More Academies Are On The Way

[AngryITGuy]

Or so it seems

 

Opt-out offer for outstanding schools

 

Coalition's schools plan to create 2,000 more academies

 

The government will allow for a rapid increase in academies - from current plans for 400 to almost 3,000.

 

Primary and secondary schools graded outstanding by inspectors could be fast-tracked into free-standing academies by this autumn.

 

And all with greater independence from local authority control!

 

Anyone here work in a school judged "outstanding" by OFSTED?

[broc]

I expect OFSTED will dumb-down inspections so more schools can become 'outstanding'

[Robz]

Well I currently work in an academy but I'm moving over to an "outstanding" LA School. TBH the LA school is x100000000000000000 better than the academy, giving it independence might send it downhill, private funding wouldn't really be a great improvement though I don't think. Edited May 25, 2010 by Robz
typo

[elsiegee40]

What's in it for the schools that choose to change?

 

How does this affect the grammar schools? Are they allowed to become academies and still be selective? (I'm not after an argument about whether grammars should exist BTW, I'm just trying to think through the implications in Kent... please don't take this thread OT) If the grammars can't become academies, are the pro-grammar tories putting their funding at risk?

[AngryITGuy]

What's in it for the schools that choose to change?

 

Not a lot as far as I can tell for the schools that are duped by the Academy Status!

 

Only information within the two articles keeps refering to the promise of more control for the schools as they opt out of LA control.

 

By taking academy status, schools will receive their funding directly from central government and will have greater autonomy over how they are run.

 

Don't Academies also need a business sponsorship?

 

Not sure on how it will affect Grammar Schools though sorry.

[sippo]

We are an outstanding school, and maybe turned into an acadamy. Hope our name doesn't change though. 1. I've just bought school polo's out of my own money. 2. It'll be hell of a lot of work changing domain name, e-mail addresses etc..

[Homer]

We're an Academy and I don't know the exact workings of it but I know we have backing from large business/investors...

[maark]

We're an Academy and I don't know the exact workings of it but I know we have backing from large business/investors...

 

What's in it for the businesses?

[AngryITGuy]

Queen’s Speech – Academies Bill

[torledo]

Where's the bit about shiny new buildings ?

 

Or does that cost too much money ?

[Pottsey]

Broc said “I expect OFSTED will dumb-down inspections so more schools can become 'outstanding' ”

Well currently it’s the reverse. Since the new inspections only 9.2% of schools are classed as Outstanding while the old system has 19% as Outstanding and the amount of inadequate schools has doubled.

New Ofsted regime: 'Inadequate' schools double - News - TES Connect source

[broc]

Where's the bit about shiny new buildings ?

 

Or does that cost too much money ?

I was talking to my HT about this; she reckons that the Govt intention is that these new Academies use their existing buildings, with minor refurbishments, nothing on the scale of New Labor Academies....

[broc]

Broc said “I expect OFSTED will dumb-down inspections so more schools can become 'outstanding' ”

Well currently it’s the reverse. Since the new inspections only 9.2% of schools are classed as Outstanding while the old system has 19% as Outstanding and the amount of inadequate schools has doubled.

New Ofsted regime: 'Inadequate' schools double - News - TES Connect source

True, and once upon a time under a previous administration Academies could only be created from failing schools..... until they found out not enough schools were interested & then they changed the rules & bullied LAs into accepting academies as part of BSF deals, so I wouldn't put anything past politicians with their 'pet' projects...... We once had Adonis, now we have Gove...

[torledo]

What's in it for the schools that choose to change?

 

 

I read in The Times the other day that apparently for a school with a budget of 5m, becoming an academy could amount to an additional 500k a year.

 

Don't know if that will actually be the case in the final shakeup, but surely it'd be strange if there wasn't an increased funding incentive, no ?

[RTi]

i'm slightly confused.. does becoming an Primary Academy....mean that IT will be outsourced to external companies?? like BSF or is that something else??

[linuxgirlie]

We had our ofsted a couple of weeks ago and was judged outstanding. Not heard anything about academies yet though.

