Private school becoming a free school

[DanglingChillis]

Our local private school is planning on applying to become a free school. I was talking to another Mum about it and she had a very different view to me. Neither of us are anti-private education but I was surprised by her attitude to this news. What would you think about a private school becoming a free school?

Good for the parents - the tax payer will be paying the fees.

I'd think one (or more) of these:

a) school has incompetent management, which means it's in financial difficulties, despite being otherwise OK, or
b) the school isn't very good, cannot attract/retain enough pupils, and hence is is financial difficulty, or
c) it's a faith school of a religion which does not have many schools in the public sector and is seeking to widen accessibility.

They do get a shock when inspected by Ofsted. The first two (Sandbach and Batley Grammar) got rated 'Need to Improve' - usually because their systems for monitoring progress, teaching methods and even facilities are out of date (that is why they need state investment). If they were struggling private schools, the reasons soon become very clear. One school got £5 million of debts written off so it's a brilliant deal for them.

But they have to abandon selection to convert to state, and increase class sizes. I imagine there would be a big turnover of staff as some would not be used to teaching mixed ability or lower sets. So eventually it will become a very different school.

I would think they were in dire financial difficulties and when /if they become a free school it will be totally different to how it is now ie normal sized classes etc.

Meditrina. Maybe the private school was an ex direct grant grammar school
that was forced to go private to keep its ethos.

If it was a direct grant grammar school the last thing many of these schools wanted to do was go private and deprive worthy pupils of a grammar school education. Whatever the views are of Gove, one great thing that as happened has been free schools.

In the north west some very successful private schools have become free schools and academy's one of the most successful is the Belvedere Academy in Liverpool. Another highly regarded ex private school is in Manchester called Willam Hulme,this was one of the first to go back to the state sector. If some very good schools go back in to the state sector surely
that is a great thing. This has been proved by colston's girls school in
Bristol doing great things with a mixed intake from across the city.

I would assume it was dire and on the point of closing and so they grabbed at the free school money to save themselves.

I would also think it was a failing school, and it could not survive any other way

I don't think Belvedere is a free school. I stand to be corrected, but it's an academy, like its "sister" school, Birkenhead High. Birkenhead High's results have gone down since it became an academy. I was a pupil at the school when it was direct grant and it's not the same at all.

Well, even if private schools need people to pay fees for their pupils, those pupils still exist. If they didn't attend private schools, they'd be in the state sector. The state is not going to be paying £12000/year for those pupils- it will give the same amount similar schools get per pupil. So if the school is in difficulties financially (which is happening more and more as fewer and fewer people have enough money for fees) then taking it over as a state school, albeit "free", makes a lot of sense. The school will be subject to inspection and a certain amount of control by Ofsted.

I don't see a problem. Unless you are literally going to make every single child in a town attend the same school, meaning schools with 10s of thousands of pupils each, then multiple schools are going to exist.

I don't have a problem with the change of status, but my first though was the same as the first few posters, that they must be having financial difficulties. Otherwise why change? So, interesting gossip in a small town. I certainly wouldn't be rushing to apply. The other Mum was convinced it would be brilliant and the state school our DC are at (outstanding school with excellent results that is massively oversubscribed) would lose lots of pupils and the new free school would keep the small class sizes and extra curricular activities and the wrap around careetc etc for free. I told DH about the conversation (he knows her better than I do) and he rolled his eyes at her, said it was typical that she would assume everyone would think the same as her.

If they keep class sizes they will have to employ fewer specialist teachers, and vice versa. They can't charge top-up fees. Simple economics, and you are correct. They get a lot of start-up subsidy though so it may not appear to change overnight but they will have to manage on £5,000 per pupil compared to what they were getting before in fees.

My thought would be, if they are in financial difficulties and sub standard, how would they be accepted as free schools?

(I am also confused about schools being accepted as free schools and then being judged as needing to improve by Ofsted - it doesn't seem a very efficient way to spend money - unless different criteria mean that freeschools can provide school places 'on the cheap').

On the other hand, positive reasons to become a freeschool would be:

1. Great for parents who no longer have to pay fees
2. Which enables you to attract wider range of students.
3. To attract more funding - you don't have to be financially failing to want to obtain funding for better facilities.

I think I'd still be worried by the fact that IMO the criteria for selecting freeschools so far seems to have been a bit lax.

And I'm also confused about the economics of free schools whose USP is smaller class sizes/longer school days/longer terms than normal state schools.

The smaller class sizes will only be maintained if there is insufficient demand for the school, or the classrooms are genuinely tiny and simply cannot accommodate more children.

