League tables are for football — not for schools

NOW that feeder school league tables are again upon us, it might be timely to reflect on the call made earlier this year by the heads of two of England’s leading independent schools, Eton and St Paul’s, for an end to the “tyranny” of league tables.

Why would these schools, which stand to benefit most from league tables and which originally welcomed them as “a breath of fresh air”, now think so differently?

Because, in their words, the system is, inter alia, “placing huge pressure on teachers to teach exclusively to produce exam results; that instead of throwing a lifebelt to struggling schools is holding them underwater; is harming the teaching of sport, music and drama and is giving nervous breakdowns to top-performing schools lest they fall out of the top”.