Moving in Darkness: back to the future at Crown Woods College
FORUM - ISSN 0963-8253
Volume 53 Number 3 (2011)
Moving in Darkness: back to the future at Crown Woods College
PATRICK YARKER, MELISSA BENN pages 421-428
DOI: 10.2304/forum.2011.53.3.421
Abstract
At the end of July 2011 The Guardian reported on the recently opened Crown Woods College in Eltham, South-East London. The College had been rebuilt on the site of the previous Crown Woods School with £50 million of funding via the Building Schools for the Future project. Its nine buildings include four 'mini-schools', one of which is a sixth form, alongside a state-of-the-art gym, a building for children with moderate learning difficulties, special educational needs (SEN) or visual impairment, and a technology and design centre. Media interest was aroused by the way the College had extended its previous policy of streaming students by 'ability'. Each mini-school (leaving aside the sixth form) operates separately from the others and is populated by students deemed to be only of a particular 'ability'. Since each mini-school has its own uniform, Crown Woods College students are effectively identified in public by 'ability', with mini-school populations prevented from mixing. The Guardian's headline was: 'School Colour-Codes Pupils by Ability'. The Guardian's report, which generated some 250 comments, was picked up by other newspapers. Elements of the original were reproduced on blog sites and Internet-discussion forums. In an article also published by The Guardian, FORUM board member Melissa Benn took up some of the issues raised by the public funding of a segregated state school. We reproduce that article, along with a piece by fellow board member Patrick Yarker, who taught English at Crown Woods school.
To cite this article
PATRICK YARKER, MELISSA BENN (2011) Moving in Darkness: back to the future at Crown Woods College, FORUM, 53(3), 421-428. https://doi.org/10.2304/forum.2011.53.3.421