Who are we?

We are parents from the The John Roan secondary school which is much loved by us, our children, the staff and the local community. In a recent inspection in March 2018, the school was judged as 'inadequate with serious weaknesses'. We believe this judgement is not right. We want to challenge this judgement by Ofsted of our school. We are crowd funding to be able to issue a legal challenge.

A flawed and biased Ofsted inspection 

Our school was inspected by Ofsted on 20 and 21 March 2018. We know that staff have complained about the conduct of the Lead Inspector and that the inspection was conducted with little regard for the rapid succession of headteachers with three headteachers in 18 months and the instability this caused.  

The Ofsted report doesn't describe a school that we recognise.The report has ignored all the positive aspects of the school and skewed evidence and fact to make our school fit a pre-determined outcome. The judgement of our sixth form as 'Requires Improvement' is simply wrong on all indicators. We are a good sixth form. We were so shocked by the report that we submitted a complaint as parents to Ofsted 14 June 2018. The school also submitted a complaint on behalf of the staff on 16 June 2018.

A conflict of interests

The UST was brought in to 'support' the school in September 2017. We are also concerned that the Chair of Governors and Executive Headteacher that were present during the inspection, are remunerated by the University Schools Trust (UST), the Multi Academy Trust (MAT) that has been named on the order that has been issued against our school on 12 June 2018. We think there is a conflict of interest since both individuals and the UST seek to gain directly from the forced academisation of our school.

We strongly disagree with the overall judgement and want the report withdrawn. We are demanding a re-inspection of our school within a time frame that allows our Local Authroity and Headteacher, to make the rapid improvement our school needs. We know that Ofsted has no appeals process and we wish to challenge the right of Ofsted to make a judgement that cannot be overturned or open to any external verification process.

Why do we oppose academisation?

As parents we are concerned that our children will not flourish in an academy. What our children need is a commitment to invest in the staff and support our comprehensive and caring ethos. All the evidence suggests that academisation has the opposite effect—staff leave in droves and our children get a diet of ‘exam factory’ education.  We are also concerned that our children with SEND needs will not be fully supported by an academy as research suggests these are the first children to lose out.

Why are we raising funds?

We are  parents from an inner-London comprehensive community school. We don't have rich benefactors who can help us raise the money to make our legal case. We have instructed our solicitors to start the process in supporting our legal challenge to Ofsted and we hope to raise enough funds so that we can seek a judicial review and halt the forced academisation of our school.

Why support us?

We believe that we are standing up for parents, children and community schools across the country who think it is wrong that schools like ours can be judged unfairly and then forced to academise. 

Schools are for children, not for businesses and if we save our school, we hope we will inspire other parents to do the same.