Talk:Wellacre Academy

Requested move

Wellacre Technology College → Wellacre Academy — College converted to Academy status on 1 January 2011 and as such old name is deprecated. Name change to be entered into article at some point.--212.159.21.125 (talk) 17:40, 2 January 2011 (UTC)

 Done--Kotniski (talk) 09:26, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

Style

"The breakdown of distribution figures for our Year 11 leavers in 2007 were as follows;". The article doesn't read like it should.

Willplatts (talk) 20:11, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Going further

Have you come to a temporary stop on this one? If so I can lend a hand. Are you from the Manchester Area, because there are things that a local will forget to say. Flixton is in the shadow of the giant Carrington petro-chemical complex. This school is a sister school to Flixton Girls School, and as they are in Trafford it is a boys secondary modern with no top end ability wise. The clue to how it is performing is in the difference between the school roll and its capacity. Girls sec mods were always more popular, as they were seen as a safer place who then wouldn't meet predatory boys crossing town to the Girls Grammar. Boys from Trafford were sent to proper comprehensives over the border in Cheshire if they had parents with drive. Why does it not have a sixth form- well it did but they closed it in 2015, I think. For any school, Google 'Wellacre Academy Closure Notice' or 'Wellacre Academy Appraisal' both find interesting things. The closure notice parental consultation gives the figures for numbers in the sixthform, a reference in the Manchester Evening News tells us that the Manchester Arena bomber was an old boy but didn't make it to the end of the fifth form! The best gem is the auto-biographical novel Joe Public which gives a description of life here as a disaffected child. I have ordered a copy from BetterWorldBooks- you can pick up snippet on Google Books- start at page 60 as you are limmited to the number of pages- and I ran out before getting to the relevant bits. One random tidbit was that for the first few years, until the building was completed, classes were held at the Girls school. I've looked at the time and it is now Epiphany ClemRutter (talk) 00:13, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Hi ClemRutter, was this message for me? I just came across this school and decided to work on it, I've expanded it a lot but I have reached a dead end in terms of sources online to expand it more (rest of the sources I've found are just minor events and individual student achievements that wouldn't be suitable for an encyclopedia). I already checked Google Books but nothing except a mention about it blocking "any sight of the railway line or diesel engine exhaust" and the book you mentioned above (you linked to a disambiguation page by the way and is page 60 the right one because that's part of a terrible section haha) — the book does say "There was always talk of Wellacre becoming a mixed comprehensive school, but it never happened while I was there", but I don't think it would be suitable to write about a former students time at the school? But if there is anything of value in that book that can be added to the article please do, such as you mentioned about classes being held at the Girls school. I know Flixton Girls School is a sister school but reference? -I did see an article on a combined prom.

As for the sixth form (closed in 2017) and Manchester Arena bomber, this is already covered in the article. If there is anything to add from that book and if someone can do a check on Newspapers.com to see if there is anything, I think this article may be ready for GA? Steven (Editor) (talk) 03:34, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Steven (Editor) Sorry if this a little brief but real life has kicked in. Last night I wanted you to have a look at our solitary low importance GA St George's Academy. It too is a secondary modern, pretending to be non-selective. I liked the way it was written- but then checked up on the 160 references! I have commented on the use of primary and secondary sources on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Schools it seemed to me that what they were doing was right though it is contrary to our wording. I was suggesting that there is a difference between using a text that has been open to legal scrutiny, (good} and promotional material or opinion (bad). Au contraire I dont think that an independent source that quotes directly from a press release can be considered secondary unless the independent source stated that in their opinion that is correct.

Tonight- I wanted to share this wonderful site. Manchester Evening News- wellacre-technology-academy. It confirms what I suspected- the school is hideously unpopular and getting more so. The clue was in the infobox- it is only a third full, and couldn't persuade any kids to stay on after sixteen.

I asked you to say where you living at the moment- this is important when writing about any school in Kent, Lincolnshire and Trafford. These three authorities never implemented Circular 10/65 or 11/66- the circulars that removed selection by ability and introducing full-comprehensive education. That has to be mentioned to explain why the ability level of the intake is so distorted. It is so ludicrous most UK teachers are blissfully ignorant. An anecdote from around 1999, a fellow experienced dupple teacher as me ' I'm getting on fine, but I haven't come across any bright kids- where are the kids that would previously have gone to a grammar school?' My reply- ' in the grammar school round the corner- this is Kent.' It hasn't changed, its a educational Jurrasic Park.

Any change in the schools status, or name change needs be tied to the enabling legislation and crucially the local authorities interpretation of that legislation.

Last night on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Schools I spoke on staying on focus and tried to introduce the concept of 'core' and peripheral information. I don't think that mobile phones or solar panels is core. Both need to be added as a peripheral paragraph to the unwritten buildings section.

I could write more but real-life is intervening. ClemRutter (talk) 22:10, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

Page organization

The History section is a bit of a jumble. I suggest starting a new section at the end, "Awards and honors", and moving the information about awards and such to there. The solar panels paragraph should probably also be moved to a later section. Yoninah (talk) 21:46, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Done, Steven (Editor) (talk) 00:34, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

Thank you, it looks terrific now! Yoninah (talk) 11:18, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

Welcome and thank you for the suggestions Steven (Editor) (talk) 02:47, 13 January 2020 (UTC)