Converter Academies are doing worse than their predecessors

38% of Converted schools have gone downhill

From AAA website 18 July

Comparing the 136 Ofsted reports for converted academies published in June with the last full Ofsted report for the predecessor school produces the following results:

– 38% are deemed by Ofsted to be worse than they were before conversion. Only 13% show a higher grading post conversion. 48% have the same grading.
– 7% were put into the bottom grade by Ofsted inspectors post conversion although no schools were in special measure before conversion.
– Nearly 6% of the conversions showed a drop of 2 or more grades compared to pre-conversion.

The analysis of the June reports of converter academies further demonstrates the contradictions in Gove’s headlong rush to privatise education. According to the Department for Education website “Schools that are performing well that want to convert to become an academy will need to follow the process outlined in the guidance document, which is available for download below.” This means, presumably, that only those which are good or outstanding, according to Ofsted, should be able to convert.

However, according to the Ofsted reports for June, ¼ of those schools which had converted were deemed to be merely satisfactory prior to conversion. Wilshaw and Gove have both claimed that satisfactory is no longer good enough but now “requires improvement”. This emphasizes yet another contradiction within Gove’s policies.

Academy status was forced upon Downhills School, against the wishes of parents, staff and governors on the basis that Ofsted had deemed the school to be inadequate. If this is the case and Gove claims that academy status is a way of improving standards, how does he explain the results below?

Ofsted Grading

% Converter Academies

% Predecessor Schools
1 17%

37%
2

52%

38%
3 24% 25%
4 7% 0%

Nishkam Free School fails Ofsted

The Nishkam primary free school ‘requires improvement’

The Nishkam primary ‘free school’ in Handsworth, Birmingham’s first free school,  opened in September 2011. It claims on its website that ‘The primary purpose of the school is the drive for academic excellence. This is exceptionally important in our aspirations for pupils to exceed national standards.’

AABA campaigned against the free school opening. Now we have been proved right. The Nishkam school has just comprehensively failed its Ofsted inspection.

It rated Nishkam Primary as ‘requiring improvement’ in all of the main areas – achievement of pupils, quality of teaching, behaviour and safety of pupils, and leadership and management. (Birmingham Mail report, 20 July).  The report concluded that the school needed to raise standards because ‘there is not enough teaching which is good enough to enable pupils to learn as quickly as they should’.  Inspectors were also critical of the school’s leadership, saying leaders and governors did not have a clear understanding of the school’s strengths and weaknesses.

That last comment was vividly confirmed by the bizarre response of headteacher Damian McBeath to the report. With the aplomb of an alchemist believing he has turned lead into gold, he said: “We are delighted that the hard work and dedication of staff, parents and pupils have been recognised by Ofsted. The academy has only been open since September 2011 and from the outset, we have focused on delivering the highest-quality education for our pupils.’

In fact what makes the school’s failure all the more unacceptable is that Nishkam creams off children from the better-off homes in the area, taking a much lower proportion of pupils eligible for free school meals than other local schools, giving it statistically a huge advantage. In 2012 just 6.4% of children were eligible for free lunches. But the average figure for the 18 primary schools in Handsworth was 43.5% and the figure for St Michael’s, the school next door to Nishkam, was 47%.

Nishkam should be a warning to parents in Birmingham – say no to free schools, support your local authority schools.

With friends like E-ACT, who needs enemies?

In memory of the many staff at Shenley Academy who lost their jobs in 2011

With the academy chain E-ACT reported in the TES and in the wider news this week for the mis-use of public money, and reprimanded by the Education Funding Agency for “a culture involving prestige venues, large drinks bills, business lunches and first class travel, all funded from public monies”, it is worth remembering the staff at E-ACT’s Shenley Academy, Birmingham, who lost their jobs in 2011 when E-ACT refused to support its own flagship academy in plugging a hole in its budget.

Shenley became Birmingham’s first academy in 2009, but by 2011, after restructuring to become top-heavy in senior management, the academy had run up a deficit of £800,000. Redundancies were announced. At the time, E-ACT was receiving £50million a year from the government to run its 11 Academies and top-slicing 5% of this for central costs. These costs included paying its director, Sir Bruce Liddington, a salary of £265,000, plus bonuses and perks, making him the highest paid person in state education. This week we have heard more about how the spending of this top-slice has “stretched the concepts of propriety and value for money”.

