The ideological vandalism of the English education system

[daphnedill]

anotherangryvoice.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/michael-gove-ideological-vandalism.html

What does the future hold for state schools?

Hmm. I don't know. What do you think?

Or is this a sneaky way of promoting your blog?

It's not MY blog! I happen to agree with it, but I was interested in whether others share my concerns. I intended the blog/link to be a starting point for discussion.

Fair enough. But why not start the discussion with what you think? Much more interesting!

Hasn't the damage been down since the cultural change from the 1970's onwards?

What do you mean by "cultural damage"? The ethos of state education has changed many times since the 1970s. Sorry, but I don't see how your observation is directly relevant without some details. It would be surprising if culture hadn't changed in 40-50 years.

I was referring to the liberalisation of behaviour and uniform policy, anti-competitive sport, blurring of professional teacher status, downgrading of exam thresholds and adoption of a one-size-fits, comprehensive system.

The last 5 years or so may be seeing a reversal including a rise in standards with all the political parties acknowledging the errors of the past.

Oh wow. Comprehensive schools do not offer one size fits all education. They offer a number of different routes under one roof. This means decisions about which route to follow are made at 14 rather than 11. This happens in many other school systems where children start high school at 13/14.

Behavior is an issue. Schools need greater power to remove disruptive students from lessons but some provision needs to be made for these kids. Currently you take them out, they suffer some punishment, then come back in. There's not a whole lot else the school can do. There should be properly run units where children are taught basic social skills in small groups and then re-integrated into mainstream school. Also, children entering KS3 on lower than level 4 in English and maths need some serious intervention at 11 to move them on.

We need to accept that there are some children who are pretty feral at 11 and as a society, we need to do something to help these kids. Inflicting them on other kids (which is what currently happens) is not fair. There needs to be some system of pastoral care in place for these very vulnerable children who can inflict untold damage on the education of others.

Sigh. It will never happen

Liberalisation of behaviour has been a characteristic of society in general - schools are part of society. Personally, I don't think that strict uniforms and competitive sport are necessary for good education (based on my experience working in schools abroad and some excellent schools in this country). Downgrading of exam thresholds has partly been a result of the privatisation of exam boards, who operate in a competitive market. We have NEVER had a one-size-fits comprehensive system in England. Local situations have always been affected by independent schools, faith schools, grammar schools and other schools with partially selective admissions policies. I'm not some left-wing loon by the way - I actually believe passionately that the education system should support every child to be the best that he/she can be. I believe that starving of funds for SEN and EOTAS provision has been a huge mistake.

However, my greatest concern is that current policies will result in public assets and curriculum control increasingly ending up in private hands - all happening underneath our noses and justified by a very narrow ideology. It really seems that few people know or care about what's going on.

The events at Kings Science Academy in Bradford fill me with foreboding:

www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/kings-science-academy-head-sajid-3006321

Not only has the head been arrested for fraud, but the school's "patron" is a Conservative Vice Chairman and benefactor, who stands to make millions a year out of rent for the land on which the school is built. The education budget should be spent on the nitty gritty of teaching and learning, not on making people with little concern for education even richer.

Ironically, free schools and academies were "sold" to the public as being more accountable to local demand, whereas the reverse is true. Budgets and the curriculum are controlled by central government; parents have fewer places on governing bodies and any concerns have to be addressed to anonymous Whitehall mandarins.

The blurring of professional teacher status is happening now with Gove's assertion that unqualified teachers can do the job just as well as qualified ones

Nothing in particular is being done to address pupil behaviour or strict uniform standards as far as I am aware.

Gove is moving back to a 'one size' approach with his emphasis on terminal exams for all subjects. This government appear to have a very confused idea about what they want from the education system - nothing is clear apart from the sustained attack on teachers' terms and conditions and an inexplicable push towards academisation. The policy is all destructive - it's about dismantling the current system - nothing consistently constructive has been put forward.

Oh wow. Comprehensive schools do not offer one size fits all education. They offer a number of different routes under one roof. This means decisions about which route to follow are made at 14 rather than 11. This happens in many other school systems where children start high school at 13/14.

Behavior is an issue. Schools need greater power to remove disruptive students from lessons but some provision needs to be made for these kids. Currently you take them out, they suffer some punishment, then come back in. There's not a whole lot else the school can do. There should be properly run units where children are taught basic social skills in small groups and then re-integrated into mainstream school. Also, children entering KS3 on lower than level 4 in English and maths need some serious intervention at 11 to move them on.

We need to accept that there are some children who are pretty feral at 11 and as a society, we need to do something to help these kids. Inflicting them on other kids (which is what currently happens) is not fair. There needs to be some system of pastoral care in place for these very vulnerable children who can inflict untold damage on the education of others.

