Coventry's Finham Park 2 in trouble with watchdog for misleading advert

The bosses of newly-created free school Finham Park 2 in Coventry have been told they cannot claim the it is ‘world class’.



The school, which was opened on a temporary site at Finham Park School in September, made the claim on its website and ran into trouble with the Advertising Standards Authority.

The ASA ruled on March 25 last year that the description of Finham Park 2 could be misleading and could not yet be proven.

An assessment by the ASA noted that the ‘world class’ was not an official rating system used by Ofsted.

The authority said that the way the term world class was presented, with capital letters and inverted commas, alongside references to academic qualifications suggested that they were using the term objectively and not aspirationally.

The assessment read: “We noted that, although Finham Park 2 was to be run by the same team that ran a high performing school nearby, Finham Park 2 had not opened at the time of the ad.

"We understood that it was therefore not possible to see evidence for the qualifications pupils at Finham Park 2 had achieved. We considered the ad was likely to mislead.”

The authority ruled that the ad breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 3.1 (Misleading advertising) and 3.7 (Substantiation).

The school were told that the ad could not remain on the Finham Park II website and bosses were warned not to used objective ratings if they have not been awarded.

The website now says the school "aspires" to be world class, and has world class "ambitions".

Finham Park II opened in temporary accommodation in September at the existing Finham Park site, in Green Lane, but will move to the former Land Registry site, in Torrington Avenue.