Schools scandal of ‘hidden exclusions’
Pupils being forced to leave to bolster ratings
THERE’S a quiet scandal taking place in our schools.
Pupils are being forced to leave – simply because they might get poor exam results.
Some are officially excluded. But others are victims of “hidden exclusions”.
For example, a school might tell a parent their son or daughter is at risk of being expelled, and it would be better if they voluntarily took the child out of school before that happens.
That way, the child is gone but is not officially classed as excluded. They may end up being home-schooled, even though parents haven’t really chosen to do this.
It’s a practice known as “offrolling”, because it involves removing a child from the school roll.
Ofsted, the official school inspection service, is worried.
They point out that schools are assessed on the progress pupils make between the end of primary school and the end of secondary school.
The official name for assessment is Progress 8.
Every pupil in Year 11 (which usually means aged 15 or 16), and on the school roll on January 1, is included.
So if a school has a pupil that hasn’t done very well, it might be able to improve its score simply the by ensuring the child has gone before they start year 11. This seems to be what’s happening.
Ofsted’s most recent annual report found that, in England, around 19,000 pupils – one in 25 – did not progress from Year 10 in January 2016 to Year 11 in January 2017.
In the North East around 900 pupils.
Ofsted said in a statement: “This is a huge cause for concern.”
The House of Commons Education Committee held an inquiry where they spoke to many people involved in teaching, such as union officials and headteachers.
And, when they published their findings, they said: “Offrolling – the process by which pupils are removed from the school’s register by moving them to alternative provision, to home education or other schools – was raised by many witnesses.”
A Yougov survey commissioned by Ofsted found one in 10 teachers said off-rolling had happened at their school.
It’s debatable whether schools are entirely to blame, or whether it’s a result of the pressure they are under to get results.
But the victims are children who are robbed of their right to a proper education. it was