Opinions

Moving on

In a plea to two sector associations, Jonathan Whybrow urges them to agree on fair and effective ways to set entrance tests and assessments to help with the pupil transition from prep to senior schools

Beachborough School is a business just like any other independent school. Without the correct business model and effective management of finances, teaching will suffer. It is our job as heads to ensure that teachers have the best possible conditions under which to do their jobs.

Goodness knows it is hard enough to teach without basic resources, well maintained classrooms, and pay and pensions also being mismanaged. Fortunately, supported by an excellent governing body and bursar, I am able
to do this. But what happens when matters beyond one’s control begin to affect the marketplace? And how frustrating is it when this matter could be viewed as an own goal? What can we do when two major players in the sector cannot get their acts together to achieve a smooth passage for children from ages 3 to 18?

I do not represent IAPS. Nor do I promote the views of a group or district of prep schools. Instead I write to appeal to all senior schools on behalf of the generations of Beachborough School children who will strive to gain entry to your schools.

Just what do you want of them? Do you want to screen them prior to a final examination at the end of their time at prep school? Or do you want the results of cognitive ability tests? The character of each child is important, so will you interview them all or will you rely on a report from the head of the prep school? Will passing Common Entrance suffice?

The answers?
Probably the answer to all of these questions is “yes” and understandably so. The marketplace, which differs so radically from location to location, has seen to that.

It is not difficult to realise that, even from the viewpoint of a relatively small feeder such as Beachborough, the suburban day schools face different recruitment challenges to those faced by relatively small, local boarding schools and to those faced by the great boarding schools that recruit from all over the country.

But let me make a plea. Find some truly common ground since Common Entrance as an entry test fails in that respect. Please decide on a test of basic intelligence and select a range of scores that suits your school. Combine this with a rigorous interview and I would suggest that we have a point from which to start negotiations.

And a further plea to HMC and IAPS: please can the appropriate committees in both organisations talk to each other about this issue? If they already are, the lowly member knows little about what is being discussed. It would also help if members of HMC desisted in washing its dirty washing in public, rubbishing what is still, if used properly, an academic test of rigour, even if it is not in the opinion of some a useful entrance test.

I believe that, if we do not work together, we will weaken the product that we are all trying to sell and that the customer either does not buy, or plays one school off against the other to drive the price of fees down. In tough times, we must be commercially savvy and to weaken the product through infighting is not.

Jonathan Whybrow is headmaster of Beachborough School, which won the Outstanding Financial/Commercial Initiative at the Independent School Awards.

Return to Opinions