Should former Barnfield boss Sir Peter hand back FE knighthood after inadequate rating?

Troubled Barnfield College has been described by Ofsted as having “no key strengths” — prompting question marks over whether former principal Sir Peter Birkett deserved his 2012 knighthood for services to FE and the academy movement.

Luton South MP Gavin Shuker blamed the college’s problems — the most recent of which was a damning inadequate grading — on the federation of academies which Sir Peter set up from 2007.

“Sir Peter Birkett took an outstanding college, starved it of resources and focussed on building a network of schools that sadly has ended up with an inadequate college and that’s a tragedy,” said Mr Shuker.

He added that the honours system “recognises achievements — but these achievements have been shown to be nowhere near as effective as we originally thought.”

Indeed, Ofsted’s report told how “success rate data are now more reliable than at any time during the past year, following a period in which a number of factors contributed to an over-inflation of the performance of the college.”

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Sir Peter’s knighthood had already proved contentious, with an online petition in April calling for him to rescind the honour winning the support of 183 people.

Although he left the college in July 2013, audits later uncovered a £1m funding overstatement, leading to claims of ghost learners, investigations by the Skills Funding Agency and Education Funding Agency and an FE Commissioner visit.

Sir Peter declined to comment on his knighthood.

Barnfield college
Barnfield college

Barnfield’s commissioner first after Ofsted blow

Barnfield College is set to become the first college to receive two full visits from FE Commissioner Dr David Collins, following an inadequate Ofsted inspection result.

The Luton-based college went from a grade three to four rating, with inspectors finding the college had “no key strengths” while viewing success rates, teaching and learning as inadequate.

The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) said the result would trigger a visit from Dr Collins, whose visit in January last year followed a Skills Funding Agency (SFA) assessment of inadequate for financial control at the college.

A BIS spokesperson told FE Week: “The FE Commissioner’s assessment of Barnfield College in January 2014 recommended new financial regulations and controls be put in place urgently and changes were made to the governance and leadership.

“The commissioner has found progress in addressing financial concerns. He is now due to re-assess the college, focusing his attention on quality of provision and the actions put in place to address the issues identified by Ofsted.”

Robin Somerville, chair of Barnfield College, which is due to submit plans to BIS to split from the federation of academies built up under former leader Sir Peter Birkett from 2007, said governors “fully accepted” Ofsted’s findings.

“This is an unacceptable failure by a significant majority of the previous management, governors and teaching staff,” he said. “On behalf of the college, I have apologised to students for that failure.”

It is the latest in a series of blows for the college following government probes with auditor KPMG finding it had overclaimed more than £1m for provision that had never happened, leading to allegations of ghost learners.

Meanwhile, Dr Collins later identified a “general feeling among all levels of the organisation that the college has been relatively neglected in the previous director general/CEO’s [Sir Peter’s] pursuit of attempting to grow the overall federation into a national business”.

And Luton South MP Gavin Shukler said the Ofsted rating could be blamed on Sir Peter’s focus on creating the Barnfield Federation academy chain.

“The criticisms in the report reflect how poor management decisions have affected teaching and staff,” he said.

“We’ve still got brilliant staff there but they need additional resources and they need steady management which we’ve not had in recent years.”

Sir Peter, who left Barnfield in July 2013, said: “It saddens me to read the Ofsted report.”

He added: “I am not sure how this has been allowed to happen and hope senior management have now put strategies in place to rectify the points raised in the report and I wish them well for the future.”

Lydia Richards, University and College Union regional official for Eastern and Home Counties, said: “The poor leadership and financial mismanagement identified last year at Barnfield College has evidently had a negative effect on overall performance, despite continued hard work and commitment from staff.”

Interim principal Monica Box is due to step down in March for Tim Eyton-Jones, currently principal of John Ruskin College, to take over.

Mr Somerville said Ms Box had “already started the urgent and robust work to correct the failings identified by Ofsted.”

And Mr Eyton-Jones said: “We will be implementing a range of robust and established quality improvement models as well as some innovative initiatives to support the turnaround.”

Please note that an earlier version of this poll was reset due to people being allowed to vote more than once. This issue has now been fixed and the poll reset to zero as of 1.30pm on Saturday, January 10.

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22 Comments

  1. I believe this general muck raking, retribution by media approach serves no purpose to the future of the college or its learners. Lets bring back ducking stools and stocks and have done with it…

  2. Bit like bankers bonuses isn’t it. Rewards for achievement that are measured over the longer term should only be gained once it’s been achieved, not when the promise of achievement is mooted.

  3. This article is hugely inaccurate and quite frankly a disgrace! The journalist and FE week should be ashamed of themselves for running this one sided, poorly written and factually incorrect article. As the highest performing GFE college in 2013 and sponsor of 2 of the most improved academies in the country…I am simply baffled at the lack of insight journalists have before writing such damning pieces. Such a shame that it seems to be acceptable to run a ‘vote’ on a persons entitlement to such a deserved and treasured honour. You should be ashamed of this public display of bullying and total lack of understanding or appreciation for a persons unrelenting endeavours for the wider good.

