A reader directs The Blogger to this term’s edition of Herr Direktor Tomlinson’s glossy newsletter(PDF) for school governors as we “may want to read the series of crap excuses she’s concocted”! The reader continues:
No great major spelling mistakes immediately apparent (just a series of bloody buzzwords that mean nothing: “Task & Finish Group”, “fit-for-purpose”, blah, blah, blah). But it looks as though she was getting tired towards the end of the article because the last paragraph doesn’t seem to make sense: “Thank you for all your hard work and commitment, and on your achievements.” Perhaps ‘congratulations’ went AWOL from that sentence? It had probably been a long day…
Indeed the vast majority of it is a typical local government exercise in meaningless jargon and obvious swerves to avoid the bad news. However this little nugget intrigued The Blogger:
It’s great that, in 2006-07, attendance has improved across both primary and secondary schools. Improving attendance is a key factor in our ability to meet our pupils’ expected levels of attainment.
It would stand more chance of being considered great if it were true. But as we all know attendance in Bristol schools deteriorated over the last year.
Are senior local government officers allowed to do this? Just tell outright lies to avoid any news that questions their competence?
COMING SOON: “We will not accept petitions of a personal nature”. That sack Tomlinson petition latest.
(Cartoon by Evelyn Post. Evelyn Post is The Bristol Blogger’s resident cartoonist. He has a woman’s name)
FFS! This woman is the GW Bush of Bristol politics. She can’t even construct a sentence! At least Dubya doesn’t actually directly run education in the US.
Interesting that for GCSE she uses the defunk 5 GCSEs A*-C rather than the pereferred measure 5 GCSEs A*-C with maths and English. If you use the right stats then Bristol is at 30.4% . The national average was 45.3%.
At the current rate of progress and assuming that all other LEAs make no significant progress then Bristol will reach the national average when my eight year old daughter is seventeen.
http://www.bristol-cyps.org.uk/policies/pdf/APA-exec-summary.pdf
Please help this poor woman page 1 and 2. Just sum her delilusion up. Validated score inadequate, self assessment adequate.
Wot about the workers? We have to read about the department’s performance in the Evening Pist before hearing anything direct from ze bunker….
Just looking at the TES. What on earth is it all about? I just love the person spec. http://www.inclusioninlearning.co.uk/
Knowledge & Experience
1. A proven track record, at a senior professional managerial level within a school setting or Local Authority, of successfully accomplishing some or all of the following:
Managing and delivering services which achieve good outcomes for children, young people and families
Managing transformational change
Providing operational direction to staff and services
Resourcing, motivating and developing a team
Planning, controlling and monitoring of complex budgets
Managing performance and achieving continuous improvement
Developing policy and practice
2. A clear and thorough understanding of the operational context within which children and young people’s services are required to operate, including the Children Act 2004, and Every Child Matters, as well as the statutory and legislative context specific to the post (see attached)
3. A proven understanding and experience of how performance information, and information & communication technology, can be effectively used in the planning and delivery of services
4. A qualification at graduate level, qualified teacher status and successful teaching experience
Abilities & Aptitudes
Evidence of applying innovative and analytical approaches to solving complex and challenging problems.
Evidence of effective written, oral and inter-personal skills, including presentation, advocacy, negotiation and consultation.
Evidence of constructive dialogue with children, young people and service users.
Evidence of positive promotion of equalities, valuing diversity and seeking to reduce inequalities both in service provision and staff management.
Looks like it’s another new ‘senior’ job in Herr Direktor’s already-top-heavy and very-expensive-to-us-poor-council-tax-paying-sods management structure.
Note how the job doesn’t feature in the dept’s ‘structure chart’ on their website:
http://www.bristol-cyps.org.uk/services/pdf/cyps-directorate-chart.pdf
And just the 66k salary for this new post. Funny really, given Herr Direktor has recently issued a directive telling all her staff how skint the dept is and no budget holders can spend more than 500 quid without the express written consent of the Fuhrer….