The government has expressed alarm at “deeply distressing” allegations of emotional harm at one of the country’s leading academy trusts after an Observer investigation.
Almost 140 parents, students and teachers have now spoken out about “systemic” and “lasting” emotional harm to children stretching back two decades at two schools in Hackney run by the Mossbourne Federation.
In response to the Observer story a fortnight ago into the treatment of children at Mossbourne Victoria Park academy (MVPA) in Hackney – based on testimonials from 30 parents – a further 70 parents, more than 30 former students and eight former teachers have now come forward with new evidence.
The testimonials centre on MVPA and the acclaimed Mossbourne community academy (MCA), also in Hackney, originally run by Sir Michael Wilshaw, the former chief inspector of schools for England who led Ofsted from 2012 to 2016. Both academies have been rated outstanding by Ofsted and are known for high examination grades and rigid discipline.
Me, realist that I am, might suggest – ever so gently – that the operative word here is “academy”. A school largely independent from the local authority. Whihc, under a Labour government, is one of those freedoms from the bureaucracy that cannot be allowed to stand.
We’ll see, obviously, but that’s a useful starting point.
“high examination grades and rigid discipline.”
All you need to know really. This cannot be allowed in our socialist Utopia. This is why the Observer uncovered it.
Is this like Olympic hopeful athletes being “bullied” into trying to win medals?
Shouldn’t everyone get a gong just for trying?
Sounds like a standard army drill. Parents probably chose the school on the promise of military discipline.
Anyway, here’s an article from 10 years ago where kids complain about the indignity of having to remove their outdoor coats when inside. My heart bleeds for them.
https://www.hackneycitizen.co.uk/2014/03/17/mossbourne-community-academy-ridiculous-dispersal-rule/
So who is complaining? The students? The parents? If they are not, who cares?
Why is the Michaela School so successful and why isn’t the model replicated elsewhere in the state sector?
I would ask how the Michaela School has survived for so long. This certainly won’t be the last attempt to bring it into line:-
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-68731366
How many kids have been through these schools in 2 decades? Got to be approaching 10,000. And they’ve managed to find 30 kids who didn’t get on well there. A 0.3% complaint rate.
Now lets compare that to the NHS……………
I occasionally go to the ASI site. A rare blog post there that isn’t by Tim of this parish but by Rajiv Shah. In it he discusses JS Mill’s harm principle. Classical Liberalism. And a metaphorical light bulb lit. That’s why all the resrictive mean practices of the left are justified by ‘harm’. If you can discover harm you can get anything you don’y like stopped ot anything someone else doesn’t like forced upon them. That is why I am adding harm to my list of trigger words. And incidentally, OT for this post, ‘plan’ too.
Online harm
Mental health harm.
Harmful offensiveness.
Harmful content.
However, it may be a two-edged weapon we can use against them…
allegations of emotional harm
Such as making them obey school rules and not letting them watch TikTok during lessons?
I’m going to say that if you can write 4 paragraphs lamenting the ‘harms’ caused yet not once in those 4 paragraphs actually layout even one example of the harms . . . what is being whined about probably wasn’t actually harmful and you’re just trying to wind people up, to prime them to be outraged when you reveal that someone was slightly mean or strict about something.
If I compare what I had to take at a bog-standard if slightly hippie “Highschool” in my Youf , because I was a bloke and was supposed to simply be able to handle some ribbing when in my pubescent Righteous Anger and ..well.. was not exactly a Pillar of Society, with what modern kids are supposed to get Major Mental Trauma from…
Yet those kids were pushed out from my generation.. and nowadays one-up, but not that far distant…
What. The. Hell. Went. Wrong…….
And no… I don’t even have Fond Memories about my highschool days. They were torture.. with just a couple of slightly shiny bits… The thorough “everybody must be Average and must also be a Special Talent but don’t you dare be better than everyone else” of the 80’s made sure of that..
It’s a solid part of the GenX cynicism..
Andrew M: it’s hard to hide the machetes in indoor clothes.
“high examination grades and rigid discipline.”
I suspect that expectation – and its application – pretty much is the “emotional harm”
It’s the start of a campaign, the aim of which is to bring all these schools under the aegis of the LEA (read, the teachers’ unions).
Then there’ll be no more of this nonsense about being the fifth best in the world at science and maths!
Like everything else this ghastly shower do, it’s a class warfare thing.