TOUGH LOVE RULES, OK!
No mobiles. No junk food. Pupils dragged from their beds if they don’t turn up. The inner city one-time sink school that’s just sent a boy to Eton thanks to its inspirational head
HE is self- possessed, articulate, modest and fiercely intelligent; the sort of teenager who sets a gold standard in academic achievement and application.
This summer he is expected to pass ten GCSEs with top grades, after which he will begin his sixth form studies at Eton College, arguably the most famous school in Britain. Princes William and Harry are among its alumni; it has educated 19 of our country’s Prime Ministers.
You may imagine that Kaashif Kamaly — whose effortless charm hints at the confidence privilege confers — has been raised in comfortable affluence.
The truth is both more surprising and uplifting. Kaashif, 15, is the middle child of a second generation Bangladeshi family who lives in Newham, East London, one of Britain’s poorest boroughs.
He attends Forest Gate Community School, which serves a community beleaguered by deprivation, gang violence and crime.
This non- selective school, which just six years ago languished at the bottom of national league tables with two-thirds of its pupils classed as disadvantaged, is now among the 14 top performing in Britain thanks to the ‘exemplary’ leadership of Simon Elliott, its head since 2011.
The pursuit of excellence is achieved through rigour, hard work and discipline. Traditional methods are deployed, much like those of schools in the Fifties and Sixties. Times tables must be learned; there are spelling tests and even rote learning. Homework is compulsory.
And although Kaashif, whose two-year tenure at Eton will be funded by a £76,000 scholarship, is one of its brightest talents, he is not its only stellar achiever. This year, five pupils from Forest Gate will take up scholarships at leading public schools. No wonder it is viewed by many as one of the most inspirational schools in Britain.
‘The first time I saw Eton it was overwhelming,’ says Kaashif, who went for a residential visit which involved three exams and six interviews. ‘I felt a combination of emotions: real anxiety but so much excitement. Even now I still can’t quite believe I’m going. When I heard I’d got a scholarship, I took a deep breath and thought, “Is this really happening?”
‘I have this extraordinary opportunity and I’ll grab it with both hands, but I still have to deliver. I still have to get 10 A*s.
‘And I’ll never forget how my family struggled to provide the life I have now. I won’t forget where I’ve come from. My community, my background, is disadvantaged but my Dad, my hero, has worked so hard to make life better for his family.
‘Both my parents raised me to be strong, determined and independent, and I’m constantly being challenged by my school, so although I know I live in an area with lots of social problems, gangs, crime and poverty, I don’t feel disadvantaged.
‘I know, too, it’s up to me to decide what I do with my life and that I have to put the work in to succeed. Dad has instilled that work ethic in me. He’s shown me you have to work, to pay your way.’
Kaashif’s mother, Shewly Begum, 43, is a patient advocate with the NHS. She was born in Bangladesh and came to Britain as a child before marrying his father Shahrabu Miah, 45, who works as an immigration officer at Heathrow Airport.
‘I’ve always told Kaashif, I’ll do my bit and the teachers will do theirs. They push him to the limit,’ says his Mum, explaining her total faith in the school to get the best out of her son. ‘ He knows we have high expectations and he has to work hard. He’s very motivated.
‘When we were told he’d got into Eton we were overwhelmed. The first time I stood on the ground there I thought, “This is where the Royal Family have stood. They’ve been to this school.” ’ KAASHIF’S
parents fully support the traditional approach to learning at the school. Mr Miah recalls the lax regime that Mr Elliott inherited.
‘I remember seeing one girl come into school with headphones on, chewing gum and drinking from a can. It was, “Can in the bin. Chewing gum out” — and the headphones were confiscated.
‘ Pupils should know how to behave. They’re not coming to a party. I thought, “That’s exactly the sort of discipline the school needs.”
‘Kaashif knows, too, that nothing will come if you don’t put the effort in. We’re proud of him. Any parent would be. And respect is owed to the teachers here. We hold them in the highest esteem.’
