FOI request details

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Request

Subject: Exclusions in Wandsworth over past five years

Reference: WBC-FOI-00581

Could you please provide me with:

  • The number of children permanently excluded from a school in Wandsworth each year for the past five years?

  • That number as percentage of school children in the borough?

  • The number of those excluded children who went on to attend Wandsworth Pupil Referral Unite provision, and of those who was subsequently moved back to a mainstream setting prior to the end of their compulsory education?

  • The number of those excluded children who were successfully moved to a different school in the borough under a 'managed move'?

  • A comment on how successful appeals are against a decision to exclude? I had a case at a Cllr surgery so wondered how often appeals are made and succeed.

Response

Part Disclosed - 14 February 2023

Our Response:

1. The number of children permanently excluded from a school in Wandsworth each year for the past five years?

Answer:

The top row is in red because that is internal data and the other data is public.

Apart from the first line data sourced from:

https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/permanent-and-fixed-period-exclusions-in-england/2020-21

time_period la_name school_type headcount perm_excl perm_excl_rate suspension susp_rate

202122 Wandsworth Total 33512 8 0.02 1132 3.38 Provisional (Currently not published)

202021 Wandsworth Total 33916 5 0.01 713 2.10

201920 Wandsworth Total 34229 4 0.01 587 1.71

201819 Wandsworth Total 34117 16 0.05 779 2.28

201718 Wandsworth Total 33657 19 0.06 899 2.67

2. That number as percentage of school children in the borough?

Answer:

The top row is in red because that is internal data and the other data is public.

Apart from the first line data sourced from:

https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/permanent-and-fixed-period-exclusions-in-england/2020-21

time_period la_name school_type headcount perm_excl perm_excl_rate suspension susp_rate

202122 Wandsworth Total 33512 8 0.02 1132 3.38 Provisional (Currently not published)

202021 Wandsworth Total 33916 5 0.01 713 2.10

201920 Wandsworth Total 34229 4 0.01 587 1.71

201819 Wandsworth Total 34117 16 0.05 779 2.28

201718 Wandsworth Total 33657 19 0.06 899 2.67

3. The number of those excluded children who went on to attend Wandsworth Pupil Referral Unite provision

Answer: 16 - a number of children went directly to another Wandsworth school or were no longer attending a Wandsworth schools after the exclusion date.

and of those who was subsequently moved back to a mainstream setting prior to the end of their compulsory education?

Answer: We are not able to verify this number as children may have left the PRU to go to schools in other boroughs and we only hold data for Wandsworth State schools.

4. The number of those excluded children who were successfully moved to a different school in the borough under a 'managed move'?

Answer: Data not held

5. A comment on how successful appeals are against a decision to exclude? I had a case at a Cllr surgery so wondered how often appeals are made and succeed.

Answer:

In terms of exclusion 'appeals', appeal is a term which refers to a previous process and this has been replaced by the 'Exclusion Review' procedure. Schools will have either set up their own independent review process or elected to 'buy in' to Wandsworth Democratic Services or offer an independent Review Service. For this reason, we are able to advise the number of reviews that have been received and the success rate of these (for those schools that use Democratic Services). 'Success' is a relative word here as an exclusion review panel have the power to direct the school's Governing Board (GB) to reconsider the reinstatement of the child and/or 'quash' the decision and direct the GB reconsider the reinstatement of the child, but ultimately they cannot direct the school /GB to reinstate a permanently excluded child.

Our records within the last 5 years (up to January 2018) of the exclusion reviews managed by Wandsworth Democratic Services are as follows:

Upheld in favour of the governing body's decision: <5

Recommended to reconsider reinstatement: <5

Quashed and the governing body directed to consider again: 5

You will notice that the phrase 'fewer than 5' (<5) has been used in lieu of some exact figures above. This is because the Council considers that disclosure of very low numbers of individuals would enable the identification of a living individual from that information, or, from the information and other data in the possession of, or likely to come into the possession of, a data controller. Disclosure of the requested information would result in a breach of one or more of the principles of the GDPR/DPA 2018 and the information is therefore exempt in accordance with Section 40(2) of the Freedom of Information Act.

Please note that our responses were accurate to the best of our knowledge at the time of release, and have not subsequently been updated. This information should be considered an historical record only.