Three high schools in deprived areas of Stoke-on-Trent have enlisted the help of a tertiary college to create their own sixth-form college to cater for the growing number of their pupils staying on after 16.
A former city hall, part of a Victorian theatre complex, is being leased from the city council for the new centre, which will cater for pupils from the three schools involved and for other young people from Burslem and Tunstall, two of the six towns of Stoke-on-Trent.
The new college, to be called the Two Towns Sixth Form Centre, will be run by the tertiary college in neighbouring Newcastle-under-Lyme, whose bid to run it beat that of the city’s own further education college. A sixth-form college already exists in Fenton at the other end of the six towns, 11 miles away.
The idea of providing sixth-form facilities for pupils in the northern part of the city arose from the success of the Two Towns project, a scheme launched by the Staffordshire Education Authority three years ago to raise the educational and career expectations of children at the James Brindley and Brownhills High Schools in Tunstall and the Haywood High School in Burslem.
The project, supported by Keele University and Stoke Polytechnic (now Staffordshire University) and all three local colleges, has been so successful that more than 50 per cent of the pupils at the three schools now stay in education after 16, compared with 20 per cent three years ago.
Mrs Yvonne Jeffries, head of Haywood High School, says there is still a great deal of talent waiting to be tapped in the three schools and in the north of the city. She says she and her colleagues are sure that staying-on rates will rise further when facilities are available in the locality.
Neil Jenkin, deputy principal of Newcastle College, who is overseeing the project, says more than 300 of the Year 11 pupils at the three schools have expressed interest in a post-16 study centre close at hand.
The aim is to ensure a friendly and familiar environment, close to home and to their high schools. Many pupils cannot afford the fares to the existing sixth-form college or the Stoke-on-Trent College, now travel expenses have ended for post-16 students.
The new college will be staffed by lecturers from Newcastle College and by teachers qualified to teach FE courses at the three schools. Funding is being provided by the Further Education Funding Council.