    FE Week total waste of the paper it’s printed on.

    At what point having moved on (18 months ago) do you no longer hold a person accountable?! 3 principals later…ummm surely that useless trio are responsible for this disappointing outcome?! Joke!

  4. The level of hysteria and vitriol in which Barnfield College has been attacked over the last two years has been staggering. A lot of commentators and agitators, not least the local MP, are in part responsible for what has become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

    Barnfield College was branded by Gove as “a model of good practice”. However, it has suffered from a lack of investment and desperately needs a rebuild. Student recruitment is down and this problem has been exacerbated by the media coverage branding the College toxic. Some management time was diverted to academies but this was not the cause of the problems. Failings occurred by managers which led to the allegation of “ghost learners” and there was significant lack of oversight and challenge from the internal finance, auditors and governors. Every pioneer needs a good finance director holding on to his coat tails. This was sadly lacking at Barnfield.

    When the oversight did come, rather than a constructive intervention to help the College and the town, it came in the form of a witch hunt.

    Downward spiral.

    The very public character assassination and shaming of Barnfield gave cause to a number of issues. Good staff left and could not be replaced. Remaining staff that had been decimated by restructures had a reason for their angst. Because of financial constraints, new leadership did not have the resources to make a significant difference. Consequently, despite parachuting in a “super chief exec”, the college had no chance. In the past 12 months they have been hung out to dry.

    Why did this happen?

    Pete Birkett was a pioneer in the academy movement and set up schools in Luton which undoubtedly have significantly improved the outcomes and prospects of young people in the town. This is what he was knighted for. In busting through a wall of opposition he made enemies. Some may describe him as too commercial or even arrogant. The same strength of personality that made him a force for change, left unchecked, was the reason for his downfall. The decision making and governance arrangements which formed the majority of the audit report findings, although having questionable practical impact, gave ammunition to his detractors. He
    flew too high and got shot down, along with the rest of the federation.

    Accountability.

    I think it’s worth remembering that Pete Birkett is not an elected politician. Along with most Principals and Chief Executives in the sector he is someone with an FE background that was quite good at his job and got promoted through the ranks. His peers and the establishment decided that his achievements were worthy of a knighthood. As the Chief Executive he is (or was) accountable. But for all the mud slung: the pay off, the car, the technical governance arrangements, and some historic quality failings by the College team leading to funding errors, I am unsure how much was a) foreseeable and b) he should be held so personally accountable for. FE Colleges have built in checks and balances which should have worked more effectively to protect the Chief Executive.

    This is a College that could have been put back on the path to former glory but for the protracted and very public investigations. What this saga has highlighted is the role of agencies and politicians in a College intervention. It’s all well and good getting to the bottom of things and holding people to account, but in the past
    18 months the College reputation has been dragged through the gutter, and ultimately it’s the learners that have suffered.

  5. The above comment is articulate and give an accurate account of the reasons behind the disappointing effects on the college. Having worked in Quality for a number of years in July 2013 the college results at 94% were the highest in the colleges history and according to the records placed Barnfield as best performing in the country in 12/13. In 13/14 the results dropped dramatically (as stated in the report), as did behaviour and attendance – the ofsted outcome was based on 13/14 results – not the period before whilst Birkett was in charge. The focus should now be on returning Barnfield to its former glory, for the benefit of students and staff and our town as a whole.

  6. Same anon here as the long essay above, still on my soap box. It should be remembered that there was no criminal activity here, just a series of mistakes, staff changes and external factors that have happened before in the sector and no doubt will happen again. Whilst of course we must learn from this, the personal pursuit of Pete Birkett will have a chilling effect on the sector. There was no blueprint for what Barnfield did and no LSIS best practice guide. They forged new ground against much opposition. In an era when Chief Executives are being encouraged to diversify income streams and grow this serves as a warning. Why not be cautious, sleep easy at night, maintain the status quo, and retire with your reputation (albeit modest) intact?

    • Hold on a minute. I met pete birkett many time and found him to be arrogant and quite clearly a law unto his own and with most colleges he surrounded himself with governors who would not challenge him

      Result – highly inflated salary, bonus, knighthood and expenses

      Mistakes – what is the consequence. Oh yes, maximum pension funded by the college for the next 30years so absolutely no comsequnce

      As for those that have come in to save the show, again no consequence because they already have their pensions

      The fe sector is a disgrace. Bring in the private sector. Its called risk and reward

  7. From inspection report “Success rate data are now more reliable than at any time during the past year, following a period in which a number of factors contributed to an over-inflation of the performance of the college.”
    It would be very useful to know what those ‘number of factors’ were… But whatever the reasons, for success data to be unreliable systematically across a whole service builds over time and means either leaders were blind (incompetent) or aware (dishonest), so it is fair to lay accountability at the door of previous leadership.
    Some posters above have mentioned Barnfields excellent success rates in 12/13 – It’s highly likely these were also over-infaated. For me, it very much takes the shine off it being held up as a model of good practice previously. You don’t build sky scraper unless you’re sure it has solid foundations and it’s foolish to blame the current occupants when the sky scraper topples over.

