Let us just get on with it, plead educationalists

That plea from executive head teacher Liz Coffey won cries of ‘hear, hear’ from some of the audience of douzeniers from St Sampson’s, Vale and St Peter Port.

One member of the audience was so impressed with the presentation from the leadership team that he thought the politicians should step aside and let the head teachers, with their extensive experience, run the show from now onwards.

The battle by Powerpoint presentation represents a new phase in the transformation of Guernsey’s schools, as Education, Sport & Culture attempts to better inform the public about its plans, amid complaints of a lack of communication.

Mrs Coffey said she believed completely in the two 11-18 schools model, and she asked her audience to have faith.

‘We want to really be able to focus on the job in hand with respect to further developing the transition models.

‘We’ve done that now for our students and now we’re focusing on the staff to give them more certainty about where they will be in the new structure.

‘That’s not to say we have to make a call to arms and tell everyone they have to be positive and shut up, I’m not saying that at all, it’s equally our opportunity to make those connections.’

Mrs Coffey explained how the transformation had been mapped out for children, and now they were engaging with teachers ‘every day’ so that staff would know their position.

There was some discussion about whether a pause in the programme was a good idea, but Education president Matt Fallaize said it would cause chaos and the matter would go round and round in circles forever.

Any delay would mean that pupils at Les Varendes who are scheduled to move into Victor Hugo College in September 2022 would find there was no space built for them.

Paul van der Tang, a douzenier for the Vale, wanted the States to get on with the project.

‘It was good to have the senior people here, not just the politicians.

‘I’m happier now with knowing more and being able to understand how it will work, but we have to be realistic, it’s not going to be the perfect thing, none of the models proposed in the past were perfect, so we need to get on and do it.’

In his presentation, Deputy Fallaize highlighted how GCSE results in Guernsey are only marginally better than those in the UK, despite the fact that the States spends significantly more per child.

One audience member asked when local GCSE results would improve and be more in line with affluent areas of the UK and Deputy Fallaize responded that it was likely to take a while.