To not really understand academies and what effects tomorrow's budget will have?

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It is suspected that the budget will announce all schools are to become academies..

Can someone explain in very basic terms

1. What is an academy?
2. What are the pros/cons?
3. What is stealth privatisation?
4. Do they really use 'teachers' with no qualifications?
5. What will this mean to parents and children?

Thanks

I'd just say that there is a lot of money flows out of academies to "consultants" and in lots of cases these appear to have been relatives or friends of the wel remunerated directors of the academy chains. It was something like £800,000 from one schools trust, just one, that buys a lot of text books!

My son is SEN and goes to a special unit specialising in ASD which is attached to an academy so there are academies which will cater for SEN. Would be potluck on where you live though.

What will happen to PRUs? Will academies want to run those?

If you don't like this you need to become as engaged, if not more, than you were about the Men B vaccine. There were 800.000+ signatures. I'd like to see a similar reaction about this.

Rooftop it doesn't matter where the children with SEN will end up even if that means they have no school place. The Tories don't need to concern themselves with children who will have no chance of being a high earner who will contribute lots of tax when they are an adult or will be expensive to educate compared to pupils with no SEN who can achieve good GCSE results with minimum expenditure.

Parents with SEN will end up having to accept that school is a) little more than a child minding service and b) that they will either have to home educate or send their children to private schools.

I can't see how Academy status will improve a school. If 20% of headteachers are inadequate, then they will still be inadequate regardless of the type of school they work at. It wont magic up more good headteachers.

Also if local councils have to make sure that there is enough school places for all children in their local area, how are they going to do this if they cannot influence any of the local schools (like make them larger) or create new spaces as they have no power to create a new school as only outside companies can do that and may not want to in certain areas.

I can't see how Academy status will improve a school. If 20% of headteachers are inadequate, then they will still be inadequate regardless of the type of school they work at. It wont magic up more good headteachers.

No - it won't but, in theory it should make them no worse, but allow other schools to get better... Dealing with headteachers who are inadequate / governors who don't govern / etc. is really a different issue - if they are inadequate under the LA, they will be under most circumstances... 2 different issues...

The theory is that an academy is able to sack inadequate teachers outright, as they don't have to abide by teachers' pay and conditions, or negotiate with unions. They can then replace them with outstanding teachers because they will be able to offer them higher salaries. Theoretically.
And goodness me, they could also dispense with high- earning, experienced, jaded (expensive) teachers and replace them with enthusiastic, fresh, (cheap) newly qualified /unqualified teachers.

My daughters school changed to an academy 4 years ago, it was going into special measures before they took over. Three years later the academy was in the top four for best gcse results (we live in a quite big city).
They are well known for turning under achieving schools around, my daughter is in year 11, and by all the meetings we've had they are going to get even better results this year.

I found when going to parent evenings, the teachers are dedicated and want the best for the pupils, they've given a lot of help and support when needed.
The academy taking over was definately the best thing for the school, my daughter agrees even though she thinks they are far to strict!!

I work in an academy. It switched about 6 years ago.

We were persuaded (most staff were not keen) as it would mean we have lots more available funds to benefit the school. Were promised pay would not be affected, and conditions the same.

As an academy they can change the pay scales as they wish, change our working conditions so reduce holidays, increase hours, remove a lot of the safe guards teachers have which unions have fought for - our directed time restricts us to only one after school meeting a week, no meetings during our 'unpaid' lunchtimes, no duties during lunchtime and similar things.

An academy can reduce a teachers pay if they so wish - am sure many wouldn't stick around if that happened so doubt it would happen much! Also from a teachers point of view if I was to move to a new job I wouldn't necessarily have my experience reflected in my pay - with the LEA system your level moved with you. The grade I am on in my current job can be ignored by a new school and they can offer me a Newly Qualified salary even with years of experience!

Over the past 6 years there was some investment in the buildings- our business manager got a pay rise and our office staff seem to have increased a lot, we have a lot of improved sports facilities and paid for a big name football manager to come and open them!

However I am currently arguing for some responsibility money as I am running a whole GCSE course and not getting a penny for it to be told we don't have any money left.

We do have unqualified teachers teaching, and this seems to be creeping in more and more.