  8. I am appalled by the lack of quality behind this article, which I think paints an inaccurate and biased picture, demonstrates a complete lack of understanding and appreciation of the complexities of managing a large educational organisation and is based on opinion and hearsay rather than fact. My opinion of FE week is that it is clearly not up to the job and is merely grabbing headlines and feeding people’s salacious desire for scandals. I think that it is disgraceful that people are voting on the basis of such a one-sided article that is sensationalist and pays scant regard to the facts. Since when has it been reasonable to vote on whether we assassinate people’s characters and damage their reputations on the basis of such an article: it sounds medieval! Sir Peter Birkett successfully directed a large educational organisation, consisting of a general further education college and two academies and was unrelenting in his pursuit of excellence with the motive of tackling disadvantage and inequalities in society. He should be applauded for his courage in challenging the status quo. The fact that the principals who took over were unable to secure a satisfactory outcome for the Ofsted inspection says more to me about their leadership than his – why is he being blamed for what has happened 18 months after he left the job and why are they not being held to account?

  9. To be fair though, although the straw poll was reset, it’s not very robust. I voted once through Internet explorer, again through chrome and am at a different PC today and voted again. While I am in the yes camp, I think this poll only demonstrates that at least 1 other person part from me reads FE week.

  10. I have also met Pete Birkett on a number of occasions at professional gatherings, as well as been in the audience when he’s presented at various conferences and I can honestly say I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone more dedicated and committed to making Barnfield a success. He displayed enthusiasm and passion for improving life chances for students and ensuring they had the best chances to succeed. I am sure he is as disappointed about this latest report as others are.

  11. I worked with Sir Peter Birkett for a number of years, and he was without a shadow of doubt, the most committed, hardworking and dedicated education leader I have come across in my entire career. He was passionate and totally determined to ensure that the Barnfield Federation was the absolute best it could be and he achieved much outstanding success during his time there. Under his leadership, the Barnfield College was graded as ‘Outstanding’ during the 2007 Ofsted inspection. If his leadership was an issue, surely the college would not have achieved such an accolade? It is totally ridiculous to hold him responsible for an inspection outcome 18 months after he has left the organisation!! There have been 3 interim CEO/Principals since then, and they should be held accountable for the recent inspection outcome as they have clearly had a highly detrimental impact on the college.
    Sir Pete Birkett was the first FE leader to sponsor failing schools and this practice had a significant impact at a national level and many other FE colleges followed his lead. The schools that he sponsored were the absolute worst two performing schools in Luton, both in Special Measures and at the bottom of the Luton league tables. They are now the top two schools in Luton and many, many thousands of students’ lives have been transformed for the better. Barnfield West was the ‘Most Improved School in the Country 2008’ and Barnfield South was the ‘3rd Most Improved School in the Country 2013’ with the value-added score in the top 1% of schools. Sir Peter ensured that Barnfield was at the very forefront of the academy movement and he was knighted because of all of his transformational work in transforming the lives of the most deprived students in the town. It is totally ridiculous and outrageous to suggest that the knighthood of such a visionary, cutting-edge leader should be removed. Have some sense, stop the witch-hunt, and recognise his achievements rather than resent them.

    • Steve Henderson

      Under his leadership, the Barnfield College was graded as ‘Outstanding’ during the 2007 Ofsted inspection

      Wrong! It was a grade 1 when he took it over. It went tragically downhill once he started

      • Applause to Steve Henderson. Bsrnfield College already held Beacon Grade 1 status when Pete Birkett joined the organisation. When the Rotheram Avenue (South Site) was sold under his leadership the Learning Support Department was almost depleted. Resouces were curbed and staff moral waned. The Academies became his sole goal to the detriment of the College, its staff and its students. Pete Birkett is a political animal and he used Barnfield as his ladder to gain his knighthood. Her is an arrogant man who liked to have his own way and did so. I am really saddened to learn the fate of this once great learning establishment. Later CEOs/Principals would certainly have struggled to put right the problems caused under this mans management.

  12. Shocking one sided story. Barnfield is a stunningly successful academy chain, led by a college who took some leadership and accountability for the low standards in the worst performing secondaries in Luton. No one else want to sponsor them and they had been in that position for some time, failing pupils. Why is the context not reported ever?
    The improvement was stunning and he was rightly recognised. Easy to criticise – I have much more respect to those who stand up and make a difference to childrens lives.

  13. Steve Henderson

    So, Robin Somerville, the present chair of Barnfield governors partly blames this atrocious inspection on the ‘previous teaching staff’. It was these very same staff that were in post in 2007 when the college achieved an ‘outstanding’ grade 1 but, as a result of the management’s ‘irregularity’ when it came to handing the college finances, ended up being made redundant. How could these teachers be held responsible for the present poor teaching and learning when they were not in post in November 2014 when the inspectors visited???
    Incidentally, ‘B’, the college had been already awarded a grade 1 before Birkett took over in 2007 (did he tell you that?)
    Dibsdall, Fisher and Box failed to grasp the reality of the problem and were clearly out of their depth. Somerville joins them.