Mary Reid

Over the last four years, Kingston schools have remained near the top of all the league tables. Remaining at the top is just as difficult as getting there in the first place, but there is a real buzz in our schools. 

In 2005 year 67% of pupils in Kingston schools gained 5 or more high grades at GCSE, placing them sixth in the country. 

You would expect the schools in Richmond to achieve much the same, and indeed they used to be our closest rivals. But since Richmond Conservatives took over the reins in 2002 their results have dropped to under 55%.

That is not the end of the story.  Schools are now subjected to the much harsher, but fairer, ‘value-added’ assessment. This is based on predictions made when each child is 11, looking at their SATs scores.  A score of 1000 for a council means that, on average, when the pupils got to 16 they lived up to their predictions.

In 2005 Kingston scored 1005.6. Only six other councils in the country got higher value-added scores. 

Richmond scored 977.7. This is a lower score than the most disadvantaged councils in London, such as Lambeth, Tower Hamlets or Southwark.