I am not convinced it is the best thing for students or teachers, students and parents may not see too many changes if all things carry on without issues - our parents would not be aware of our budget limitations currently - its just the staff who are feeling it.

My school has sent letters home saying they are teaming up with other schools and forming a trust so they DON'T have to become an academy?
So is this not what will be happening then?

My DS's school was in special measures and they became an academy in the summer term. 5 years later and they are in the top 100 schools in the country.
However, they have a very good head who listens to the local community when they do consultations and have a low staff turnover. I think that's probably quite rare amongst academies.

Timri I think they mean an academy trust. They will still be an academy.

The letter definitely said they were forming a trust to prevent them becoming an academy Cam

our office staff seem to have increased a lot

The office staff would have to increase in number as many admin jobs were being done by the local council, such as the Payroll, HR Services, Administrating the various pension schemes, etc. All costs that some academies are suddenly shocked that they have to actually pay for.

Our primary school is an academy. All teachers qualified, national curriculum taught. It's part of the Co-op, so follows cooperative values (preferable in my book). The only noticeable changes have been positive, new books, furniture etc. Its Ofsted has also improved. So not all doom and gloom!

It's mainly finance based jobs or additional pastoral support who basically give staff a lot more jobs to do! - we still buy in a lot of services from LA payroll being one of them! We already had a HR person.

Business managers wife seemed to get a nice cushy number as well!

We have very shiny new automatic gates though, and a pointless inside astro turf pitch which is only match suitable for up to u12's due to it's size! We are a secondary!

If you are struggling to pay your main teaching staff what they should be getting due to spending on big ticket items you start losing the goodwill of your staff!

With regard to faith schools, I wonder if the faith in question will still be required to make their token financial contribution in order to give priority/exclusivity to their own or if as an academy they can still discriminate without paying anything because they make their own admission rules. It would be interesting if other academies could then give admission priority to self declared atheists.

I don't like the idea of education being privatised and run for profit. Where's the regulation to make sure kids are all being taught the correct things and they aren't deliberately excluding special needs pupils if an authority isn't keeping an eye on it?

Sadly a lot of these things were part of why teachers went out on strike over the past few years - couldn't be officially as legally they are not allowed to do so but got very little public support.

I have family who moan about their school being turned into an academy, changes to the curriculum, assessment process etc but will not accept its not down to the teachers but government - have strong suspicion voted Tory!

Our primary became an academy a while ago, I don't think it's changed at all really. They are skint big time though.

So if schools are/going to be academies, how does the LEA have an jurisdiction when it comes to not taking holidays in term time? I don't understand this at all.

All schools being turned into Academies really worries me. It will be really hard for those on low incomes and benefits to be able to afford the uniform and equipment that they have to get. When my GD started her high school, thankfully not an academy, it cost £94 for Blazer, tie and PE kit, everything else could be bought locally. Her friend who went to an Academy had to pay over £300 for the required equipment that could only be bought from the school. These are not schools they are businesses.

"And goodness me, they could also dispense with high- earning, experienced, jaded (expensive) teachers and replace them with enthusiastic, fresh, (cheap) newly qualified /unqualified teachers."
Not sure if this was supposed to be a good thing? If you think hiring inexperienced, unqualified staff to teach is a great thing your a flipping moron.

Yeah, cause inexperienced staff are good with difficult classes ( fuck me they take it out of experienced members), they can handle a syllabus change where you plan a new set of lessons to different targets, whilst also still delivering a large proportion of lessons and grading to seperate targets. They don't need more time to plan prep and mark.

Great attack on teachers there, well done you, well done, round of applause for the right wing wolly.

I read that response very differently-i read it as Goblin very much thought replacing experienced staff with inexperienced staff was not a good thing, lurked.

I research this field, and have published in the areas, so here are some answers and comments in response to the OP.

1. What is an academy? Legally, an academy is a special kind of independent school that does not charge fees. These can be former state comprehensive schools (e.g. Pimlico) or former private schools (e.g. Belvedere).