[e_g_r]

What happens to schools that have signed on the dotted line for BSF. Will they be able to get out of it and at what cost?

[Dos_Box]

Uppign the amount of Academies from 400 (IIRC) to 4000 is a way of offloading a lot of costs to the schools 'sponsor'. Does anyone know if the agreement (what the sponsor must pay for) has been changed for these new sign ups? If so, my guess is tha this will effectively kill BSF and put the onus on the private companies 'buying' into these schools for their upkeep and maintenance.

[broc]

As I understood it, under the previous administration, Academy sponsors contributed a one-off payment of £2m towards the cost of the academy; this could be cash up front, promise to pay, or payment 'in-kind'. The remainder of the Academy funding came from Govt directly. In many cases a new building was also provided, mostly financed under PFI.

 

I don't see this changing significantly, I doubt there will be many sponsors willing to stump up the full cost of rebuilding, so I suspect the new Govt view will be that many academies will merely be a rebranding exercise in existing buildings with the money traditionally held back by LAs being passed directly to the academy along with any funding a sponsor chooses to provide. Any new buildings would have to be funded by similar means to any BSF schools, should that program continue.

Edited May 26, 2010 by broc

[e_g_r]

If it going to effectivly kill BSF then how is that going to affect those LEA's/Schools that have signed along the dotted line but may be waiting 3+ years for a build to start. What happens to the staff who are on the Tupe list?

[Dos_Box]

I recall being on a training day when still employed by Lancashire CC last year and we had a talk on Academies by the person who was in charge of teh contracts\negotiations for a couple of Lancashire schools. I was quite shocked by what I was told:

 

1. The school and it's gorunds were handed over on a 100 year lease

2. The Academies new 'sponsors' could choose the govenors and they could put anyone they like on there, not just parents

3. The sponsor is not allowed to make money out fo the school but one large company who has many schools now under it's control had created a schools supply company and bound those schools into only buying from that one outlet (Kerchinnngggg!)

 

I do hope that these were simply Lancashire CC being silly and most Academies are not like this, and I do hope that a couple of schools who want to go for academy status get in contact with us, as I'd like to see EduGeek having some ICT input in a good school.

[e_g_r]

I recall being on a training day when still employed by Lancashire CC last year and we had a talk on Academies by the person who was in charge of teh contracts\negotiations for a couple of Lancashire schools. I was quite shocked by what I was told:

 

1. The school and it's gorunds were handed over on a 100 year lease

2. The Academies new 'sponsors' could choose the govenors and they could put anyone they like on there, not just parents

3. The sponsor is not allowed to make money out fo the school but one large company who has many schools now under it's control had created a schools supply company and bound those schools into only buying from that one outlet (Kerchinnngggg!)

I do hope that these were simply Lancashire CC being silly and most Academies are not like this, and I do hope that a couple of schools who want to go for academy status get in contact with us, as I'd like to see EduGeek having some ICT input in a good school.

 

Dosn't that remind you of BSF and Choice Fund Catalogues (sp)

[Dos_Box]

Dosn't that remind you of BSF and Choice Fund Catalogues (sp)

 

The Choice Fund Cataloge? I've not heard of that, but let me guess. When it says 'choice' what it actually means is one choice and no looking around either?

[e_g_r]

They say that there buying power is greater then other suppliers so give you a choice of hardware/software for the school to purchase as part of the spend on BSF

[beeswax]

Heard on Radio 4 this morning of one group of parents who want to set up their own "free" school in Wandsworth. They had identified a hospital building which had been closed down and estimated that the book price was somewhere between £8-£10 million, and bringing it up to standard for educational purposes would be £20 million, so a total of up to £30 million in all. Wandsworth borough were in favour of this, so where would the money come from? They were already talking to private companies, but it wasn't made clear if the private companies would provide funding.

 

BBC News - Schools are being invited to become academies

 

And for Michael Gove's views on education, try the two links below

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article7052010.ece

 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2010/apr/13/gove-education-plans