Under the Labour government’s rules, E-ACT should have paid £2million to take over Shenley, but that money never materialised. At the time of Shenley’s redundancy crisis AABA called on E-ACT to cough up the £2million that had been promised. The teaching unions demanded that E-ACT use some of their £50million schools budget to support Shenley and avoid redundancies. They also asked the head teacher to take a pay-cut. E-ACT refused and, needless to say, so did the head teacher. 27 teachers and support staff in total lost their jobs, including every single teaching assistant, leaving the 1 in 5 Shenley pupils with special needs without the additional support they needed. Pupils protested at the school gates, devastated at the loss of cherished support staff.

AABA warned in a leaflet to parents that the redundancies would jeopardise improving outcomes at the academy. The previous Ofsted report (November 2010) had said the school was improving but identified improving the low level of literacy as a priority. Over half the pupils were on free school meals, and 1 in 5 had special educational needs, yet the very teachers and support staff these pupils needed were being sacked.

By contrast, shortly after this, and despite results significantly below average, the beleaguered academy was judged ‘outstanding’ by Ofsted. Determined perhaps that this flagship academy should be seen to be a success, and adding fuel to the general perception in Birmingham schools that Ofsted is no more than a tool of government, Ofsted inspectors actually disregarded the hard data and instead made a judgement based on work seen in lessons and students’ books;

 

“Although attainment in English and mathematics at Key Stage 4 was below national figures in 2010 and 2011, the work seen in lessons and students’ books confirms that standards are now broadly average.”

Bearing in mind that ‘below national figures’ equates in Ofsted terms to a grade 4 – ‘inadequate’, and that  ‘broadly average’ equates to a grade 3 – ‘satisfactory’, the leap that Ofsted made to award Shenley Academy a grade 1 overall was quite extraordinary. No mention is made in the report of the extraordinary number of redundancies or the loss of so many critical support staff.

It is no surprise to AABA that Ofsted’s confidence in Shenley’s ‘ever improving’ outcomes has proved misplaced. Since the redundancies, and against a background of above average improvements in Birmingham’s LA schools, results at Shenley Academy have taken a dip;

Percentage achieving 5+ A*-C GCSEs (or equivalent) including English and maths GCSEs

2009

2010

2011

2012
School NA 33% 46% 41%
LA 47.7% 54.9% 58.2% 60.1%
England – All Schools 49.8% 53.5% 59% 59.4%
From DfE http://www.education.gov.uk/cgi-bin/schools/performance/school.pl?urn=135911

It would seem that Michael Gove sees nothing particularly untoward in the self-serving goings-on of the likes of Bruce Liddington. Sir Bruce resigned last month after E-ACT received a formal reprimand from the Education Funding Agency about the way it managed its accounts, only to be taken on by the Department for Education as a consultant advising the DfE on developing high quality academy sponsors.

Hamstead Hall School Strikes against Academy Status

communitiesagainstthecuts

Hamstead Hall 008

Over half of the teaching staff were on strike today, as the school NUT members walked out for one day in opposition to the Head and Governing Body’s push for academy status. There was a large and spirited picket line, which was joined at one stage by many of the school pupils. Many passing motorists honked and waved in support, and messages of support have been coming in from far and wide.
This action was taken as NUT members felt their concerns and opposition were being completely ignored. At a meeting with the head a few days ago, there was a refusal to engage with the NUT officer present in any shape or form. There has been no meaningful consultation with parents, and a one-sided presentation in favour of academy status is all that has been offered, to pupils and others alike. In a recent school assembly, about why people do things…

View original post 218 more words

Catching them young at the Moor Green primary business academy

On March 11 Moor Green primary school in Moseley became an academy sponsored by HTI Academy Trust. HTI stand for Heads, Teachers, Industry. Moor Green is its first Academy.

And who better to exemplify the values on which the school will be based than…Sir Alan Sugar and Sir Richard Branson? Yes, Moor Green academy is, according to its press release, the ‘first ‘employability-themed’ Academy School in the UK’. This, don’t forget, is a primary school.

