City And Islington College - Sixth Form College

The way this school is handling mental health is honestly quite appalling, my son has been struggling a lot because of covid and the constant pressure for attendance has been insane, especially since he HAS been trying. This college needs to understand that with the current situation, students are quite obviously going through a hard time and rather than threatening to kick them out for school work or attendance, there should be more support and help. And maybe perhaps looking into why they may be finding it difficult to attend classes.

Unfortunately this college seems quite prejudice to the type of students it accepts. Many of the vocational level 3 courses clearly state that as long as a student has an equivalent Level 2 qualification at Pass or above level or has achieved a grade 4 in English OR /AND maths they can continue to complete the level 3 course with the support of also taking on studying their GCSE English/ Maths to achieve their grade 4.

However, many students get turned away if they do not have grade 4's in both English AND Maths, only to then be told that they also need grade 4 in other qualifications - going against the actual factual requirements of the course.

This therefore implicates that the college is very subjective of the type of student they accept and provide further disadvantage and to those students who clearly fit the course requirements and are judged for being lower level learners.

Also implicating that the quality of teaching and learning may not be fit for purpose to offer challenge and engagement to learners of both end of the spectrum.

Really disappointed with the elitism mentality of this college. Education should be an open and equal forum for all students who meet the criteria of the course they intend to study.

This college shouldn’t even get a 1 star
Do not go to this college!my son wasted a year doing level 2 , tutors were even on long term sick or would cancel lessons on the day .
He thought he was going to do a level 3 in September, has been told today he was not successful when his course starts in 3 days time !
This college is a joke, can’t get hold of anyone, they have not told him what options he can do

This college is not reliable if you get extra time in exams or have any learning difficulties. From the start of year 12 I was Guaranteed extra time and then when time came for me to sit my alevels, the extra time department didn’t even let the exam boards know! My overall experience was great but when it came down to doing my actual exams, there was no support. That whole extra time departure needs to be fired. The amount of stress I was put through on my first exam day just because someone was lazy and ‘forgot’ about my extra time. Even when I bought this up after my exams no one took it seriously, including the management team.

This college should not exist! The tutors are good, but after an year, I am still waiting for my certificate. No one cares, as long as they take your money.

This college is by far the worst college in the country. When i was attending we only had 2 teachers who taught throughout the year. I was only going in 3 days a week (full time). In the year that i attended MOST classes were cancelled because just one teachers father died. As a result the other teacher decided to cancel classes as well. There was a substitute teacher that came in to teach for a few months, we later discovered everything he taught us was wrong and was discarded. At the end of the year i decided to leave and i did not complete my course. This college wasted 1 year of my life. I barely left with P's due to the terrible teaching. My teacher had the audacity to ask why I'm leaving the college when i was "doing so well". Send your kids to this school only if you don't like them. But if you value your childs existence, teach them yourselves. The education system in this country in general is a complete failure. For once in history students are trying to study but our teachers are failing to do their job.

As a parent, (mom pov)
This is a horrible disappointment of a sixth form college. My son started school 4 weeks ago and since then has been burdened with stress from this school. This resulting from the messed up timetable , teachers being incredibly stubborn. Extremely unforgiving and not helpful at all. They tried to put my son in a lower level of education simply because he couldn't meet the attendance standard. He tried to change one of his subjects he was supposedly struggling in but they rejected him as other the subject already full which is ridiculously untrue. Despite being a central London Sixth form college I have to say they are absolute failure in giving kids a effective and good education.

At the beginning of the year (September 2020) I don’t know why we were learning remotely and most of our lessons were online. This college makes my mental health even worse. And then they make year 13s to do assessments (teacher assessments grade) at the beginning of May and gives us so little time to catch up all the things we miss, absolutely horrendous and looks like a prison. City and Islington college will ruin your futures so please don’t go there!