Walthamstow Guardian; New Schools Setup July 1st 1966

July 1st 1966
Change Over Next Year?
A DETAILED plan for the soon-as-possible introduction of comprehensive secondary schooling in Waltham Forest will be submitted for Government approval from the monthly council meeting to-night (Friday).
One of the shock features of the scheme is the scheduled closure, in July, 1967, of another Waltham Forest School, Goodall Secondary. The buildings in Goodall Road, Leyton, will be offered to the Roman Catholic authorities for possible conversion to a Church school.
Two Walthamstow schools, George Gascoigne and Mark House, are closing later this month.
Under the comprehensive plan already approved by the borough Education Committee there will be 17 junior secondary schools feeding nine senior secondary schools. All children will transfer at the age of 14.
The borough's eight grammar and technical schools - Sir George Monoux, Walthamstow High, Leyton Boys High, Leyton Girls High, Chingford High, McEntee Technical, William Morris Technical and Tom Hood Technical, will become the senior secondary schools.
The ninth senior secondary school will be Sidney Burnell School in Highams Park, linking up with a new junior secondary school being created at Heathcote School, Chingford.
Introduction of the comprehensive system in Waltham Forest could take place in September, 1967. But this will be possible only if the Government gives its blessings to the early stages of a £900,000 school improvement building programme planned for the next five years. .
Delay, unless
"Unless the Department of Education and Science can assure us of satisfactory building programmes for the next two financial years, it will be necessary to postpone the first year of the change to September, 1968," the Council will tell the Government, in its detailed plan.
Lion's share of the planned improvements will be in the senior secondary schools, most of which must be enlarged to cope with increased numbers and to provide advanced teaching facilities for a school roll composed entirely of fourth, fifth and sixth- formers. "Until we can be sure that there will be suitable and adequate accommodation in the senior secondary schools for the 14-plus age group, on the conclusion of their junior secondary course, we cannot put into force the transfer without selection from the primary schools to the junior secondary schools" says the Council statement.
An assurance previously given by the Education Committee has been restated this week. All children who have begun a grammar or technical school course before the new system is introduced will be permitted to complete the course.
This means that only in their early years the new secondary schools will be two schools in one catering for a slowly diminishing number of selective scholars who will be "relics" of the old system plus a yearly intake of 14-plus children of all abilities.
Goodall School Leyton, is due to close at the end of next school year. No 11-year-old children will be admitted this September. Headmaster Mr John Binner is being offered a transfer to George Mitchell School Leyton to succeed Mr Frank Bassett, who is retiring soon.

Assurance to teachers

The Headmasters of Heathcote School Chingford, Mt Ronald Woods and of Sidney Burnell School, Highams Park, Mr H.G. Paul are also being warned that they may be asked to take new posts when the reorganisation begins.
Teachers receive this assurance from their employers, the Council: "We are fully alive to the importance of the safeguarding of salaries, under the reorganisation, and we will implement fully any agreement that may be reached by the Burnham machinery.
The Council statement to the government stresses that 1967 would be a desirable time to introduce the changeover. But this is not possible until the necessary work on the new senior secondary schools, they will bear the full cost of raising the school leaving age to 16, has been authorised.
2We regard the two tier system now proposed as a sound long-term solution and as having advantages over a system of "all through" comprehensive schools with their long age range and large numbers," says the Council statement.
The statement admits that the Council attaches great importance to linking particular junior secondary schools to specified senior secondary schools, one will feed the other. But parents are assured that they will be given a chance to state a preference as to which schools their children attend. Wishes will be honoured, if places are available.
The Council will encourage regular meetings of head teachers and subject teachers within each linked group, in the borough as a whole.

Eight Groups
Waltham Forest's secondary schools will be divided into eight groups under the scheme suggested to the Government. Here are the groupings:

Walthamstow
Junior Secondary Schools
Warwick Boys (450 pupils), Warwick Girls (450), Chapel End (450),
feeding Secondary Senior Schools,
Sir George Monoux (600) and Walthamstow Girls High (600)
Junior Schools,
Beaconsfield (450), and William McGuffie (300)
Feeding Senior School William Morris Technical (540)
Junior Schools,
Willowfield (450) and Sidney Chaplin (450)
Feeding Senior School McEntee

Leyton
Junior Schools
Lake House (450), and Ruckholt (450)
Feeding Senior School
Tom Hood Technical (600)
Junior Schools
Connaught Girls (450) and Leyton Manor Girls (450)
Feeding Senior School Leyton Girls High (600)
Junior Schools
George Mitchell Boys (450) and Norlington Boys (450)
Feeding Senior School
Leyton Boys High (600)

Highams Park Chingford
Junior School
Heathcote (720)
Feeding Senior School
Sidney Burnell (480)

Chingford
Junior Schools
Chingford Boys (450) and Chingford Girls (450)
Feeding Senior School
Chingford High (600)