At the launch ‘the Children will don face masks representing business stars of today such as Lord Alan Sugar, Sir Richard Branson and ‘Dragons’ Hilary Devey, Deborah Meadon and Peter Jones to illustrate the school’s focus on equipping young people to succeed in the world of work. All of HTI’s Academies will place employability at the heart of the curriculum offer, using leading local and national businesses in all aspects of teaching and learning.’

‘Moor Green Primary is the first of 26 planned Academies designed to blend educational excellence and employability sponsored by HTI (Heads, Teachers & Industry) Education Trust.’

Moor Green Primary Headteacher Stuart Smith said: “We are delighted to become the first school to join the HTI Education Trust.’ What he didn’t seem to mention was that the HTI Multi-academy Trust was only set up in November last year, with just three directors, one of whom was…Mr Stuart Smith. Yes, it seems he’s the sponsor and employer of…himself!

The other two directors are also directors of HTI Enterprises Ltd, which went into administration on 17 April with charges/ mortgages due to the Bank of Scotland.

Just in time for the launch HTI seem to have added some new directors. ‘The Trust Board includes the CBI and other leading and experienced education and business representatives and is chaired by former education Minister Lord Knight of Weymouth.’

But don’t bother attempting to access HTI websites on Google to find out more – they don’t work.

Ofsted inspectors concerned about effect of forced academy conversions

Rhonda Evans reported in the Guardian recently that Ofsted  inspectors  have raised concerns that the forced academisation process is holding back the improvement of primary schools by distracting headteachers and governing bodies. In two monitoring reports written recently, the judgment has been that headteachers have been swept up in meetings with Department for Education academy brokers, or staff and parents, that are getting in the way of their job.

Read more here

Gove’s £1Million academy conversion bribes

Warwick Mansell reports on his blog that the DfE is offering academy trusts as much as £1million per school to take over other local authority schools converting to sponsored academy status.

This money is on top of the regular funding that any school or converter academy generally receives and as such amounts to a  bribe to schools to convert. It also makes a nonsense of Michael Gove’s claims that academies will not be funded more generously than maintained schools. Warwick Mansell points out that these figures ‘dwarf’ previous controversy over allegations that DfE consultants have been offering schools up to £65,000 to convert.

Read the full article here

Academies Farce

One of the unintended consequences of Michael Gove’s obsession with academies is that schools are facing farcical turf wars.

But you’d have to go a long way to beat the confrontation between Holte School, Lozells primary school and Mayfield special school in Birmingham.

The three schools share the same site. Holte and Lozells are converting to academy status, but Mayfield is remaining under council control.

Tense discussions are taking place over access arrangements in Mr Gove’s brave new world.

Council leader Sir Albert Bore, remarkably maintaining a straight face, explained: “One of the schools has access to the boiler room, the other one does not. One has access to the thermostat control for the boiler, the other does not.

“The alarm system for the whole of the building is in the boiler room, to which one school does not have access.”

And for the latest update on negotiations, over to cabinet member Brigid Jones: “Both schools now have access to the boiler room, but access to the intruder alarm is yet to be resolved.”

From A sick council, Michael Gove meets Steptoe and Son

The inside track on Birmingham City Council – Paul Dale’s Diary

By: Paul Dale
Published March 5, 2013, in Mr Dale’s Diary, Opinion, Chamberlain Files website.

Cooperative Trusts

By Richard Hatcher

There is a lot of misunderstanding about the term Cooperative Trust. One meaning is the Birmingham-wide umbrella partnership that the LA is trying to set up. This has no connection with the Cooperative Schools Society’s Cooperative Trusts, which are schools or groups of schools – LA and academy – adhering to the Coop’s model (over 200 of them now, including in Wolverhampton and Sandwell). Separate again are schools or groups of schools which may set up ‘cooperative trusts’ (again, as in the Bham LA’s model) without having any connection with the Cooperative Schools Society (CSC) model.

A word about Cornwall. Some LA people have given the impression that Cornwall LA has set up a CSC Cooperative Trust involving all its schools. This is not true. The case they are referring to is a CSC comprising Helston Community College and 15 local primary schools. (See below for a report.) As far as I know the largest example of a CSC Trust is a headteacher-led co-operative organisation in Plymouth where all but one of the city’s 70 primary schools are represented.