Sigh. It will never happen

I think the blog referred to in the OP makes a very good point about assets being lost. That should worry everyone. Whether this is worse than the PFI fiasco I do not know but certainly the figures are even higher.

But I have never been especially worried about who provides public services (local councils or private companies) so long as they are effective and efficient. It will take several more years before this aspect is clear.

As for the educational policies of Gove, I am not sure there is a great deal between the parties with the genie of choice, specialisation, increased academic rigour, competitive sports, curriculum review etc now out of the bottle. Gove is however undoubtedly strident and polemic. The difficulty for those who do not want change is they also seem highly politicised and don't present a plausible argument for the status quo in my mind.

It makes a good but wrong point about assets being lost.

In many (possibly most) cases where a school has converted to academy status the assets remain the property of the LA. The academy has a long lease (typically 125 years) at a peppercorn rent.

In other cases the land is transferred to the academy but with restrictions that mean it cannot be sold or used for any other purpose. If the academy ceases to operate the land will be transferred back into public ownership or alternatively the operator of the academy may be allowed to purchase the land at the market price at the time of purchase.

I take your point about physical assets, prh.

I'm actually more concerned about the money being "leeched" with very high salaries paid to directors, advisors and headteachers, procurement deals not going out to tender and the reluctance to disclose information via FoI requests. I'm also concerned about the lack of local accountability for finance and the curriculum. I understand LAs can take back control of failing academies, but I don't know what happens with free schools.

This is money which is being redirected from textbooks, equipment, teachers' salaries and repairs for leaking buildings, amongst other things. With the imminent change to the law, it is quite likely that we will have American profit-making businesses using UK public money to fund schools.

What's happened at Kings Science Academy in Bradford is hopefully a worst-case scenario, but it could happen again (and probably will).

I'm angry about the weakening of LAs with nothing in their place but patchy provision by vested interests; the big gaps in strategic planning, transparency and accountability; reduced parental/democratic rights and representation in everything from governing bodies to consultation. And the nepotism, financial irregularities, wastage (new schools in areas of surplus places). But most of all the fact that this is largely irreversible - a scorch and burn policy dreamt up by political elite of think tanks and marketeers who did not have a political mandate but have pushed it through an opportunistic gap at break-neck speed. An unelected elite of people who do not rely on state provision but have imposed their ideology on those of us who do. It will take years to unpick and repair.

And especially the fact that there is no evidence that academisation (sponsored or otherwise) pushes up results. With regard to OddSins's comment on grade inflation in exams, sponsored academies are the very worst culprit in using 'equivalents' to boost results. Gove uses this data, and false comparisons in general, to try and prove academies are worth this fragmentation of the school landscape. But it's all a big lie.

Is that correct about academies not raising standards? That again would concern me as that is the argument that I felt superseded the others. Is it not too early to be certain as educational cycles are quite long? Perhaps 10 years or so allowing for the influence of primary education.

Have the numbers of schools in special measures, 'failing' etc gone down or is that not relevant to academies? As for Free Schools, it must be at least another 5 years minimum before a real judgement can be made (leaving aside the other issues).

Correct OddSins. NFER research concludes the 5 GCSE figure looks good for academies but not if stripped of equivalents. And that 'A significant difference was seen for academy schools that had been open for more than two years. These schools, on average, made less progress between KS2 and KS4 than non-academy schools ... based on the 2012 GCSEs, we do not see a jump in attainment following a school taking academy status'.

Terry Wrigley found, analysing academies open for more than two years, that

• academies rely twice as much on alternative qualifications as non-academies
• fewer pupils on FSM gained 5 GCSES inc E&M without equivalents than the national average. Academies open 5 years or more did marginally better for FSM pupils than average (30% as opposed to 28.6%) but overall non-FSM pupils did worse than average.
• equivalents have narrowed the curriculum: of a smaller sample '12% sat History or Geography (cf 57% in other schools), only a third took a language (14% cf 40%), only 10% took D&T.

And Ofsted ratings show a lower percentage of good/outstanding sponsored academies compared to LA maintained ones, and there is a higher number in special measures. Don't forget that previous Ofsted ratings are wiped once a school converts or is taken over by a sponsor.

And don't forget that the first Conservative academies were schools which Ofsted had already judged to be outstanding and were fast-tracked to becoming academies. Many of these schools were already foundation schools and becoming academies made little practical difference. However, they do boost the average figures for academies.

The Labour academies were generally failing schools and were freed from the constraints of the National Curriculum, especially in Key Stage 4, so that they could teach "alternative" qualifications. They were rebranded and a massive amount of support was given, but there is scant evidence that the restructuring made any difference at all.

