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The UCL provost said he had been talking to Camden Council for two years |
Academy backers: We wanted a school south of Euston Road
Under-fire university chiefs ask: ‘Do you want us to be involved or not?’
THE sponsors of Camden’s first city academy wanted the new school to be located south of Euston Road rather than the proposed site in Swiss Cottage.
Professor Malcolm Grant, provost at University College London (UCL), which has won backing from Camden Council for its plans to run a new academy proposed for Adelaide Road, said on Tuesday that his choice would have been to open a school closer to the university’s main campus in Bloomsbury.He said: “We would have preferred south of the Euston Road. It would have been more accessible to our campus. We have run through with the council possible sites and there were no sites available.
“One site is the Eastman Hospital [in Gray’s Inn Road]. It is not owned by us, unfortunately, and it is too small for the sort of school we have been talking about. It is also a very expensive piece of land. We are not endowed with surplus land.”
Prof Grant added: “If anybody knows of a site which is going cheaply or free then please bear us in mind.”
His admission came as UCL hosted a public meeting in one of its lecture halls aimed at explaining why the university has become involved in the city academy plan. It was meant to be a session to showcase the university’s dream of creating a school capable of boosting achievement in maths and science, as well as encouraging pupils to master foreign languages.
Instead, Prof Grant and his deputy, Michael Worton, faced a barrage of criticism directed at UCL negotiations over the project, its refusal to join an open competition for control of the new school and the failure to deal with the chronic shortage of secondary school places for children in the south of the borough.
There was no announcement of the admissions policy at the new school, a major sticking point among opponents of the project because, as an independently-sponsored academy, it will not be tied to any rules set by the council.
Neither was there any guarantee over how the governing body will operate.
Sean Wallis, from UCL’s lecturers’ union, said: “I have been in many meetings, in rooms like this, with Malcolm Grant. They are always very good on presentation but detail free.”
Prof Grant said he rarely “saw eye to eye” with Mr Wallis and added: “If we had come here with a blueprint for the school you would have said that it had been all predetermined.”
The lack of fresh information, however, means that a six-week public consultation exercise on the council’s preliminary choice of UCL as preferred sponsor has now run for three weeks with little discussion on how the proposed academy will work.
Critics have suggested that senior councillors were foolish – or deliberately unhelpful, depending on how cynical the critic is – to begin a consultation when schools had broken up for summer and parents and governors were on holiday.
Prof Grant said he had been talking to Camden Council for two years but confirmed that UCL had said it would not enter a competition – under which the merits of rival bids would be sized up and ruled on by an independent adjudicator.
When asked by Luca Salice, a governor at Torriano School in Kentish Town, whether UCL’s refusal to debate in the open was tantamount to “not believing in an open society”, Prof Grant shook his head and said he would not answer.
He added: “I think this question is absurd.”
Mr Salice said: “By not submitting to an open competition, it suggests UCL are scared of an open society. That is not what Camden’s family of schools are about.”
It was the first time Prof Grant and Mr Worton have faced the public, although they must both have been aware of the controversy surrounding the project.
Neither attended previous public meetings on the issue and they were not present at the council cabinet meeting which saw UCL take command of the project last month.
Known for his slick style, Prof Grant began the two-hour meeting with a potted history of UCL’s achievement and international recognition, and a joke about how it had pioneered the “experiment” of admitting female students. By the end, he appeared increasingly irritated at the opposition.
At one stage, Prof Grant asked: “Do you want UCL to be involved in this or not?”
Later on, he sighed and said: “Look, we are not trying to wrench the guts out of Camden’s education system and take all the bright students for ourselves.”
Mr Worton batted away several questions with the reply that he could not give detailed answers because of technical reasons relating to council policy.
Defending the university’s motives, Mr Worton said: “This is not about recruitment, although we would like to take the brightest pupils from the academy – as we would from other schools.”
With a series of meetings planned before the final contracts are signed, this was just the first test for the two men as they try to convince parents that the flagship project is safe in their hands.
Labour councillors, who privately believe they have the sympathy of backbenchers in the Liberal Democrat and Conservative ranks, are due to make another attempt to force an open competition at Monday’s full council meeting.
In a motion, they will call on the Town Hall to give the Church of England and campaigners for a traditional community school the right to bid for the school.
Prof Grant and Mr Worton will need to steel themselves for further scrutiny over why UCL has not demanded the new school is located in the south of the borough – if that was their preferred option.
Labour councillor Julian Fulbrook said: “What is happening is offensive and morally wrong to the children living south of the Euston Road.”
Jim Murray, from Bloomsbury Association, said: “If you really wanted to, you would be able to find a site. If you ask the right people, somebody might even give it to you for free.
“This is what we have been waiting for for years – it’s just in the wrong place. I don’t care if it’s in Camden or Westminster, this area needs a new school. I don’t understand this stuff about borders when the education of schoolchilden is at stake. We need one here.” |
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