Birkdale High School

Birkdale High School is a school in Kirklees. The school is quite small, with just under 600 pupils at present 2006/7. The school's buildings are in two distinct phases; the older building, comprising mainly the former Wheelwright Grammar school (Girl's section) and a newly built wing connected by a bridge c1980. The school is fortunate to be set amongst lovely grassed grounds with a large playing and track area and more recluse grassed quads located within the main building.

Overview

The school is located on Halifax road, near the Dewsbury/Batley boarder. The intake of the school is reflected by the surrounding area, most pupils are taken from the Batley/Dewsbury area due to the school's central location and its position on many bus routes through the surrounding towns. The school, oddly, has a slightly high male population due to the presence of an all girls school in the school's catchment area as noted by OFSTED.

The school was placed in 'special measures' by the government’s inspectorate, OFSTED, under a section 3 inspection in 2005 for several reasons. The school has since been removed from 'special measures' and placed on a 'notice to improve'. [http://www.http://www.ofsted.gov.uk/portal/site/Internet/menuitem.7c7b38b14d870c7bb1890a01637046a0/?event=getReport&urn=107774&inspectionNumber=307206&providerCategoryID=8192&fileName=\school\107\s5_107774_20071113.xml]

The school has been re-inspected by the local authority and given a clean, educational bill of health. They saw improvements in teaching and learning, and pupil's achievement. The school received a congratulatory letter from the local authority upon their improvement in GCSE exam results, nearly doubling their previous results and achieving a 40% 5x A*-C pass rate for the school. The school reached a CVA of 1001.7 showing that they had turned around and were starting to add value to the education of those pupils in their intake. The school has also reached it's KS3 targets for all core subjects and has even exceeded some targets. They will be inspected by OFSTED again in the near future.

Despite all this success and praise it was recently announced by Kirklees council (with leaks in the local press) that they were aiming to merge the school with another local one to form a city academy under the Building Schools for the Future program. The local authority are beginning the consultation phase of the project. It is generally believed that the local community are against the program; but lack of information, impressive glossy brochures, and a lack of open public consultation are worry those opposed to the plans.

Notable Alumni

* Sayeeda Warsi, Baroness Warsi, politician

External links

* [http://www.birkdalehigh.net/ Official site]

References