I feel very strongly that the cash spent on opening free schools and converting to academies could have been better spent. More importantly, I think that in ten years time, people will look back and wonder what on earth was going on, as they try to sort out the piecemeal mess which will be left behind.

I feel it will be like council houses, many of which are now owned by big btl landlords. Some individual people did well out of the sale, but we now have a housing crisis, because there just isn't enough low cost housing, which, of course, is having an effect on the welfare bill. (Sorry to digress.)

I would feel less strongly about free schools if it was an isolated policy because so far there haven't been many of them (despite the secretive haste, opening in areas of surplus, lack of due diligence, etc.). Some individual schools may well do a lot of local damage or just be complete failures, some may work better than sponsored academies imposed by previous administrations.

But as part of the wider academies policy it's worrying to see how many of free schools are proposed by chains, US education businesses, religious groups. etc. - and too much risk is being taken with them. Meanwhile LAs are prohibited from opening and running community schools, at a time when there are growing pressures on places (especially at primary schools) in many cities. And with forced academisation and the bribing of schools to become converter academies (£1 billion wasted on that one!), LAs are withering away. So the bigger picture is of a very cynical marketisation of the system which will just segregate communities and waste money without seeing any overall improvement.

I am worried that one day we may not have any or only very few decent state schools left. Ordinary young kids may have to pass some kind of selective exam to stay in state education. The rest may have to either pay full or part of the school fees or to opt for some kind of vocational schemes.

I feel very strongly that the cash spent on opening free schools and converting to academies could have been better spent. More importantly, I think that in ten years time, people will look back and wonder what on earth was going on, as they try to sort out the piecemeal mess which will be left behind

I feel the same way. That isn't to say there wasn't a problem to sort out in the first place, but the problems we had before if anything have been exacerbated by the current system.

PRH wrote 'he operator of the academy may be allowed to purchase the land at the market price at the time of purchase.'

Do you mean with competitive bidding for the land, and then when they do own it, surprise, surprise it will be better to sell it off and build a block of flats since the money all goes back into the school budget?

This is PFI all over again, in fact its even worse, PFI was just loosing money, that never existed, this time we are loosing real assets. This country is a joke, but it isn't funny.

Read the whole post rather than quoting out of context. The land can only be sold to the academy operator if ALL the following conditions apply:

• The land has been transferred to the operator. In many cases it is still owned by the LA and rented by the academy so this doesn't arise - the operator can never buy the land.

• The academy has ceased to operate. This does not simply mean that the academy operator has decided to stop running the academy. In that situation the Secretary of State would transfer the academy to a new operator. It means the school is no longer needed. There are no circumstances in which the academy operator can buy the land while it is still needed for running a school.

• The land is not being transferred back into public ownership.

• The academy operator is willing to pay the market price for the land. Since the Secretary of State has to make an order to sell to the academy operator and the only other option is to transfer back into public ownership it seems unlikely that competitive bidding would be involved.

As the law currently stands the academy operator cannot close the school and build a block of flats on the land. No assets are being lost.

So why the fook would an operator by the land? These greedy bar stewards don't get into this business for the good of the children. Its all $$$ to them.

Obviously it is lies again, the proof will be in the proverbial. In five years time we will have seen another wave of schools turn into private rabbit hutch size flats. School places will be even harder to find, and there will be yet more teachers building the unemployed numbers.

prh,

I recognise that you know far more about issues regarding land transfer than I do. Am I right in thinking that this www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2011/21/schedule/14/enacted is the relevant and most recent legislation?

I don't claim to have legal expertise, but it seems to me that it would be possible for the operator to buy the land. The question of "market price" is surely debatable. I know I've certainly known cases of market prices being - er - massaged (not in a schools context).

Nevertheless, land transfer hadn't occurred to me. The link in the OP gives examples of how operators can profit from running schools, including tying schools into deals for IT, HR and advisory services - there are many examples of these being provided by companies associated with the charities running the schools. There is also evidence that directors of the holding companies and headteachers (sometimes former employees of the holding companies) are drawing high salaries.

One example in the OP is "the Aurora Academies Trust which runs four primary schools in Sussex which demands that all of their schools must use the Paragon Curriculum and pay a £100 per student per year premium to the American company that owns the patent on the curriculum; Mosaica Education Inc. These fees add up to £100,000 per year. It will come as absolutely no surprise I'm sure, to learn that Aurora Academies Trust is owned and operated by a UK subsidiary of Mosaica Education Inc."

The Paragon Curriculum has been criticised by Ofsted, but it seems that the teachers at the schools and local parents have to accept it.