Queens Park Community School

Infobox School2
name = Queens Park Community School


motto =
Quality, Progress, Creativity and Success
established = 1989
type = Mixed sex State school and Sixth form.
head_name = HeadTeacher
head = Mr Mike Hulme
city = Brent
state = London
country = England
pupils = 1200
website = [http://www.qpcs.brent.sch.uk/ www.qpcs.brent.sch.uk]

Queens Park Community School (commonly abbreviated to QPCS) is a specialist Business and Enterprise inner city comprehensive secondary school and Sixth Form in Queen's Park, North West London, in the borough of Brent, UK. There are, as of January 2006, 1204 pupils aged between 11 and 19 on roll who come from a range of backgrounds.

History

Background

Opened in 1989, Queens Park Community School is the result of an amalgamation of three schools during the 1980s. The three schools that were merged were South Kilburn Community School (formally Percy Road School), Aylestone Community School and Brondesbury and Kilburn High (commonly abbreviated to B&K, formally Kilburn Grammar school). The new school's logo, an image of three trees, represents this union of the three schools. The head teacher chosen to head the new school was "Ms Mary Norton". Ms Norton headed the school from its formation through to her retirement from education in 2002.

The school is located in a relatively middle class area of Brent, but many less affluent communities lie within its catchment area. Initially many parents held back from sending their children to the school but once the school began to achieve results heading towards the national averages, the school became heavily oversubscribed.

In 2000 the school benefited from a brand new block funded through the millennium National Lottery fund at an estimated cost of £6 million. The building of this block involved demolishing one of the two existing buildings. The new building was officially opened by Ken Livingstone with a plaque commemorating his visit. Recently the school been granted specialist school status in Business and Enterprise and was also chosen to host a City Learning Centre (CLC) which contains state of the art ICT and music facilities. It has also secured additional funding through the government's "Excellence in Cities" programme, which provides resources for schools, to provide extended activities and work for gifted and talented pupils.

The City Learning Centre

The QPCS City Learning Centre (CLC), as one of 105 CLCs built by the DfES throughout the country, is a separate centre built in the grounds of Queens Park Community School. It was completed in 2003. The CLC is equipped with a 'cyber centre' including ICT equipment, computer suites, video editing suite and a fully equipped recording studio. Recently The CLC has developed a specialism in using ICT to support language acquisition for Key Stage 3 children who are new to Brent. The CLC also has an extensive out reach programme which supports learning though ICT in a range of areas at Key Stage 2 including systems and control and modern foreign languages.

Uniform

Before the school opened, there was a consultation with parents about whether a uniform should be introduced or not. The vote was overwhelmingly in favour of a school uniform. The Queens Park Community School uniform was featured in the local press for its unconventional uniform, consisting of a black tracksuit bottom, with a red or black T-shirt featuring the school three trees logo, and a black jumper with a red collar. The design of the uniform was intended to be comfortable, attractive, practical, economical and one that students would enjoy wearing. The design has since gone somewhat out of fashion and faces criticism from students for being hot in the summer, as well as expensive for parents to buy.

Awards

Two members of the QPCS teaching staff have received recognition in the National Teaching Awards.
*Sue Wales winner of the Lifetime Achievement Teaching Award for London and the Southeast of England in 2001
*Alison Hook came second for the prestigious Teacher of the Year Award for London for 2003.

Notable Visits

*Ken Livingstone, 2001At time of visit, Member of Parliament for Brent East. He laid one of the key stones in the new school and also opened the new building.
*Shaun Wallace, 2004"Mastermind" Champion, visiting as former student.
*Shortman, 2005Performance poet through Rap.
*Tony Benn, 2006British politician, visited twice as a speaker to students.
*Hilary Benn, 2007
Secretary of State for International Development, Visited as a speaker to students.

Notable Alumni

*Promise Cambell
Serious Desert, 2003 finalist.
*Shaun Wallace
Barrister and Champion of "Mastermind", 2004.
*Maria LawsonProfessional R&B singer and X-Factor, 2004 finalist.
*Nathanael BaringProfessional actor, starring in 2008 film 10,000 BC

QPCS in Media

Grange Hill

QPCS featured in Grange Hill (1979+) as Brookdale School, a rival to Grange hill. In Series 2 the story involved a Grange Hill student having to attend Brookdale instead and a mini-war erupts over stolen blazers.

This morning with Richard and Judy

QPCS was featured on This Morning with Richard and Judy for its uniform which was seen as an 'original' idea for a uniform.

Robert Symons

QPCS was featured in the media in 2004 as the school at which Robert Symons, who quit his high paid job to give back to his community, taught as a newly qualified teacher. Robert Symons was murdered in his home in October 2004 defending his family from Yousef Bouhaddaou when Yousef attempted to rob his house.

Classroom Chaos

QPCS was also one of the six schools featured on the controversial 2005 Channel 5 programme Classroom Chaos in which a retired teacher under the pseudonym 'Sylvia Thomas' returned undercover as a supply teacher after 30 years. Her stated objective was to show the 'chaos' which teachers must deal with in the modern classroom, although it is widely agreedWho|date=September 2008 that the main aim was simply to make a controversial and high rating television programme.With the use of hidden cameras, she filmed chairs being thrown, pupils fighting in class and swearing at teachers and other such behaviour. It should be noted that the majority of incidents filmed occurred at other schools, with only minor disobedience being filmed at QPCS. The programme was strongly criticised by teaching unions and other educational bodies. ManyWho|date=September 2008 argue that she deliberately allowed the children to get out of control in order to film staged action footage for the show.Fact|date=September 2008

Trivia

*QPCS appeared in the background shot of an episode of Smack the pony.
*QPCS appeared in the 2006 film Stormbreaker during a cut scene of British schools.

External links

* [http://www.qpcs.brent.sch.uk/ Official QPCS Site]
* [http://www.the-clc.org/index.php Official CLC Site]
* [http://www.ofsted.gov.uk/reports/index.cfm?fuseaction=summary&id=101560 QPCS Ofsted Report]
* [http://www.ofsted.gov.uk/reports/pdf/?inspectionNumber=268883&providerCategoryID=8192&fileName=\school\101\s10_101560_20041209.pdf QPCS, Ofsted Inspection report] . Online posting (Pdf file). 2004.
* [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/education/06/school_tables/secondary_schools/html/304_5403.stm QPCS, BBC League Table]
* [http://www.brent.gov.uk/Educ.nsf/vwAllDocs/QUEENSGUIDE?open QPCS at Brent.gov.uk]
* [http://www.grangehillfans.co.uk/locations/Series2.htm Grange Hill fan site featuring QPCS (1979)]