The equity argument for ambition

A low-pitched KS3 is an inconvenience for some pupils.

For others, it closes doors, and that’s because pupils with plenty of academic support beyond school can usually compensate. They have the vocabulary, the background knowledge, the wider reading. It means that if school doesn’t stretch them, something else will.

But for pupils who rely on school to open doors, a thin KS3 is a ceiling.

This is the equity argument for ambition.

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When we lower the pitch to be kind, we don’t remove the difficulty. Instead, we simply shift it, very often into Year 10, into interventions, and into gaps that become harder to close later on.

High expectations, well scaffolded, are not a luxury for high prior attainers, they are the entitlement of every child.

We keep asking “What can they cope with?” when we should be asking “What do they deserve access to?”

Too often the KS3 curriculum is pitched low because it feels safer.

This is one of the themes I explore in KS3: The Ambitious Years available here.

Until next time

Mary