For Mr Elliott, this parental endorsement is crucial. ‘In schools where I’ve worked in the past, dealing with difficult parents has been soul- destroying, but the parents here are really supportive and want their children to do well,’ he says. This is reflected in attendance at parents’ evenings, which is routinely 93 per cent. Elsewhere in the UK, it can be as low as 50 per cent.
‘There are very few parents who don’t share our values, and if necessary our family support worker will go round to the house and get their children out of bed in the morning,’ says Mr Elliott.
There is, it seems, a correlation between the school’s ethnic diversity — only five per cent of pupils are white British — and its pupils’ commitment to self-betterment.
‘The pupils here, the majority from immigrant families, know when they go into the workforce they haven’t got connections or social influence, so there is a real desire to achieve,’ says Mr Elliott.
‘We tap into this latent aspiration. We set the bar high and challenge them. I’m constantly asking, “What can we do better?”
‘I take the view that children need both guidance and pushing to meet demanding targets.’ To
THIS end there are Saturday morning lessons, half term teaching sessions and every pupil in their GCSE year must stay for an extra hour’s exam preparation after school every day.
‘I tell the parents, “Your child will stay after school for their own good.” It’s obligatory. Everyone in Year 11 has to attend,’ says Mr Elliott.
‘They have to sit there and do an exam and they get feedback. We tell them what they have to do to get the highest grades.
‘To begin with, they resisted. They were running out of school and we’d be physically turning them round at the gate and marching them back in. It took a lot of work. Now they line up to attend the extra classes.’
Two-thirds of Forest Gate’s 1,070 pupils are among the most deprived in the country yet the fact that they have outperformed privileged children nationally has been attributed to their inspirational head.
Sir Michael Wilshaw, former head of ofsted, singled out Mr Elliott’s ‘exemplary leadership’ and a ‘transformed’ Forest Gate in a report.
The son of a coalman and nurse from Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria, Simon Elliott, 49, attended a ‘rough’ comprehensive and was the first in his family to go to university. Likeable, bluff and tall, he believes no ambition is too elevated for his pupils; no challenge too exacting.
When he took over at Forest Gate, just 47 per cent of its pupils attained five A-C grades at GCSE, and ofsted noted it ‘ required improvement’. Within 18 months it was ranked ‘outstanding’. Today 74 per cent of its students attain five A-C GCSEs.
Today one of the new benchmarks of a school’s success is the level of progress its pupils make. Forest Gate students improve so significantly that the school ranks in the top one per cent for this marker.
That a significant minority arrive at the school speaking no English appears to be no barrier to its soaring success. Recent immigrants are given intensive coaching until they are fluent. And thanks to rigor-
ous monitoring, under-achievers — staff carry lists bearing their names and photos — are swiftly identified and taught in small groups until they catch up.
All this requires commitment and dedication from teachers who routinely work 12-hour days for no extra pay. Pastoral work is also integral and home visits pinpoint pupils in most acute need.
However, the poverty and overcrowded conditions endemic in Newham are not seen as excuses for failure, but reasons to succeed. Assistant head Omar Deria, a father of five whose wife is also a teacher, runs Forest Gate’s scholarship programme. He notes that one of school’s most gifted families endured the worst privations.
‘There were eight siblings living with their parents, second generation immigrants from India, neither of whom spoke much English, in a two-bedroom flat.
‘All the children were very bright. One, now in his first year at St Andrews University, also attended by Prince William, won a scholarship to Winchester.
‘With kids like that you’re just a facilitator. You point them in the right direction and they’ll go off and explore. Our pupils are ambitious. All of them can achieve and we provide them with the scaffolding of pastoral support. Where there’s genuine hardship we supply uniforms; if they’re hungry we give them healthy food.’
In its constant pursuit of the small, incremental changes that raise standards, the school puts high emphasis on pupils’ nutrition. It opens at 7.30 am and a breakfast club provides a free, sustaining meal for all pupils. When Mr Elliott arrived, the local authority caterers, supplying what he disparagingly refers to as ‘brown food’, were ousted in favour of private contractors. On the day I visit, tasty lentil burgers are served with a green leaf and tomato salad and rice; or there is shepherd’s pie and mixed vegetables.
