"Scandalous for our pupils and parents" School performance report for Central Bedfordshire branded "disturbing and worrying"

As children progress through primary, the picture is one of a widening gap between local attainment performance and national, according to a report to CBC’s children’s services overview and scrutiny committee.

“Our performance measured against statistical neighbours is poor,” said the report. “This trend is more marked for disadvantaged pupils.

“At the end of reception, CBC’s results were ahead of national. In Year 1, 4 and 6, our performance was behind the national picture. This trend persists through secondary until the end of key stage four, where the gaps between CBC and national performance on all three measures widened in 2024.”

You can read the report online here.

Independent Leighton Buzzard West councillor Steve Owen described it as “not a good news report”, with “too many figures not going in the right direction between us and national performance”.

Executive member for children’s services councillor Owen explained: “We’ve parents of thousands of children attending school hoping we’re going to educate them properly and give them at GCSE and A-level the chance of competing on equal terms with pupils in neighbouring authorities around college and university places, and jobs.

“This shows we’re not doing as well as we should be. A series of issues were raised at scrutiny 12 months ago and appear not to have been followed up. An action plan with plenty of detail was requested and I’ve not seen that.

“This gives all the figures and some helpful narrative, but it doesn’t give a comprehensive action plan. We need to do that. It’s not here today and I regret that.”

Conservative Flitwick councillor Ian Adams labelled the report “shocking for us, scandalous for our pupils and parents, and ridiculous considering our area.

“It’s so bad and so worrying. It must be systemic. The big difference is the way we arrange our schools. Perhaps the transition to two-tier education disadvantages those schools for a period, which is why the numbers are down from last year.

“Something serious needs to be done to disrupt this. We can’t accept the areas we represent are so poor.”

CBC’s head of education and inclusion Clare Mosseveld referred to the “real impact of long-term poverty”, adding: “The paper focuses on the biggest gap for when children move between early years and year one.

“This will take time to iron out. We’re sharing good practice, and we’ve a really tailored package currently. We’re looking at writing, reading, multiplication and Maths, while offering targeted support. We’ve limited capacity, but are doing everything we can.”

Council leader and Independent Potton councillor Adam Zerny called it “a disturbing and worrying report”, acknowledging: “We won’t do this justice today because there’s too much detail there.

“Even at the age of two and two-and-a-half, we appear considerably worse off than the national average based on these results. We need a corrective action plan.”

The committee expressed its “deep disappointment at the direction of travel” and agreed several recommendations, including a member briefing session.