School Admissions and Accountability: Planning, Choice or Chance?

221 Pages·2013·0.606 MB·English

by  Mike Feintuck, Roz Stevens

school admissions
and accountability
planning, choice or chance?
Mike Feintuck and
Roz StevenS
School admiSSionS and
accountability
Planning, choice or chance?
Mike Feintuck and Roz Stevens
First published in Great Britain in 2013 by
The Policy Press
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ISBN 978 1 44730 622 1 paperback
ISBN 978 1 44730 623 8 hardcover
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contents
List of statutes iv
List of cases v
List of abbreviations vi
Notes on authors viii
Acknowledgements ix
Preface x
one The admissions question 1
two The changing policy context 21
three The rise and fall of the planning model 53
four Admissions in a quasi-market system: policy developments 73
1988 to 2012
five The realities of choice and accountability in the 105
quasi-market
six Admissions by lottery 137
seven Conclusions 173
References 187
Index 199
iii
School admissions and accountability
list of statutes
Academies Act 2010
Disability Discrimination Act 2005
Education Act 1944
Education Act 1976
Education Act 1980
Education Act 1981
Education Act 1991
Education Act 1993
Education Act 1996
Education Act 2002
Education Act 2011
Education and Inspections Act 2006
Education Reform Act 1988
Equality Act 2006
Equality Act 2010
Human Rights Act 1998
Local Government, Planning and Land (No 2) Act 1980
Race Relations Act 1976
School Standards and Framework Act 1998
Sex Discrimination Act 1975
Teachers’ Pay and Conditions Act 1987
iv
list of cases
Associated Provincial Picture Houses v Wednesbury Corporation [1948] 1
KB 223
Bromley LBC v Greater London Council [1983] AC 768
Brown v Board of Education, 347 US 483 (1954)
Choudhury v Governors of Bishop Challoner Roman Catholic Comprehensive
School [1992] 3 All ER 277
Council of Civil Service Unions v Minister for the Civil Service [1985] AC
374 (‘GCHQ’)
Cumings v Birkenhead Corporation [1972] Ch 12 (‘Cumings’)
R v Bromley LBC ex p C and others [1992] 1 FLR 174
R v Cleveland County Council ex p Commission for Racial Equality [1994]
ELR 44, CA
R v Commissioner for Local Administration, ex p Croydon LBC [1989] 1
All ER 1033
R v Greenwich LBC Shadow Education Committee ex p John Ball Primary
School (1989) LGR 589 (‘Greenwich’)
R v Lancashire County Council, ex p West, 27 July 1994
R (on the application of Ahmad) v Waltham Forest LBC [2007] EWHC 957
R (on the application of Governing Body of Drayton Manor High School) v
Schools Adjudicator [2008] EWHC 3119 (‘Drayton Manor’)
R (on the application of Omotosho) v Harris Academy, Crystal Palace [2011]
All ER (D) 161
R v Richmond upon Thames LBC and Education Appeal Committee, ex p
JC [2001] ELR 21
R v Rotherham MBC, ex p LT [2000] ELR 76
R v Sheffield City Council, ex p H [1999] ELR 511 (‘Sheffield’)
Secretary of State for Education and Science v Tameside MBC [1977] AC
1014 (‘Tameside’)
Watt v Kesteven [1955] 1 QB 408 (‘Watt’)
Wood v Ealing LBC [1967] Ch 364
v
School admissions and accountability
list of abbreviations
AA10 2010 Academies Act
AJTC Administrative Justice and Tribunals Council
APS Assisted Places Scheme
CLA Commissioner for Local Administration
CTC City Technology College
DDA 2005 Disability Discrimination Act
DCSF Department for Children, Schools and Families
DES Department of Education and Science
DfE Department for Education
DfEE Department for Education and Employment
DfES Department for Education and Skills
ECHR European Convention on Human Rights
EA44 1944 Education Act
EA80 1980 Education Act
EA93 1993 Education Act
EA02 2002 Education Act
EA11 2011 Education Act
EIA06 2006 Education and Inspections Act
ERA 1988 Education Reform Act
GCHQ Government Communications Headquarters
GLC Greater London Council
GM Grant Maintained (schools)
HOC House of Commons
HOL House of Lords
HRA 1998 Human Rights Act
ILEA Inner London Education Authority
IPPR Institute for Public Policy Research
LA Local Authority
LEA Local Education Authority
LMS Local Management of Schools
NAO National Audit Office
NFER National Foundation for Educational Research
NUT National Union of Teachers
NASUWT National Association of Schoolmasters/Union of Women
Teachers
OE Open Enrolment
OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
Ofsted Office for Standards in Education
OSA Office of the Schools Adjudicator
vi
List of abbreviations
RRA 1976 Race Relations Act
SATs Standard Assessment Tests
SDA 1975 Sex Discrimination Act
SEN Special educational needs
SMF Social Market Foundation
SSFA 1998 School Standards and Framework Act
TES Times Educational Supplement
TUC Trades Union Congress
vii
School admissions and accountability
notes on authors
Mike Feintuck is Professor of Law at the University of Hull. He was
the author of the well-received Accountability and Choice in Schooling
(Open University Press, 1994), in which he explored, from a socio-
legal perspective, issues arising out of the introduction of Grant
Maintained schools; some of the same themes are returned to in the
present work. He has since written extensively, primarily on issues
relating to regulatory theory and practice. Other publications include
The public interest in regulation (Oxford University Press, 2004) and
Media regulation, public interest and the law (2nd edn, with Mike Varney,
Edinburgh University Press 2006). He has taught a wide range of
undergraduate law subjects, including, as an accredited mediator,
mediation and alternative dispute resolution.
Roz Stevens, after spending a substantial portion of her career working
in the field of leadership and management development in a variety of
sectors including IT, investment banking and the media, developed an
interest in education policy during a period of employment with the
Centre for Educational Leadership at the University of Manchester.
Here she worked closely with school leaders during a period of intense
policy change between 2006 and 2008. She pursued this interest
further by completing a PhD on New Labour’s Academies policy and
its relationship with democratic values and constitutional practice, at
the University of Hull from 2008 to 2011.
viii
acknowledgements
We are both very happy to have the opportunity to thank our friend
and colleague Professor Mike Bottery, of the Faculty of Education at
the University of Hull, who was instrumental in bringing us together
for this project, and during discussions with whom the early gestation
of this project took place. In addition, we thank all those who attended
and contributed to seminars which Mike Feintuck gave at the Institute
for Learning at the University of Hull, and at the Law School of the
University of Manchester. Roz Stevens would like to thank Vernon
Coaker, MP, Fiona Millar and David Wolfe QC for granting permission
for some extracts to be quoted from research interviews conducted in
2010/11, originally undertaken for other purposes but which proved
highly relevant to the subject matter of this book.
We would both like to thank the staff at The Policy Press for their
consistently professional approach to all stages of the publication of
this book and also those academic readers who kindly reviewed the
initial proposal and the final draft, and offered insightful suggestions
for improvement and focus. Above all, we owe enormous debts of
gratitude to our spouses, Lisa and Paul, who offered continuous support
on which we relied.
ix