Building Plans
Extensions to most of the new senior secondary schools will form the basis of future building programmes submitted by Waltham Forest Council for Government approval.
But there are more ambitious proposals for William Morris tech where the old group of buildings need to be replaced by a new purpose built senior high school.
Another long term plan is to replace Beaconsfield and William McGuffie schools in Walthamstow with a single purpose built junior secondary school.
Abandonment of the scheme to build an all-age comprehensive school in Verulam Avenue Walthamstow, has left the Council with £240,000 in the education building "kitty."
This money is being spent on immediate improvements to Tom Hood Technical, Leyton; Sir George Monoux Grammar, William Morris Technical and Warwick Boys Walthamstow.
These are the projects due for submission in years to come as part of the reorganisation scheme and the raising of the leaving age to 16.
1967-68 - Additions and improvements to Leyton Boys High (£80,000) and Chingford High (£80,000).
1968-69 - Additions and improvements to Walthamstow Girls High (£100,000) and Leyton Girls High (£80,000).
1969-70 - Stage two improvements to Sir George Monoux Grammar (£60,000) Tom Hood Technical (£60,000), and Chingford High (£70,000).
1970-71 - Stage two improvements to Leyton Boys High (£60,000), and Leyton Girls High (£60,000).

Comp-Ed scheme goes to whitehall July 1966 Guardian

Only minor rumblings from the opposition benches threatened the smooth passage through Waltham Forest Council on Friday of the two-tier comprehensive secondary education system planned for the borongh.
There was an eleventh hour "Save the Grmmar School" cry from a lonely Conservative member Cllr. Harry Fulton and Ratepayers members sniped at some aspects of the scheme - notably the delaying effect from a shortage of Government cash needed to finance essential school improvements.
Finally the scheme, received Council approval by an overwhelming majority and now passes to Mr. Anthony Crosland, Secretary of State for Education and Science, for a final decision.
The Council's action sounded the death-knell of Goodhall Secondary School Leyton, due to close in September, 1967, because its antiquated premises have no place in the new scheme of things.
Under the comp-ed. Plan Waltham Forest is split into eight groups, each one embracing junior secondary schools and senior secondary schools.
All children will spend three years in a neighbourhood junior secondary school, transferring at the age of 14 to a secondary school - where they may remain until ready to sit their G.C.E. A level exams.
The scheme could be introduced next year. But the change-over is more likely to come in 1968; a 12-month delay expected to result from the non-availability of money needed to raise the accommodation standards of the senior secondary schools.

A MERE FACADE
Opening his attack on the new system at Friday's meeting Cllr. Fulton came immediately to the point. "We are doing the wrong thing in disposing of the grammar schools."
The Socialists had made up their minds about the system to be introduced six months' ago, and period of public opinion testing by the Education Committee had been a mere facade, claimed Cllr. Fulton.
No good schools should be lost in "a wilderness of comprehension" and the provision should have been made in the new system for the peaceful coexistence of comprehensive and grammar schools.
Many Council members' own children had benefited from the advantages of grammar school education and it was deplorable that these opportunities were to be denied future generations in the town.
With the demise of the grammar school would also go the present quality of attainment in the borough, claimed Cllr. Fulton
The standardisation of education would also result in a decline of interest among children Cllr, Fulton believed. And this would result in more and more children leaving school as soon as they were able to do so.
Calling for a delay in the new system, Cllr. Fulton suggested: "Try out a fully comprehensive scheme when time and money is available." As an alternative he favoured the retention of the present selective system.
"A FALSEHOOD"
Voice of the Ratepayers Association Cllr. H.J. Berry Suggested that the scheme was far too optimistic and took account of too many imponderables - the proposed school leaving age being raised on a given date, the availability of money needed for school improvements, the continuing shortage of teachers, retention of parents' choice in their children's education.
The scheme has been devised to fit the school buildings we have - so we have a built-in weakness from the start<" said Cllr. Berry. "Other weaknesses will show up as the system goes on.
Cllr. Berry also expressed misgivings about the part to be played within the comprehensive framework by church schools.
Anxious to preserve the parental choice of schools for their children, Cllr. Berry mentioned the problems that could result from an inordinately large number of schools being removed.
The suggestion that Grammar schools were being thrown onto the scrap-heap was a falsehood, declared Cllr. Foxton. The tradition of the best schools would be maintained in their new forms by the continuing enthusiasm of the teachers and children matched by that of the local authority.
The suggestion that more children would leave at as early an age as possible was also refuted by Cllr. Foxton. "The system which we are putting forward will encourage children to stay on beyond the age of 16" he said.
Under the present selective system, secondary modern school education ended abruptly at 16, he pointed out. But in the new comprehensive schools children would be encouraged to stay on beyond 16 by the example of others.
On parents' choice, Cllr. Foxton had this to say: "This will be no more limited in the future than it has been in the past."

SCHEME WILL WORK
Closing the discussions, Education Committee chairman Cllr. Mrs: Winrfrid M. Palethorpe said she and her Committee were certain the new scheme was going to work.
On the question of possible staff shortages, the chairman posed a new question. "Why shouldn't a borough with the fine reputation which we have been for looking after our staff be able to attract the right teachers?"
On the possibilities of delay, Cllr. Mrs Palethorpe conjectured: "If we are going to wait, the time will never be right and the money will never be there. This scheme must go through new for the sake of our children."