An argument made for CSC Cooperative Trusts is that they offer protection against forced academisation. How true is this?

The advantage of a multi-school Trust is that collaboration among the schools might support lower-performing schools to raise their standards and thus prevent any of its members from finding themselves on Gove’s hit list. However, that applies to any collaborative arrangements among schools, of which there are many forms, not just Cooperative Trusts.

But what if one of the schools was targeted by Gove? He would require it to become a sponsored academy. One of the Trust schools could be a candidate for sponsor if it was itself an academy. And the Cooperative Schools Society is itself approved by the DfE as an academy sponsor, and does sponsor several converter academies. (The position of the NASUWT is that ‘Whilst the NASUWT remains opposed in principle to academies, where schools are consulting on conversion to academies, with the intention to convert, the NASUWT will press such schools to use the co-operative model to safeguard stakeholder sovereignty in governance and public and community accountability.’)

But as far as I know there are no instances of the Cooperative Schools Society being approved by Gove to sponsor a forced academy. Gove wants forced academies to be taken over by chains, partly because they have the apparatus to take control of a school and manage it. The Cooperative Schools Society doesn’t have that sort of capacity or role at all. So in that sense a group of schools forming a Cooperative Trust does not offer any protection against forced academisation.

A possible objection to LA schools becoming Cooperative Trusts is that they would have to become Foundation schools (specifically ‘Foundation schools with a foundation’), still LA schools but with the governing body as the employer. (If, that is, they were not already: 42% of schools are currently foundation schools.)

A positive feature of Cooperative Trusts, which does not apply to other forms of collaboration, is their adherence to the Schools Cooperative Society’s ethos, including a set of values and, most distinctively, a greater degree of democratic governance than other schools. See http://coop.carboncode.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Workshop-4.-Convertor-Academies-sponsored-academies-and-role-of-SCS.pdf.

RH

The Helstonian

Helstonian News

June 2012

Launch of Historic Partnership between All Schools in Helston and the Lizard Peninsula

The Helston and the Lizard Peninsula Education Partnership Trust was officially launched by Dr. Upton, the Pro Rector (Learning and Teaching) of University College Falmouth.

With 18 primary and secondary schools, and 7 external partner organisations it is the largest co-operative education Trust in the UK and thought to be the second largest in the world. The Trust schools educate over 4,000 pupils and will be working to be a catalyst for community cohesion.

Member schools of the Trust are Boskenwyn Primary School, Breage CE Primary School, Crowan Primary School, Cury CE Primary School, Garras Primary School, Germoe Primary School, Halwin Primary School, Helston Community College, Landewednack Primary School, Mullion Primary School, Mullion Secondary School, Parc Eglos Primary School, Porthleven Primary School, Sithney Primary School, St. Martin-in-Meneage Primary School, St. Michael’s CE Primary School, Trannack Primary School, Wendron CE Primary School.

In his opening address Dr. Upton said “Achieving more by working together summarises the vision and aims of the Trust. That by working together in a co-operative partnership, more can be achieved for our children, young people and families, than can be achieved by working alone. This is true at individual, school and community levels. The Trust is building on existing links through stronger and deeper partnerships with more schools and other organisations. We will provide the best possible education within our schools by sharing expertise and making the most of all our resources”.

Dr. Upton went on to say that “The Trust is working through groups that focus on teaching and learning, raising aspirations and opportunities, as well as maximising our resources. Now that the Trust has been launched, our next focus is to develop our democratic membership forum, which will be open to our pupils, parents and carers, staff, alumni and local community”.

At the opening, a choir made up of five or six pupils from each of the participating schools entertained the audience, then following the speeches all those attending had the opportunity to see displays from each of the schools, manned by the pupils themselves, that featured their distinctiveness and how they relate to the co-operative values.

The Trust’s external partners from Careers South West, The Co-operative Group, Cornwall College, Cornwall Council, Truro Diocese, Truro and Penwith College and University College Falmouth, all had displays manned by staff who were on hand to provide information and to answer any questions about their role in this important education development for the communities in the Helston and Lizard area.

If you would like to find out more about the Trust please contact: The Helston and Lizard Peninsula Education Partnership Trust, at Helston Community College, Church Hill, Helston, TR13 8NR.