Twice a term, in a random ‘snack attack’, school bags are raided by teachers and sugary drinks and unhealthy snacks confiscated. ‘The kids go mad but we have very few parental complaints,’ says Mr Elliott, who has no children of his own but helped to raise those of a former partner.
‘Beyond the school gates we have a chicken shop patrol, too, to stop pupils buying junk at fast food outlets. One of the worst has a no star hygiene rating. Imagine!’ He rolls his eyes. ‘You’d get one star just for washing your hands.’
This passionate concern for every aspect of pupils’ wellbeing filters into all facets of school life. Courtesy and good manners are expected and rewarded with merits. Uniform infringements, running, dropping litter, shouting or using inappropriate language are all punished by detentions.
Mobile phones seen in school are taken off pupils and only returned when parents collect them.
ADISCIPlINED atmosphere of quiet industry prevails. In classrooms, pupils do not speak unless they are asked to.
In Salim Foughali’s Year 11 class the murmured conversation is in French: students are memorising prepared essays in hushed voices. One pupil is speaking to Mr Foughali in fluent Spanish.
Her skills are so advanced that she is having extra coaching in a second foreign language.
Difficult English texts are not avoided: Shakespeare has been reintroduced into a curriculum that once accepted failure as inevitable. Sham Uddin, head of English, recalls: ‘When I took over, standards were on the floor. Children spent lessons watching videos. Now we’re exporting the model we have here to other schools.’
Ms Uddin’s energy and commitment belie the fact she has terminal cancer. ‘But I want to do something worthwhile with the time I have left, so I’m still teaching,’ she says. ‘ This school gives me a purpose.’ It is impossible not to be
moved by the ethos of dedication and hard work that pervades the school. It touches everyone. Refreshingly, diligence is allied to care.
Pupil Moosa Ali, 16, has just won a scholarship to Westminster public school. He is ‘off the scale bright’ says Mr Elliott. He is also modest and likeable. The son of a sales assistant, he joined the school’s accelerated learning scheme and passed his first GCSE, in maths, with an A* aged 12.
A year later he attained a top grade in further maths. The following year he replicated his success in three science subjects and statistics.
I ask him what his ambitions are. ‘I thought about going into the financial industry after university, but I want my life to be about more than money,’ he says. ‘I’d like to do something meaningful that helps future generations, perhaps working for a charity.’ Moosa discloses that he regularly gets up at 5 am to memorise passages from the Koran before beginning schoolwork. The discipline has been helpful with his academic studies, he says.
Meanwhile Rayyan Chagani, 15, whose father works in a shop, came from his native India to London 13 years ago, and will take up a scholarship at the independent Latymer School, Hammersmith, in September. He hopes to become a surgeon and has volunteered for a month at a Mumbai hospital to gain experience. Such initiative is humbling; the scope of his intellect, astonishing. He is already planning a research report into the ethics of surgery.
Rehim Miah, 15, another of Mr Deria’s scholars, will take up a place at Forest School, Snaresbrook, this autumn. ‘There won’t be many people from my background there,’ says Rehim, whose father works in ICT.
‘Most of them will be upper class, but it will be good to be in a different environment, and I know they’ll challenge me as much as this school does.’ Rehim, whose family came to Britain from Bangladesh in the Seventies, is learning Arabic as a hobby.
Muhtasim Choudhury, 16, the son of a taxi driver, will attend the prestigious City of London private school from September on his scholarship.
He has learnt sign language to communicate with several relatives; every year he also organises fundraising events for the deaf.
The cosseted children of our suburbs could learn much from those at Forest Gate about self-improvement, community spirit and sheer graft. Soaring self-belief is central to the school’s philosophy: its pupils believe nothing is beyond their reach.
But head Simon Elliott is not complacent. ‘I’ll do everything I can to continue improving standards,’ he says. ‘Every morning when my alarm goes off at 5 am I think, “What can I do today to make it even better?”
‘It’s like spinning plates. We just have to keep going.’