Can a state primary become a free school?

[Fraidylady]

Just that really. Lease the building from the LEA and run ourselves.

No.

But a state school can become an Academy.

Different process, similar outcome.

But the question is why? Is there a particular issue with the LEA?

No, not really. We just want to run the school ourselves and do our own thing! We're very happy with the way things are going at the moment, and soon all our good efforts will be shot down with the new curriculum.

An academy has all the freedoms a free school has, and doesn't have to follow the curriculum.

I thought an academy was still under the watchful eye of Ofsted, and were open to inspections is progress was seen to slow down.
Do academies have to be sponsored (by business or joining with local schools)?
I also thought that free schools could employ whoever they wanted on whatever terms, whereas academies are still tied to the existing employment and pensions agreements.

No, you thought wrong.

Academies and free schools are basically identical except that an academy is an existing school and a free school is a new school.

Both will still be subject to ofsted, but don't have to follow the NC.

Neither need a sponsor.

If you're keeping your existing staff then you can't change their contracts. But new staff can be employed on new contracts.

OK, with your help and a google of the comparison between schools, I'm beginning to get it.

It's getting a bit confusing with academies - first of all they were outstanding schools, then they added in failing schools, now they are forcing schools to become academies... and we've got for-profit organisations about to run them.

On top of this the chief wallah of Ofsted is some exec within ARK. Is that to be allowed?

Just for clarity...

The academies set up under the last government were failing schools and had to have sponsors in order to convert. This government has encouraged successful schools to convert without any requirement for a sponsor - the vast majority of schools converting recently do not have sponsors. The 200 poorest performing primary schools in the country are being forced to convert. In 9 LAs which have a high proportion of poorly performing schools those schools are coming under pressure to convert.

The new Chief Inspector at Ofsted will be Sir Michael Wilshaw. He takes up the post next month. He is currently executive headteacher of Mossbourne Academy and Director of Education for ARK. He will be leaving those posts to join Ofsted.

If you look at the TES website, it sounds like the government's second tier of 500 schools are coming under a lot more than a bit of pressure since the Education Act was passed in November.

I got a bit confused, actually. I remember when they announced about these 200 schools in the summer, they spoke about removing heads and SMTs and replaceing them along with appointing a sponsor.

Now there only seems to be talk of a sponsor - the heads writing on the TES board don't seem to have been told that they're going to get sacked.

Does anyone know anymore about these 200 schools?

I can't get my head around this - can someone help?

My colleague's sister is a head teacher. I was asking my colleague about academies yesterday and it's happening to her sister. She took over a school last year sometime when it was in special measures. It came out of special measures sometime earlier this year - don't know what is is now. But she's been told that she's got to be an academy, I think with a sponsor. Though there's been nothing said about staff changes.

Can anyone throw any light on this?

This is a 'forced academy' which is very different to a school choosing to convert.

It's exactly like she said. She has to find a sponsor, and the school has to become an academy.

So where are all these 'super heads' that the department for education was talking about in the summer?

How would having a sponsor make it a better school?

She's gutted. She's worked really, really hard since she's been there. League tables out today, still low results but much, much better and nowhere near the bottom of her LA.

I don't understand it - I thought these 200 forced academies were meant to have new heads and things to improve them.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2004047/Michael-Gove-200-failing-primary-schools-academies.html

Even more confused now.

The Labour party argue that sponsors are part of the reason the original academies succeeded and that the government is getting it wrong by allowing schools to convert without sponsors.

As the article says, the 200 schools being forced to convert have all failed to achieve the floor standard for at least 5 years, many of them for much longer. I don't know if there is any scope for opposing the change on the grounds that the head hasn't been there for long and has already achieved significant improvements but, given what you have said, I think she has an excellent case for keeping her job - again, as the Daily Mail article says, not all the head teachers involved are being replaced.

The idea is that a sponsor will help to improve the school. The sponsor could be an educational charity, a university, a college or even another school that has already converted to academy status. So the head should be getting more help than she does from the LA and she will also have a bigger budget, although she will have to pay for some services she currently receives from the LA.

I am not saying that forced conversion will work or that it is a good thing.

My friends son's school in Hackney is sponsored by RBS.

I thought this was really weird when she told me - I don't know if it was 'underperforming' before.

So private companies can sponsor schools too? How do RBS or businesses liek that improve schools .

