The most senior government education official is due to visit schools in Brighton and Hove today (Friday 4 October).
Chris Wormald, the permanent secretary at the Department for Education (DfE), is scheduled to go to the
- King’s School
- Portslade Aldridge Community Academy (PACA)
- Brighton Aldridge Community Academy (BACA)
- Bilingual Primary School, Brighton and Hove
- Downs View School and Link College
Mr Wormald is the civil servant in charge of the DfE. He is also Education Secretary Michael Gove’s chief policy adviser.
He used to run the office of Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, who visited BACA and the Bilingual Primary School last year.
He also ran the academies programme under the last Labour government and has been publicly praised by the former Labour Schools Minister Andrew Adonis. It was Lord Adonis who introduced academies as a way of trying to raise standards.
Four of the schools being visited by Mr Wormald are academies or free schools.
BACA and PACA have both reported significant improvements in exam results since becoming academies.
Their results are even more impressive when using the respected Fischer Family Trust “value added” score.
They are run by the Aldridge Foundation, an education charity set up by the millionaire former Portslade schoolboy turned business tycoon Sir Rod Aldridge.
The foundation hopes that the improving results will encourage more parents and their children to choose BACA and PACA which are currently undersubscribed.
The King’s School opened last month and the Bilingual Primary School opened last year. Both schools are in temporary premises and searching for permanent sites.
