Did Supply in a new Academy yesterday and feel sad

[gabid]

Yesterday I went into a once failing school in a deprived area that has been an Academy for a year now. The first impression was good - new buildings, great photos of children in the reception area, but at the end of the day I felt sad .

There was no ino given to me (e.g. rewards and sanctions, map of the school etc) so I felt I was sent into the classroom 'naked'. I had to ask someone in the staffroom.

In general, I felt the kids weren't motivated or interested, even the better groups, behaviour in class and around the school was very poor (shouting, swearing - just lots of noise). I entered a couple of classrooms and there was lots of rubbish on the floor (in period 4 and 5).

I spoke to some members of staff and they didn't seem to have enough textbooks to go round, I didn't see many in the classrooms either.

And in P5 I taught a bottom Y9 group who didn't know their timestables and after the lesson on the way out I had to break up a fight.

Shouldn't things change and improve with turning a school into an Academy?

Sounds like the academy I work in.

Nothing has improved, behaviour has got worse.

I feel sad and angry every day.

Why spend money on resources when your shareholders can have it instead?

I agree with your, but think you would struggle to find any comPrehensive where bottom set year 9 know their times tables.

Academy or not, as a supply teacher you should be furnished with the information you need to function in an unfamiliar school.
Did the Head of Department not go over anything with you before the "day" started?

I don't understand what any of your concerns have to do with the school being an a academy.

Is it because the school was better before it became an academy?

Or because you hoped making it an academy would improve it?

Or is it just general academy bashing?

Unless you worked there before its surely difficult to know if there has been any improvement? OK, it's not as good as you'd have liked and I am inclined to agree with you that it ought to be better given the increased resources but I can't agree with the insinuation it would have been better if it were left as it was. Only because we don't know ...... Unless you have worked there before as do know, of course.

The other comment about shareholders profit - do any publically funded academy schools have shareholders? Don't they have members limited by guarantee (where they get nothing but have to stump up a few pounds if it folds)?

I also think blaming fights on being an academy is pretty feeble ...... We had fights break out daily when I was at school and that was as state maintained as you could get! I also agree - bottom set year 9 of an ordinary comp - no surprise they don't know their times tables. Actually, something like that is historic, so you could blame it on not being an academy earlier! However, that would be unfair too.

I think it's fair enough to link the problems to it being an academy: academies are lavishly funded b/c they are supposed to be better than ordinary schools. If they're not, then obviously something's going wrong. Ideologically-motivated leaping about by IndigoBell and Kez100 won't change that.

OP
If the school is an ex failing one it MUST have been an academy since before the election - so is a sponsored one.
The tranche that converted last April were all ex outstanding schools.
Our local sponsored academy has not addressed the problems that led to its creation.
In our case there is a light at the end of the tunnel but due to external factors, nothing to do with the management of the school which is by all accounts utterly dire

I cannot see how my comments are ideologically motivated. I believe in as well resourced schools as possible. For some that means becoming an Academy but, for others, it doesn't.I'd be both pro academy or anti academy depending on the facts of the individual school.

All I said was how do we know, what evidence do we have, that this school isn't better than it was before the investment? You can only compare this school with its former self.

Then I mentioned about shareholders because I think that comment was wrong - that was ideologically motivated, not me!

I agree with everything other than the textbooks.

I run an outstanding department and we don't own a class set of textbooks. I have 1 of each of the gcse ones for reference.
Textbooks = lazy teaching.

Pottering along, a genuine question - how do your severely dyskexic pupils access GCSE work for revision without textbooks. My son (not year 10 yet) has processing issues so cannot write in class notes while concentrating on learning. If he does write notes due to dyspraxia they are unreadable fr revision. I'm desparate to find the best solution for him- do you have any ideas? Message would be fine to avoid this thread going off topic. I'd be really grateful for advice.

The5thFishy - As Kez100 says, academies do not have shareholders.

The school is an ex-failing school, has the same HT and as it appeared to me the same staff, staff moral seemed low, one staff member was complaining about having 4 textbooks for a whole year group (don't know which subject).

I have gone to a couple of schools with intake from deprived areas, but there was a good support system in place and the schools/classrooms/pupils work appeared more organised, and there were resources, such as books in orderly piles. I feel textbooks is an important resourse such as many other things, besides, a school without books seems odd to me.

Obviously, there was money for new buildings and uniforms (for the image) but none for learning.

prh
they may not have shareholders - most seem to be companies limited by guarantee, even the sponsored ones, but they remunerate their boards well

And with having been turned into an academy so recently I would have expected new enthusiasm and good systems for dicipline in place.

Kez - I've written my own revision guides with everything they need / independent learning tasks etc in and they get them module by module and then at the end again in a big wodge so they can scrawl over them for revision.
I teach RE and this way it means we can keep the writing down of 'stuff' to a minimum as I know I can just give it to them, concentrate on discussion and exam techniques.

The boards are paid? Surely the boards are what were Governors in the old school and the only ones paid are the Staff Governors and Headteacher.

Thanks Pottering along.

That's really very sad. I live on the outskirts of Middlesbrough where there's an academy where only 9% of students got 5 GCSEs not including equivelents. As well as this 50% of the childen get free school meals :(
It's a truly amazing school building, but what use is that when only 40% of children make expected progress? Something really needs to be done to help schools like this and the ones mentioned above.

Academies are an appalling idea. My children will never set foot in one. Furthermore, they can choose not to recognise if a teacher is a member of a union.

"I've written my own revision guides with everything they need / independent learning tasks etc in"

...Or you could buy a textbook with the same stuff in that can be used for more than one class/year. You wouldn't get the photocopying budget for individual revision guides at my place. I find it odd that you think that a textbook = lazy teaching, but you've essentially just written your own.

Kumquats.. lots of perfectly good schools are becoming academies, so you may not have a choice. DCs school became one as it seemed likely (and still does) that if it didn't it would be the only one, one of a very few good/outstanding schools under LA control. Therefore the central resources would be unavailable as they would be concentrated on the poor schools. The terms and conditions for the teachers is exactly as before, and I think this is pretty much so for the support staff. The one big change is a lot more money making schemes, eg. charging for courses for School Admin staff and TAs.
But then again there are two kinds of academies, those who were Good/Outstanding and failing schools which are turned around (although I also think some new schools are also Academies).

Every single secondary school in my LEA is an academy.

Kumquat - are you prepared to home educate?

I had to laugh at the suggestion that academies are lavishly funded. Failing schools might have money chucked at them, but from looking around at my classroom with leaky windows and holes in the walls, I can assure you that the new academies are not plated in gold.

Which times tables were the Year 9s doing? I'm a solicitor and a Russell Group university graduate and I struggle with times tables frankly, always have done.

I'd imagine it takes more than a year to turn around a failing school tbh.