The school just saying 'but we've admitted up to PAN' will not be enough to prevent successful appeal.

merry ime ethos is also extremely important. It takes a long time to build up a good strong event-proof ethos.

"My thought would be, if they are in financial difficulties and sub standard, how would they be accepted as free schools?"

Financially failing private schools often have beautiful sites, even if the teaching and management is not up to scratch. Surely its better for a failing private school to become a state school and get help to improve. A change of head can take an inadequate school to good in a matter of months.

We need more schools and if private school sites can be used for state school children then everyone benefits.

I can't see how a private schoool can keep free wrap around care and extra curriculuar activites. However many parents will choose a state school with good affordable wrap around care and affordable extra curriculuar activites.

I feel that taking the pressure of over subscribed schools can only be a good thing.

I wish this had happened to the private school up the road from us which closed due to financial difficulties and unfortunately was bought for re-development before all this free school business came in. So sad as it is a lovely building on a beautiful site and we are really short of decent (or any) secondary schools in our area .

It may turn out to be a positive thing for the area OP - I hope it is.

Two schools in my city converted from private to academy status five or six years ago. They basically converted because this city has an over-supply of private schools, and those two weren't keeping up with the competition - their results weren't as good, so they attracted lower-quality applicants, so their results went down further etc in a vicious circle. Their fees were also lower to try to draw people in, but that meant they couldn't pay to get the best staff, improve facilities etc. If they hadn't converted, I'm pretty sure at least one of them would have closed by now.

Since switching to academy status, they have both been massively oversubscribed with people wanting to get a private-school-style education for free (most other state schools here have a very poor reputation - results were amongst the lowest in the country for years). Obviously there were changes, like larger class sizes, but also benefits, like funding for expansion of buildings to cope with higher numbers, modernisation of facilities etc (this was a few years ago - this kind of funding may now have been cut, of course).

They are open to children from all over the city and the wider region, rather than a narrow geographic catchment area, and since they are hugely oversubscribed, entry to the academies is by banding: everyone takes a test to put them in an ability band, and the school picks a certain number from each band at random. This is meant to give a wide spread of abilities rather than cherry-picking the brightest.

However, it does mean that the only parents who apply are ones who are prepared to jump through the hoops of the testing system, and possibly to arrange transport for their children from a long way away, which of course is a form of selection in itself: having parents who are interested in and supportive of their child's education is a fairly crucial factor in getting good results.

The upshot has been that GCSE results of the first cohorts of pupils that have been through the schools from yr7 to yr11 are actually way better than they were when they were private schools. However, whether that would happen with the school you are talking about would probably depend on admissions procedures

Yes I agree with exexpat. At one of the converter schools she mentions, gcse results for the first academy cohort were 91% A*-C inc maths and English. This school has about 25% on FSM and is a true comprehensive.

It depends on who is running the school. If the school is financially failing because the head is a bit rubbish and nobody wants to go there, then obviously they shouldn't become a free school, (throwing good money after bad) but you would hope that they wouldn't have a chance of becoming a free school anyway. (Although presumably there is nothing to stop anybody from wanting to run a free school/fly to the moon etc. etc.)

It would be a different situation if financial difficulties were due to some other reason or there was a change of management.

However, according to the papers the free school selection process hasn't been fool proof so far - I don't know whether this is just headlines or reflects the general situation.

So re: the OP, you need to know more about the proposal.

Just remembered - I wanted to comment on one thing MarmiteLover said relating to the private-school-turned-academy I was talking about - "this is a true comprehensive" - no, it is most definitely not.

The selection process, although it is designed to engineer a comprehensive spread of abilities, does eliminate children from families where the parents are not interested/bothered enough or physically able to put their children through the selection process, and then to transport them or pay for them to get to school if they are not within walking distance (most aren't).

This basically screens out a lot of children from the most socially deprived families, those from families with no interest in education, those from families with problems relating to mental health, alcohol, drugs etc, and generally those from deprived and chaotic backgrounds. Possibly also some of those from families recently arrived in the UK who are not knowledgeable about the school system or where English is not a first language - I think application materials are available in other languages, but you would have to know to request them in the first place. All those categories probably account for many of the children in the lowest-performing groups in most 'true comprehensives', so it is not surprising that the results at these academies are much better.

i think far fewer parents can/ or want to afford private fees at the moment.

Applications to the good ones near us are very down and everyone I know who applies gets a place. The outstanding state schools are hugely over subscribed.

I think this is a sign of the times.

Yes I think exexpat has a good point, but the fact that the school has 1/4 on free school meals surely means that it is attracting more deprived families too? It will be interesting to see the stats, when they become available, for the first academy cohort.