Gove's proposals for academy schools: parents and community will have no say at all!

[policywonk]

In the proposed Academies Act, which will be one of the first pieces of legislation the coalition government brings forward, the rules will be changed so that governors alone will be able to decide whether or not to turn their school into an academy. Parents and the wider community are explicitly excluded from the decision-making process.

Academy schools could be run by profit-making businesses and religious groups as well as by groups of parents. The sponsors are given the school land and buildings, and can decide which subjects are taught, and how. And once a school has become an academy, there's no clear way back into local authority control.

38 Degrees has set up an online action in which you can email your MP to ask him/her to oppose this move and sign an Early Day Motion against it.

Sorry but are the school governors not representatives of the community and parents??

Don't know about your school, but in ours, about 10% of the parents participate in elections for governors. We have a parent governor election going on at the moment; I have seen one paragraph of information about the candidates, which told me nothing at all of any substance on the issues that matter to me.

Anyway, why on earth close down the representation of parents? Didn't Michael Gove spend the pre-election period pontificating about 'parent power'? This is breathtakingly hypocritical and frightening in its implications.

At least one of the governors will be a parent governor and it may be more, depending on the governing board's instrument of government. Another will be an LEA-appointed member, so might possibly have opposing views.

SO it's not exactly a shoehorn in.

If parents have a problem with the proposal they have every right to lobby the parent governors and for that matter the others, too.

They normally have someone from the LEA, some people from the local community and some parents.

How can I get to read this Act? As a school governor, I have to say I would hate to think that this responsibility was placed in my hands and those of the 13 other governors in the school. Having said that, I sometimes wonder how much the parents care anyway? We have abandoned having an annual meeting with parents (even though we held it before a PTA social event) as about 6 people would turn up. Nobody put themselves forward for election for parent governor the last time we had vacancies and when we held an information evening asking for parents' input into recruiting a new HT, 12 people out of approx 200 parents attended. To be fair, I bet everyone would be jumping up and down to have a say on this.

OK you two, let me ask you a question. If a new EU treaty involving the transfer of powers to Brussels is mooted, do you think it should go to a nationwide referendum? Or would you be content to lobby your MPs? They're your elected representatives, after all.

This policy is outrageous. It really stinks.

I find this frightening too. Ar our small primary, most people know each other but I don't regard governors as being particularly representative. Most of them - no idea who they are. Parent governors - I doubt even if 10% vote for them. And at secondary - good god I've absolutely no idea about them at all. No idea about parent governors - with s school of 1,000 pupils from 2 small towns and several villages, how on earth can they be known to all or representative? I didn't vote in the local secondary parent gov election because (1) I'd no idea who they were and (2) the info (as you rightly say) is so bland you don't know what you're voting for anyway.

Ann, the bill text is here

So one of the local primaries around here that is outstanding, could theoretically become unaccountable?Wow.

That's right ILove, but not just the outstanding schools - they'll be in the first wave, but soon it will be any school at all.

As far as I am aware staff will have no say either which means their contracts will move from the Local Government to the Trust running the academy.

Many, many schools do not have Governors with the right skillset to make thses decisions or be responsible for the consequences of them.

Parents have never been part of the 'official' consultation process for changing a community school to an academy. However, it has always been considered good practise to include them (and the teaching staff). It's the local authority who Gove has taken out of the process.

If the school's head thinks academy status is right for his/her school and gets the backing of staff, parents and governors - then I don't think the local authority should be able to object.

No, parents and the wider community are not specifically excluded. They are not specifically included but that is a different thing.

There is no statutory consultation with parents but schools are expected to discuss their intentions with parents and pupils. Similarly the school is free to discuss its plans with the local authority and any local partners but the LA is no longer able to block schools wanting to become academies. Teachers and other staff have to be consulted.

The governors can take the decision on their own but they don't have to. And parents (and the LA) can, of course, lobby the governors.

The new academies don't have to have an external sponsor. It is expected that most will be run by their existing governors. The school cannot change its religious character as part of the conversion process.

As the schools being fast tracked through the system are already successful, it is expected that they will not make any immediate fundamental changes.

I'm not saying all of this is how it should be but at least lets get the facts right.

How active are Govenors and how prepared are they to stand up to the HT? That's something that's impossible to tell given the meetings are held in private and we never recieve any communication from the Govenors. Our parent Govenors have no interest in canvassing the views of other parents either, they are what I'd descibe as pretty crap and follow their own agenda.
Our school could be one of the first to jump ship - how would we know? When would they tell us?

'Schools are expected to discuss their intentions with pupils and parents' - there's no language to that effect in the bill. Nor does it say that teachers and staff have to be consulted.

The right to lobby is, frankly, worth jack shit. Our school recently became a foundation school in the face of fierce and vocal opposition. The only 'consultation' worth having in a decision of this significance is a ballot of all parents and staff.

Absolutely policywonk. There's a massive difference between being having a 'voice' and actually having a vote.

Why would you be a governor unless you had an interest in the school ie some sort of connection past parent at the very least ?

I am a school governor and I must say that I would look very carefully at any proposals to be an Academy - as I would at any other ideas for change.

Being a governor is like being a member of a board - you are there to oversee and advise, not really to offer a running commentary to the parents at the school gate.

I would like to think that my experience of life and business enables me to make good decisions on this sort of issue.

I do appreciate, however, that many governing bodies are composed of less than ideal governors (there are a few type members on ours) and it is difficult to stand up to a head who plays their cards close to their chest or is on some sort of crusade.

gramercy, are you a parent governor or some other kind? Is it part of the responsibility of parent governors to act as representatives of parents? If not, even more reason to regard these proposals with extreme suspicion.

What worries me is that schools will be able, unilaterally, to utterly screw up the best interests of the majority of children in an area.

There's a story here that illustrates this (sorry i couldn't find a better link). Essentially, if this all girls school becomes an academy, plans to turn a nearby all boys school into a much needed (and wanted) co-ed will be scuppered.

Policywonk - No there is no language to that effect in the bill. It is in the guidance on the DfE website. As for consulting teachers and staff, that is a requirement of TUPE and therefore doesn't need re-enacting in this bill.

Thanks prh, but 'consultation' and 'guidance' really don't cut it on decisions of this magnitude. As I said below, I have experience of 'parental consultation' in a similar context, and all it means is that a determined head listens to objections and goes right ahead anyway.

There's only so much a determined head can do without the Governing Body on side - he/she can't change policies or staffing structure, for example, and can't spend over a certain threshold without GB approval. And yes, as a Parent Gov I do see my role as representing the views of the parents, always balanced of course against the best interests of the school.

This whole academy thing is making me slightly twitchy and is something I have been thinking long and hard about - am a Chair of a pre-qualifying school. So far, I've come up with a lot of reasons why not to go for it, and far fewer reasons to do it. But it does change quite fundamentally the nature of governance, from the provision of strategic direction and guidance to a much more hands-on, management role. And I certainly am not qualified to do that - but yet seem to have been handed the opportunity on a plate. Scary times.

all the thinking behind the new set up for academies is totally contrary to what they were originally intended to do. Schools that are failing will continue to do so, whilst the good ones get to do what they want. It is scary and sad.

Yes hassled, true that GB provides a brake of sorts if it includes high calibre members who are prepared to stand up to the head where appropriate. But that's a very big 'if', in my experience anyway (my experience being my own school, and another school of which a friend of mine is a community governor - he resigned in the end as he said the other governors did exactly what the head wanted without a second thought).