Anyone with a child at an Academy? What's it all about?

[aliportico]

Friend of mine is a parent governor of a 'satisfactory' comp - she tells me that as more schools in our LA become academies, then the central admin for schools at the LA will basically disappear, so her school has no real choice about whether to become an academy or not. They *have* to change, and have that autonomy forced upon them, because there won't be anyone left at the council to run the schools. Not sure whether it's a vicious circle or a self-fulfilling prophecy or what.

[push-pull-mum]

Friend of mine is a parent governor of a 'satisfactory' comp - she tells me that as more schools in our LA become academies, then the central admin for schools at the LA will basically disappear, so her school has no real choice about whether to become an academy or not. They *have* to change, and have that autonomy forced upon them, because there won't be anyone left at the council to run the schools. Not sure whether it's a vicious circle or a self-fulfilling prophecy or what.

Hmm ... I suspect now that this is way the old Head left (I liked Old Head - he was an old school 'Headmaster' as opposed to the new Head, very good in her way, but much more of a 'Management' type)

DD's main concern - "Will they change the uniform?"

Probably. Local Academy costs more to kit out for than my niece's minor public school, and everything has to be bought through the Academy!

[khanj010]

my ds is attending an academy in bucks its not a gs school, im not happy with it but i have no choice. there is no structure there , i dont know who to see if i have a question or problem, so many diffrent teachers who are in charge. and no feed back on issues that occure.i am thinking of changing my ds buit i dont know if it will be the right move to make . ds is currently in y8 , i also think they do not push the children to there potential. i personally think the schools back in my day (i went to the same school years ago) was more like a school then a goverment scheme which might go wrong.

[Jiff]

If the grammar schools become acadamies and opt out of local authority control, who coordinates the 11-plus in that area?

[ourmaminhavana]

Friend of mine is a parent governor of a 'satisfactory' comp - she tells me that as more schools in our LA become academies, then the central admin for schools at the LA will basically disappear, so her school has no real choice about whether to become an academy or not. They *have* to change, and have that autonomy forced upon them, because there won't be anyone left at the council to run the schools. Not sure whether it's a vicious circle or a self-fulfilling prophecy or what.

That's exactly what we were told. I find it quite depressing actually as morally I don't feel that they are right as I IMHO we have a duty as a society to fund things like SEN which schools like mine will now opt out of.
It's also a huge amount of work for the business manager (bursar!), especially as it's still in a state of flux.
Personally I love the freedom to the timetable eg to do IB, IGCSEs but we probably won't be able to afford to run lots of different classes anyway.

[push-pull-mum]

Well - DD was told in form time today that the Academy status was definitely going through. So much for parent 'consultation.'
Actually quite worried. DD's school is o.k but not brilliant and with quite a high percentage of SEN. I think things could easily go badly wrong.

[Etienne]

If the grammar schools become acadamies and opt out of local authority control, who coordinates the 11-plus in that area?

I see three possibilities:
1. The schools pay the LA to continue providing the service
2. Each individual school makes its own arrangements. (This could lead to children sitting multiple 11+ tests).
3. The schools set up a consortium to provide a single 11+ test.

[aargh]

Jiff wrote:
If the grammar schools become acadamies and opt out of local authority control, who coordinates the 11-plus in that area?

In Gloucestershire several of the Grammars are academies. The rules state that they have to abide by the central admissions policy for offering places, thus results are sent to the LEA and the LEA make the official offer of places, referring to each Grams list of qualifiers and the CAFs we send in.
Some of our Grams used to have their own tests but now they have a joint scheme and share results, though this seems to have been farmed out to a private firm.
The LEA still co-ordinates for academies - both Grams and Comps. Though the LEA relinquishes control over various aspects of Academies, they still have co-ordinating and advisory responsibilities. Once all secondaries become Academies there may be difficulty in sustaining the LEA's functions as chunks get delegated to the schools themselves.

I think employees' pay, hours etc will be protected under a law called TUPE when transferring to an academy. I suspect, however, that academies may put pressure on staff to change these terms and conditions at a later stage.

Existing staff would get some protection with TUPE but new staff won't. Employers can sometimes get round TUPE by declaring that they are restructuring their business.

Agree with Waiting For Godot - the Academy scheme fits with the continuing pattern of Government (previous and existing) wanting to shrug off responsibility for the things we pay them to provide.

The Gov are tying proper funding to following their academy scheme. There seems to me a real danger of creating even more disparity between the quality of education at different schools. For every school with the imagination and drive to do something constructive with it (e.g. Pates in Cheltenham) there will be a school that takes Academy status for the funding without wisely using the freedom.

Now the Gov are trying to get Primary schools to go for Academy status too. What earthly point is there in that? Experts agree that the primary school system works very well compared to secondary (though there are always going to be some better than others) If it ain't broke why fix it?

Academy status is just another Gov ploy to give the illusion of "Fixing" education with some simplistic "solution".
My Dad was a teacher for many years, then an HMI (way before ofsted) he once said at HMI conference, "The problem with the education system is that ministers do not listen to the teachers and Headteachers." A week after this, the then education minister made a speech in the house saying "The problem with education is that teachers do not listen to ministers."
Who do you think knows more about how to educate our DCs?
Were it not for constant Government interference, Professional educational staff might actually be able to use their skills to make the system function properly. On the surface, Academy status should help this, but in reality it is a government cop out and relinquishes the advantages of LEA central resources and co-ordination. IMHO the Gov are delegating one level to far down the line.

[Etienne]

In Gloucestershire several of the Grammars are academies. The rules state that they have to abide by the central admissions policy for offering places, thus results are sent to the LEA and the LEA make the official offer of places, referring to each Grams list of qualifiers and the CAFs we send in.

Under the Admissions Code the LA certainly has to co-ordinate the offering of places, but - as you indicate - foundation grammar schools and academies are free to go for option 2 or 3 on my list if they so wish. Option 1 is there if the LA is willing to provide the service at a price the schools are prepared to pay .......

[Amber]

Academy status is a half-cocked adaptation of a scheme which apparently works well in some US states; just as free schools are a half-cocked adaptation of a scheme which doesn't generally work all that well in Sweden. Because both these countries have totally different social and educational traditions from our own rather fragmented system, there is nothing to suggest that transplanting aspects of these schemes into England will be any more successful than what we already have. Which as education systems go, is actually reasonably successful. It's just that successive governments like to start out in office by saying something like 'we will repair this broken education system', as if it is a universally acknowledged truth that it is indeed broken.

Most schools, both primary and secondary, will be academies before the end of next year. And there will be still the same amount of money going round, just in different circles. The positives will be that schools will have more independence in choosing what to do with it. I work in both a primary and a secondary school and am on the governors of a primary - we are looking at it because we don't want to be the only ones not doing it - I suspect that accounts for the motivation in a lot of cases.