1. What are the pros/cons?

PROS a. Schools can personalise their curricula to make them suitable for the children in their care. They can even ditch the National Curriculum. (But they are still going to appear in league tables for public examinations and SATs, so GCSEs can't disappear any time soon in most cases). b. Schools can hire teachers without QTS, which might be useful for subjects such as music, drama and laboratory science, where professional expertise exists outside the teacher training context. c. To some extent they can develop their facilities, although there are various significant and inhibiting limitations on them being able to borrow against future income and the value of their estate. d. Schools are likely to have more money in their kitties, although they will have to buy a huge number of external services in ranging from psychologists to payroll, and this will cost more than a local authority doing it for schools en masse.

CONS
a. The reservations about handing over land and property to academy chains and even the schools themselves is to some extent justified. Most academies want the best for the children in their charge but there is scope for abuse, for example developing facilities which profit (and distract) a few people running a management company and which make relatively little money for the school itself. We have already seen some examples of this.
b. The Government will have to revise the admissions code so that adverse selection (cherry picking) of pupils does not become rife, as it did in the early days of academies. At the moment, again, there is some scope for abuse, so there will have to be stringent checks.
c. They have paved the way for future legislation regarding profit-bearing contracts to run schools. This is risky. In Sweden profit making companies came in to run their version of Free Schools, resulting in one or two firms collapsing financially with serious consequences for pupils. They tended to trim SEN, sports and school library facilities in order to turn a profit. There is scope for this to happen in both academies and free schools in the UK, if future legislation allows it.
d. Academies can pay teachers less and make them work more. In principle this sounds like a good way to reform the profession but in practice it leads to classroom instability for many children with no uplift in attainment - in fact some do a lot worse.
e. The DfE has proved itself utterly incapable of managing the limited number of academies it already has, with academic and financial difficulties for many institutions not being picked up properly, even massive fraud. It is unlikely it will be able to oversee 24,000 of them. The role of Local School Commissioners may therefore have to grow.
f. Academies are a lot less democratic and accountable to parents and can do what they like in many respects. If they want to bring in a £500 uniform and make you feel you have to pay for skiing trips to Zermatt, they can (having expensive uniforms and extras is a long-standing way cunning schools exclude certain groups of deprived pupils, and keep their results up without necessarily being the best at actually teaching).
g. If a school burns down, or there is a baby boom, it is possible there will be nowhere for pupils to go. Local Authorities are currently legally obliged to find places for children to go or to provide alternative education. If they haven't got any schools, this isn't viable so they may have to buy in places from the private sector, or send children out of county. In extremis people may find themselves sending their children to other parts of the country to boarding school, although the numbers doing this will probably only be in the dozens.

1. What is stealth privatisation? Allowing companies to run schools for profit, in the first instance by letting state schools commission services such as payroll and psychological assessment from profit-making companies, and then handing over increasing numbers of functions to these private companies so in the end everything is on a business footing. It also means giving the land and facilities to the private sector, and also removing some of the democratic processes underpinning education, e.g. local representation from the community on governing bodies.

1. Do they really use 'teachers' with no qualifications? Not really, unless you count the dodgy practice of letting teaching assistants more or less deliver lessons single handed because the school is disorganised. Most people without QTS but teaching will have some training or experience in education, or be working towards a qualification, just like in independent fee-paying schools. What these people won't have much of is special expertise in handling diversity issues, SEN and also children with deprivation, which is a key focus in British initial teacher training and something we are respected for around the world (not that you would know from the British media!). This will need attention and so I think there will be a push towards getting qualifications on the job for people with none at all.

1. What will this mean to parents and children? I think there will be an increasing tendency for schools to look out the children who are easy to educate, as anything non-standard is frankly going to be too expensive to support. Parents will find that there are fewer avenues to complain when things go wrong. In terms of standards, universal academicisation is unlikely to have any impact on results for most children - where there has been uplift in the past it was from a very low base and frankly any reasonable intervention would have worked. A factor in improvement in the past has been the enhanced funding offered to converting schools, or sponsoring schools, which has allowed for more to be spent on teaching. The same money is not in the system now. So schools with transient populations in areas of social deprivation are likely to do much worse, as there can be no viring of funds by local authorities from affluent areas to weaker ones.

Someone mentioned the idea of co-operative academies and this I think is a really positive way of promoting independence whilst sticking to inclusive values.
www.co-operativeschools.coop/message/co-operative_academies