Kilmarnock Academy

It is an okay school there is alot of clubs

If I had to sum up the school in a few words I would say it is a low progression school with a very mixed, and difficult, intake and overall has very low ambitions for its pupils. I work in Glasgow and the opportunities for able pupils to learn and develop in KA compared to work colleagues children's schools are night and day.

My son did well in his exams, not because of KA, but because of an enormous amount of support at home. If left to KA it would have been a very different story. One thing I would say to parents of pupils starting at KA is to read the handbook, buried in there is a clue about what you need to do for your child to succeed at this school. KA gives out very little homework (the cynic in me suspects this is because it means teachers do not need to chase disengaged students, mark it and give feedback!), in the handbook it tells you how much self-study your child should be doing - heed that advice and support your child to do it. They won't want to, because their friends probably won't be doing it, but without homework from the school to support and guide revision and studying you will need to learn how to encourage your own child and plug the huge gaps.

Also be aware, if you child is doing just ok it is very easy for them to become invisible - this became apparent in 3rd year parents evening when more than one teacher actually said to me "I don't know what to do with your son, he is doing everything I need him to do, marks are great but I don’t have time to do anything with him, I need to focus on those that are struggling". My son is bright, but not exceptionally so, he had to work hard for his grades. He had times when he was very disengaged with some classes, he would complete in class work, ask for more, complete it, and then have to sit and stare into space waiting for the lesson to end as there was nothing else the teacher had prepared to give him.

The school has nothing for pupils doing well. 3 times we had lip service of pupils being highlighted as capable, an unexpected letter home saying they would be getting extension work or extra support which gave us some hope, but not one single thing materialised. Do not expect anything beyond the absolute minimum information or any support for university applications (the good news is you will get a widening access uni offer from some unis because you come from a school flagged as being so poor!)

Most of the teachers my son had were the definition of apathetic, or at least that is what they display to the pupils, as with any organisation this apathy will be a culture that comes from the top of the school. Some openly tell pupils of their issues with the school, one example was a teacher repeatedly telling the class that two teachers sharing their Higher class each teacher delivering different units at the same time was the wrong way for them to be taught, but the school was making them do it this way and it wasn't their fault if they didn't do well.

That aside, KA, like any school, has a few very exceptional, skilled teachers that really engaged my son and his learning over his 6 years at KA. The ones that he personally had that stood out were - Mrs Tweedy whose expert delivery gave him a firm foundation and ignited a real love of maths, Mr Robertson although slightly disorganised made his worst and dreaded subject English fun and gave him the confidence he could do it if he put his mind to it (he got an A!) and last but not least he was very fortunate to have the legend, Mr Struthers for 3 years for Physics. Mr Struthers, a strong role model who clearly loves being a teacher and I suspect will have no idea how much he stands out in the school and inspires his pupils both for Physics, learning and also as young men.

Many teachers themselves are good but the higher ups consistently handle things poorly. Pastoral support offer little to no help to students who most need the help. Students not allowed appropriate study time as only S6 can remain inside. Despite every year group being allowed in for the first half of lunch so no difference would be made for them to remain inside instead of them mixing year groups outside. No social distancing in the corridors and masks are poorly enforced giving pupils no choice but to feel exposed to the virus. Only safety against the virus is a hand sanitiser bottle in every classroom even if that and sometimes the bottles are even filled with watered down soap. The school is actively keeping all new covid cases surrounding staff a secret, like the janitors who have caught covid. Many new cases of covid in the school but there has been no attempt to deep clean the building. Many teachers hand out work without sanitising first which further puts pupils at risk. Some teachers don’t have the patience right now to be dealing with classes. Higher pupils are struggling in particular as they are left with little to none supported study and consistently kicked out at lunch which ultimately isn’t fair as this will be a hard year for them.

teachers are decent, higher ups handle things poorly