Hillhead High School Hillpark Secondary School Holyrood Secondary School Hyndland Secondary School John Paul Academy King’s Park Secondary School Knightswood Secondary School Rosshall Academy St Andrew’s Secondary School 1.5 For the remaining 17 secondary schools, the key entry criteria is based on which primary school the child attends, these primary schools are often referred to as “associated” or “feeder” primary schools, and these secondary schools are referred to as “non-delineated” secondary schools. The 17 non-delineated secondary schools are: All Saints Secondary School Castlemilk High School Cleveden Secondary School Drumchapel High School Govan High School Lochend Community High School Lourdes Secondary School Notre Dame High School Shawlands Academy Smithycroft Secondary School Springburn Academy St Margaret Mary's Secondary School St Mungo's Academy St Paul's High School St Roch's Secondary School St Thomas Aquinas Secondary School Whitehill Secondary School 1.6 School rolls in the city are steadily increasing after decades of reduction. This necessitates that Education Services effectively plans to ensure future capacity is met (see 3.8). 1.7 The consultation process requires authorities to actively involve and consult with all stakeholders and other school users (‘affected parties’). It is necessary to include an educational benefit statement, that is, the authority must produce a statement setting out its assessment of the effects of any proposed changes on children and young people and other users of an affected establishment. 1.8 There is a minimum six weeks term-time consultation period, however, the overall consultation process takes longer than six weeks to complete. If approved, the detailed consultation timeline will be developed and included in the formal consultation documentation. The key stages of the consultation are: Prepare pre-consultation information Undertake pre-consultation engagement Present proposal to Policy Development Committee Prepare proposal to consult report for the City Administration Committee; including the formal consultation document Present proposal to consult to City Administration Committee This paper is part of the process as detailed above. 2. The Proposal 2.1 The purpose of the proposed consultation is to simplify the entry criteria for mainstream secondary schools and to make it equitable and transparent. That is, to establish one key entry criteria across all 30 secondary schools by making them all “delineated” so all mainstream secondary schools will have a defined geographical catchment area. 2.2 Whilst this consultation directly involves 17 mainstream secondary schools, and indirectly 13 other mainstream secondary schools, the proposal to create delineated entry criteria is unlikely to have an adverse effect on the current arrangements across the city; on the basis that the current entitlement for the majority of the families in the city will be unaffected (see 3.7). 2.3 It is not the purpose of this proposal to alter, amend or otherwise change any of the existing secondary school delineated catchment areas. It may be that responses to this consultation contain requests to make changes to existing catchment areas, however, any such response would be noted and thereafter considered by officers and elected members. It may be that these changes would be the subject of a future consultation on changes to catchment areas. As noted in 3.5 below, the unification of the entry criteria across all secondary schools within the city would make future catchment area changes within the secondary sector more straightforward. 3 Educational Benefit Statement for the Proposal 3.1 The Children Standardising the entry criteria for secondary schools throughout the city would make it clearer and would lead to an improved level of certainty for children as to which secondary school they would be transitioning to. 3.2 Parents, Carers and Local Community Parents and Carers of children would benefit from having a single entry criteria for placement within the city’s secondary schools by having a clearer understanding of which secondary school their child has an entitlement to attend. As the entry criteria would be based on where you live then local communities would have a greater understanding of which secondary school(s) they are associated with. 3.3 Other users There would be no change. 3.4 Future users of the provision Parents, carers and children progressing through primary school would have a clear understanding that the secondary school they have an entitlement to attend would be based on their permanent residential address at the time of enrolment into the secondary school. 3.5 Other schools/establishments in our authority Having a single entry criteria for secondary schools within the city would benefit school communities by removing any ambiguity over which secondary school a child has an entitlement to attend. Any future proposed changes to the catchment areas of secondary school(s) within the city would be more straightforward to undertake, given that the key entry criteria for all secondary schools is the same. In addition, the implications of any future changes to catchment areas within the primary school sector would be better understood. 3.6 Our assessment of any other likely effects of the proposal (if implemented) As is the case in any consultation of this scale, there may be those who perceive their situation to be affected positively, and those who perceive the changes as negatively affecting their situation. For example, a child who attends a primary school through a placing request and wants to transfer to the associated secondary school (where it is one of the current non-delineated secondary schools) would need to use a placing request to transfer to the secondary school if the proposal goes ahead and the secondary catchment becomes delineated. As the majority of children attend their primary catchment school and transition to their secondary catchment school then the overwhelming majority of families within the city would be neither advantaged nor disadvantaged. 3.7 How we would intend to minimise or avoid any adverse affects that may arise from the proposal (if implemented) The catchment areas for the secondary schools would, in almost all cases, be the sum total of the geographical catchment areas of their current “associated” or “feeder” primary schools. These maps are still being finalised as they require detailed assessment. There may be some minor changes, but this will be made clear in the final consultation document.