I can't get my head around this. My colleague's sister has done so well - why the need to change now when what she's doing is obviously working?

Then again if RBS was going to give her school money, and probably lots and lots of volunteers such as reading partners - wouldn't her school do even better?

People in banks often are encouraged to do some kind of charity work. A day's paid leave to do so etc. If their chosen charity is the school, and a bunch of them rock up to build a something, it's likely to be a good thing.....

I don't know if they do that. It's secondary, so maybe not?

I know she was really pissed off when they closed the school for a day at the beginning of this term, so that they could hold some corporate do there, the day after they'd sent letters home to parents about the importance of 100% attendance .

I got the impression that they're not actually involved in the day to day running of the school, but don't really know.

What does a bank know about education?

I'm sure they get volunteers in from RBS in one way or another, because I work for another bank and we're always being asked to volunteer at a local school.

You / your friend wouldn't know this was happening. But it will be.

RBS may not know much about education - but they know a lot about management, and the senior leadership team is a management team.

But really RBS are probably just doing this so that they look good. They won't be involved with the school at all, besides to show how charitable they are (by donating both time and money)

Perhaps you could get Year 9 to go in and run RBS while RBS go to school. The kids couldn't possibly make a worse mess than the adults managed to do five years ago. Meanwhile the RBS people could sit through a few citizenship and maths lesson.

That's along the lines of what I was thinking Boffin.

The week my friend told me about the corporate do, RBS were in court on corruption charges.

Yes, when I think of sound management, strategic planning and accountability, particularly of finances, RBS are not the first organisation that spring to mind.

Ways in which my bank helps a local secondary school:

• We offer interview practice / coaching
• Help with CVs
• Work experience
• Maths booster classes
• Literacy booster classes
• Football + reading classes
• Aspirational role models for the students
• Maintenance days

Most schools would be very pleased to receive so much help for free.

The aspirational aspect, of having really well paid city workers spending time with kids who don't know anyone who's really well paid, shouldn't be underestimated.

The work we do with the school does a lot of good. And why you begrudge it I don't know.

I don't think my friend does begrudge it.

She begrudged the school being closed for a day for a corporate jolly just after they sent stern letters home about the importance of 100% attendance, but I don't know about anything else.

My colleague's sister, who I mentioned above, however, is very, very distressed at what's happening to her. She got the school out of special measures and above 'floor target' this year (don't know what this is?) and is still being made to become an academy. Their 'added value' was really high this year, she said?

Several teachers are leaving today. Over 50% of the others are planning to leave before September. The staff are in turmoil as they were told by Ofsted in the spring I think that they were doing well.

I truly don't understand how this is honestly about improving attainment.

Google the floor target. For primary school's it's something like 60% of children getting a L4. So it's a really low target. Nowhere near the average or expected target.

And the school has to have got below the floor target for the last 5 years in a row.

So over the last 5 years an awful lot of children have been failed at that school.

Why are the teachers leaving? Their pay and conditions won't change when they become and academy. It's the union winding them up and telling them it's a bad thing. The kids are the same. The job's the same.

If she's not losing her job, why is she upset?

She doesn't know whether she's losing her job - she's been given hardly any information from what I understand.

So it sounds like she's being judged on the performance of the previous head? How nonsensical.

I don't know why the staff are planning to leave - there's a lot of anger about the forced nature of it and that they haven't had a say. An nearby school that got a good Ofsted considered changing to be an academy, but decided not to. I think they're pissed off that they've had no say, but there may be other reasons too.

Given what you have said I would be surprised if she loses her job. If I were her I would be putting forward the case that she is a new head and she has already improved the school to the point where it met the floor target this year.

I can understand her and her colleagues being upset that the school is being forced to convert. However, if they can't stop it I hope they find that it is an opportunity to further improve their school.

So why is being done?

I really don't understand.

Because the schools concerned are struggling and the government believes that the evidence shows converting them to academies will help them to perform better. That is based on the fact that the academies set up by the last government were all failing schools at the time of conversion but are now generally producing better results and improving faster than other schools in their areas.

There are, of course, arguments for suggesting that the same will not happen with the primary schools being forced to convert. There are differences - the original academies were all secondary schools and were not forced to convert. But the government's point of view is that something needs to be done about these schools and, rightly or wrongly, they believe this is the correct thing to do.