Frank Montgomery School

Frank Montgomery Secondary Modern School

Motto	"Strive for the Right"
Type	Secondary Modern
Headteacher	Closed 2007
Location	Bredlands Lane Sturry Kent CT2 0HD England
Local authority	Kent
DfE number	886/5453
DfE URN	118925 Tables
Students	Closed 2007
Gender	Mixed
Ages	11–18
Colours	Bottle green

The Frank Montgomery School was a mixed-gender secondary modern school in the village of Sturry near Canterbury in east Kent. The school served children aged 11 to 16 until its closure in 2007. The school was founded in 1935, and was originally known as Sturry Secondary Modern School. It changed its name to Frank Montgomery in 1985. The former school's site is now home to Spires Academy.

As a secondary modern school the Frank Montgomery School was a non-selective school which tended to take in pupils who had failed to pass the controversial Eleven-Plus exam set by Kent County Council to stream children to attend either selective grammar schools or non-selective secondary modern schools. According to Anthony Sampson, in his book Anatomy of Britain (1965), there were structural problems within the testing process that underpinned the eleven plus which meant it tended to result in secondary modern schools being overwhelmingly dominated by the children of poor and working class parents, while grammar schools were dominated by the children of wealthier middle class parents. To some extent the Frank Montgomery School corresponded to this pattern by being dominated by poor and working class children, and by having both low academic expectations and poor examination results.

The Frank Montgomery School was placed in special measures in 1998 due to poor Ofsted inspection reports, although it left special measures five years later following intervention by the Local Education Authority and Ofsted. However, in 2004 the BBC reported that the school was still bottom in the national school league tables for GCSE examination results in England and Wales, with just 4% of pupils on the school roll achieving any GCSEs at grade C or above. Three years later, at the point of its closure, the school had risen from bottom place to thirteenth from bottom with 7% of pupils achieving the official requirement of five or more GCSE results at grade C or above, and 43% of pupils gaining at least one GCSE at grade C or above.

The school returned to special measures in 2005 and remained there until its closure in 2007, at which point a new Academy School was formed on the same campus, taking in the former pupils of Frank Montgomery.

The Frank Montgomery School was not only controversial due to its poor academic results. In 1997 its then headmaster, Rodney Freakes, was quoted as saying he was "impressed with the loyalty of the pupils to their teachers" following a riot by 200 pupils at the school in protest at the sacking of five of their teachers.

Results for Pupils GCSE Examinations

Year	% Gaining Any Grades A* to C
1997	13%
1998	21%
1999	9%
2000	14%
2001	10%
2002	19%
2003	7%
2004	4%
2005	26%
2006	43%

Source: Ofsted

Headmasters and Headmistresses

• Betty Chapman
• Rodney Freakes
• Ian McGinn

Notable former pupils

• Nic Ayling, TV Producer [1]
• Simon Burles, TV Sound Engineer [2]
• Rusty Goffe, actor
• Paul Hussey, Chef
• Michael Paraskos, novelist and anarchist art critic
• Terry Richardson, musician [3]
• Claire Taylor, Lady Mayoress for Canterbury [4]
• Christian Darcy Willett, competitive motorbike racer
• Derek Minter, motorcycle champion