David Jesson
David Frederick St John Jesson (born 23 August 1935)[1] is a British educationalist and a professor in the Department of Economics at the University of York, who studied specialist schools and value-added performance (CVA).
Early life and career[edit]
He was born in Hackney in 1935, the son of Frederick John and Florence Jesson, and attended the University of Manchester and the University of Cambridge. He became a Maths teacher, teaching in several schools, state and independent, including Charterhouse School and Lincoln Christ's Hospital School.
Jesson next joined the University of Sheffield, where he developed the contextual value-added system of school performance measurement. This involves looking at the relative improvement of pupils, not their absolute performance, to establish how much 'value' has been 'added'.
In 1995 he joined the University of York as Professor in the Economics department. He worked in the CPERM department, in the Department of Economics and Related studies, under Professor David Mayston. As of December 2021[update], he is listed as an associate member of York's Centre for Research on Education and Social Justice.[2]
Research[edit]
His work on 'value-added' performance came from the belief that working from absolute exam grades was too crude a measurement, as pupils from different backgrounds and schools found it much more of a challenge to gain the same grades as someone from a more privileged background.
Science education[edit]
In 2007 he found that 68% of all comprehensive schools – around 2,020 – did not offer the three separate science courses at GCSE, and that only one in 20 pupils at state schools took physics, chemistry and biology at GCSE.[citation needed]
Academically bright children[edit]
In a report in April 2008 for the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust, he found that academically bright children at comprehensive schools were likely to do better when there were more academically bright children at the same school. This was from data on more than 150,000 children, and involved his 'value-added' measurements. The higher the proportion of 'able' pupils, the better the value-added performance.[citation needed]
In November 2005, he reported at the Birmingham annual conference of the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust (which represented around 2,400 secondary schools) that pupils at private school in the top academic 5% were almost guaranteed to get three A-grades at A-level, yet for state schools only a third of the top 5% would get three A-grades. He called this a 'severe talent drain' in the state school system. In the same speech he said that Britain's future economic success depended on identifying and nurturing this top 5% of pupils.
Personal life[edit]
In 1965 he married Catherine Whitehead; they had three children.[3] He lives in St. Ives, Cornwall.
References[edit]
- ^ Companies House
- ^ "Research people – Education". University of York. Archived from the original on 30 July 2018. Retrieved 27 December 2021.
- ^ "Freebmd Search". Retrieved 10 July 2012.
External links[edit]
- Personal website, archived in May 2012
- Centre for Performance Evaluation and Resource Management – University of York, archived in February 2011
- Specialist schools conference, archived in August 2011
News items[edit]
- Faith schools, November 2009 – BBC
- Specialist schools, January 2009 – BBC
- Faith schools, December 2007 – The Telegraph
- Grammar schools, November 2007 – BBC
- Church schools, February 2006 – BBC
- 1935 births
- Living people
- Academics of the University of York
- Alumni of the University of Cambridge
- Alumni of the University of Manchester
- English educational theorists
- English mathematicians
- Schoolteachers from London
- English statisticians
- Mathematics educators
- People from the London Borough of Hackney
- People from St Ives, Cornwall
- Socio-economic mobility
- Specialist schools
- Academics of the University of Sheffield