Southampton schools behind in every subject
An education boss admits the city 'needs to do better'
Last updated 30th Sep 2022
Southampton schools are behind in every single subject and some are getting worse, this year’s grades show.
Key Stage 2 (KS2) results – which come from tests in Year 6 – show Southampton is seven per cent behind the national average in reading, writing and maths combined. Individually, reading is four per cent behind, writing is seven per cent behind and maths is five per cent behind.
Other KS2 subject areas were grammar, punctuation and spelling at five per cent below and science, which was also five per cent below.
No subject performed any better than one per cent below the national average.
Now Southampton City Council is considering offering teachers a salary of at least £30,000 to improve teaching.
In science, Southampton came in 141st out of a ranking of 150 authorities.
In grammar, punctuation and spelling (at an expected level), Southampton came in at 139th out of the 150.
Derek Wiles, head of education at Southampton City Council said: “We need to do better.
“The performance in some of our primary schools isn’t where it ought to be.”
Moving on to secondary school performance, Mr Wiles said: “Nationally the GCSE results have dropped.
“Not in Southampton. We’ve maintained that steady level.”
That ‘steady level’ is even further behind the national average than KS2 is.
Some measures show that the poor performance at GCSE level isn’t being maintained, but getting worse.
This year, 62 per cent of GCSE students in Southampton passed (grades 9-4) English and maths. This is two per cent lower than last year when 64 per cent passed, eight per cent lower than the then national average of 72 per cent. There are not yet figures for national average this year.
Mr Wiles said that ‘there are about seven schools we feel are underperforming’ and that these schools ‘have brought down the overall Key Stage 4 results.’
Following the pattern, sixth forms in Southampton bears no better; the percentage gaps are higher than the two lower stages.
In A-A grades at A-level, Southampton is 14 per cent behind the national average – and A-C grades were 11.4 per cent below.
The poor education performance in Southampton is not spread out eqaully, however, as the pandemic is said to have had a greater impact on the grades of schools in more deprived areas, bringing the average down.
Measures to ensure school children didn’t fall behind during lockdowns, such as computers and broadband were less available in the poorer areas of the city.
The council is now trying to work out how to improve Southampton’s schools performance.
One suggestion was to improve teaching, by offering at least £30,000 to teachers, and also by getting rid of a ‘blame’ culture where teachers have society’s fingers pointed at them when children grow up to do wrong.
Another possible way to improve schools performance is the reintroduction of Family Hubs, which would give children a better start in life, however, with this remedy, it will be four years before Southampton sees any improvements to its academic performance.