Harlow headteacher turns “whistleblower” as she tells BBC Panorama that her school is being “ploughed into the ground”.

Education: Secondary / Tue 26th Mar 2019 at 11:12am

A HARLOW headteacher turned whistleblower has told the BBC that she “cannot stay here and watch what they are doing to my school”.

A tearful Deb Garfield told Panorama on Monday night of her experience as head of Aspire Academy in Commonside Road, Harlow.

TBAP Aspire Academy provides what is called “alternative provision” for children between the age of 4-16 who have been excluded from mainstream schools.

It caters for up to 103 pupils. It is run by a trust called TBAP.

Ms Garfield said: “I have never spoken out against my bosses before…we tried to do it through the proper channels but we weren’t getting anywhere.”

“The schools finances were stable when it was opened in 2014 until Dec 2017 when it joined a multi-academy trust. The bills stopped being paid”.

Ms Garfield showed the BBC reporter a host of bills and stressed that instead of teaching she is dealing with demands for payment.

She also shows the BBC the state of disrepair at the Commonside Road school as they cannot afford to repair facilities.

The programme looks at the state of finances at TBAP and the quality of teaching in other academies but then returns to Aspire where senior teachers are off with stress and others face redundancy.

Consequently, there are real concerns regarding personal safety of staff. To emphasise this, the staff are seen watching CCTV footage of when a disturbance takes place within the school.

Teacher, Katherine Frances said: ‘There’s not enough of us around to be safe.”

TBAP said: “They have made robust risk assessments when reducing staff.”

The BBC claims that TBAP is in serious debt and their accounts were “deliberately falsified”. A claim TBAP denied.

The programme concludes by revisiting Aspire Academy and Ms Garfield.

She said: “Everything we have worked for over five years is being ploughed into the ground. I have been thinking about leaving education altogether.

“I am so proud of my staff and I am so proud of my kids. It is a shame it has come to this.”

Ms Garfield has now gone off with stress.

The full programme can be found below.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m0003nw3/panorama-the-academy-schools-scandal

3 Comments for Harlow headteacher turns “whistleblower” as she tells BBC Panorama that her school is being “ploughed into the ground”.:

durcant

2019-03-26 11:47:16

I thought this lady was very brave and honest. She should receive full support from our community for standing up for her students and staff. This is a lesson for everyone that privatising everything doesn’t work. Not sure if she will get this message but hope others will join me in thanking her. Thank you.

Pytr Kropotkin

2019-03-26 12:18:04

Completely in agreement with durcant, and indeed the brave Deb Garfield. This school provides education in a very special and necessary niche. In many ways it is the most important area of education provision, and is a most suitable resource for the state to fund directly. Private business, with it's multi-academy trusts, are failing many thousands of pupils up and down the country, while their executives are earning huge salaries; in some instances over £400k per year. Parents are often further removed from involvement in their children's education than is typical for state schools. These trusts, and many academies, are a vast sinking flotilla, and the cost of failure is simply walking away, often having stripped assets and having paid trust managers large salaries and bonuses 'while the sun shone' (on their personal circumstances, if not the schools themselves.. The state will inevitably have to restore provision, and invest in ways the worst of these trusts simply refuse to do. If this Tory system is to continue, it should be a matter of priority that only Charitable organisations or 'not for profit' CIC's be permitted to operate academy trusts. With in the case of CIC's, any residual income returning to Local Government to recycle as additional state education funding.