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Submission 2

Preliminary Findings on Wantage and Grove

Secondary Education

1. Independent Survey

1.1 Initial Preferred Option

From the independent survey of initial preferred options:

Table 1.1: Preferred Options - Initial

OPTION

TOTAL

(891 people)

Parents & Non-Parents

(605 people)

A

47%

49%

B

21%

20%

C

18%

20%

No preference

8%

6%

Don't know

5%

5%

Samples: Parents(144), Non-Parents(461), Business(189), Children(97)

Note 1: Cabinet paper (page 2) only uses the Parent & Non-Parent sample, quoting A=49% (294), B=20% (120), C=20% (120), but this makes no difference to the conclusion.

Note 2: The Executive Summary in the survey (section 1.3) clearly states “Preference was consistently expressed for a two schools option, specifically two schools of the same size”.

Comments:

  1. Option A is the clear favourite.

  2. Option B appears to be preferred marginally more than C (in the Total sample).

1.2 After Sixth Form Implications

From the independent survey, after sixth form implications have been taken into consideration:

Table 1.2: Preferred Options - After Sixth Form Implications

OPTION

TOTAL

(891 people)

Parents & Non-Parents

(605 people)

A

32%

33%

B

30%

27%

C

21%

21%

No preference

11%

12%

Don't know

6%

6%

Samples: Parents(144), Non-Parents(461), Business(189), Children(97)

Note 1: Cabinet paper (page 2) says “Option A was still the most popular option but there was a slight swing towards Option B”.

Note 2: The Executive Summary in the survey (section 1.3) clearly states “Among parents and non-parents, two separate schools of the same size was still the preferred option”.

Comments:

  1. Results change significantly when the sixth form is taken into account.

  2. It clearly matters how the sixth form implications are defined and presented.

  3. Options A (32%) and B (30%) become much closer in the presented sixth form scenario.

  4. Option C (21%) gets the least support in the presented sixth form scenario.

Concern:

The wording of the sixth form implications in Section 4 of the questionnaire is clearly contentious. For example, under Option A on page 30, it states “Sixth Form Implication - both schools would have a Sixth Form, and both Sixth Forms would be smaller and have fewer pupils than the one which currently exists at King Alfred's. The number of pupils in the Sixth Form will have an impact on the curriculum available at each school”. This makes the explicit assumption that the two schools would not have a joint sixth form or collaborating sixth forms, which are obvious (and some would say preferred) solutions. It is therefore not clear what value can be put on the figures in Table 1.2 when such narrow sixth form and curriculum scenarios have been presented.

It is regrettable that the sixth form solutions presented were so narrow and not more flexible and inclusive of collaboration and partnership, seen as central to achieving the future 14-19 agenda.

1.3 Option Preferred Least

From the independent survey, the least preferred option (but apparently BEFORE the 6th form question was posed):

Table 1.3: Option Preferred Least

OPTION

Parents & Non-Parents

(605 people)

A

9%

B

51%

C

16%

No preference

16%

Don't know

7%

Samples: Parents(144), Non-Parents(461)

Note 1: Cabinet paper (page 2) says “The least preferred option - 306 (51%) of respondents indicated that Option B was the least preferred”.

Note 2: The Executive Summary in the survey (section 1.3) states “One large school was the least preferred option amongst 51% of parents and non-parents, 9% elected two separate schools of the same size as their least preferred option, and 16% elected two separate schools of different sizes as their least preferred option”.

Comments:

  1. This question was only addressed to parents and non-parents.

  2. Option A was again the favoured option.

  3. The figures quoted in the cabinet paper on page 2 apparently relate to Q12 on the questionnaire, which was asked BEFORE the sixth form implications were considered (see section 4.1 of the survey).

Question:

  1. What are the relevant figures for Q14, which are AFTER the sixth form implications were considered (they do not appear in section 4.2 of the survey)?

2. Oxfordshire County Council Consultation

From the second public consultation conducted by the County Council:

Table 2: OCC Consultation

OPTION

Including Photocopy Responses

(215 people)

Excluding Photocopy

Responses (145 people)

A

58 (27%)

45 (31%)

B

110 (51%)

62 (43%)

C

43 (20%)

32 (22%)

No preference

4 (2%)

6 (4%)

Note: Cabinet paper (page 2) says “The consultation response is less clear, favouring Option B, but also the response rate is very low”.

Comments:

  1. The issue surely is more to do with potential biases rather than sample size. If this were a genuine poll, the margin of error would probably be approximately 7%-8%.

  2. It is stated that the consultation was carried out with Governors and staff of schools, parents of pupils at primary schools, the Diocese of Oxford and Portsmouth, MP, County Council elected members, local district, city, town and parish councils. It is not at all clear how these results can be compared with the independent survey, which used weighted sample bases of parents, non-parents, business and children.

  3. There is little, if any, mention of sixth form implications in the consultation making it impossible to compare with the crucial survey results that included this information.

  4. The issue of “photocopy responses” clearly has an effect (and hence a bias).

  5. In view of the above, it is unfortunately not clear what weight can be placed on the OCC consultation and therefore why it was included in the cabinet report.

3. Conclusions

It is unclear why the most popular Option A from the independent survey of the Wantage and Grove communities (900 data subjects) has not been selected.

The lack of consideration given to the sixth form implications (which have a clear effect on the survey results) in the Cabinet report needs to be addressed. It is particularly regrettable that the sixth form solutions presented in the survey questionnaire were so narrow and not more flexible and inclusive of collaboration and partnership, seen as central to achieving the future 14-19 agenda.

The figures for the “option least preferred” need to be presented for the post sixth form implications - these were not apparent in the Cabinet paper (ITEM CA11), nor in the survey report.

It is regrettable that the second OCC public consultation was not better controlled and analysed, to ensure more useful feedback and to enable it to be compared with the independent survey. The weight given by the cabinet to this data needs to be established. If it has no standing, it should not have been submitted to Cabinet as evidence. Indeed, the validity of the second public consultation needs to be ascertained to determine whether there can be any public confidence in these results.

There needs to be a clear compilation of all of the statistical evidence. In the interests of full transparency in the consultation process, the results of the independent survey and consultation should be made publicly available via the County Council website.

If there are overriding educational reasons for a different selection to the independent survey, these should be part of an open and transparent decision-making process which is fully documented and minuted. These educational reasons were not made available at the Cabinet meeting of 20 June.

Finally, if it transpires that choosing Option C is really a route towards Option A, then the recommendation should be varied to make this completely explicit. This would mean that rather than choosing a 600 place 11-16 school with no sixth form (as stated in all the survey literature) another solution has been selected instead. This needs to be made clear to all parties at the earliest opportunity.

6 July 2007

Other related submissions:

Submission 1: Call-in of Decision on Provision of Secondary Pupil Places in Wantage, Grove and Surrounding Villages

Submission 3: Oxfordshire Secondary Schools and Sixth Form Provision.

Footnote: All percentages from the independent survey are rounded because of unavailability of the raw data. Figures are based on the quoted percentages and sample sizes in the BMG report.

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