STAFF and parents have said ‘No’ to a Brent, north west London, primary school being forced to become an academy school.
At a well attended meeting on Wednesday 4th March at St Andrew’s Church in Willesden, parents and staff from St Andrew and St Francis C of E Primary School in Belton Rd, Willesden, London were joined by members of the community to voice their anger at the school being forced to become an academy.
John Roche, who spoke for the staff and has been a teacher at the school some years, spoke about how the Year 6 results in the summer had been the best ever and among the best in the country.
Ofsted monitoring visits have said that the school is making good progress.
He questioned the whole premise of the Ofsted inspection that had ‘failed’ the school.
He had seen documents obtained under Freedom of Information requests that clearly showed original grades being crossed out and lowered.
‘Give us our own headteacher, our own Board of Governors and give parents back their voice,’ he said to loud applause.
Irene Scorer, the parent speaker, said that parents need to stand next to their teachers and support them. ‘Start standing up as parents and say no to an academy. For our children’s benefit we have to,’ Scorer declared. She also warned about the dangers of privatisation and running schools for profit.
Hank Roberts, who spoke for the unions, said that this was a government conspiracy. The aim was to turn all schools into academies and then run them for profit.
He explained the history of how schools had first been financially rewarded into becoming academies and how when the money dried up they are being forced.
He quoted from the Parliamentary Education Committee’s report on Academies and Free Schools. The MPs’ report said: ‘We have sought but not found convincing evidence of the impact of academy status on attainment in primary schools.’
Roberts further urged parents to make every effort to ensure that St Andrew and St Francis was not forced to become an academy. There were lots of contributions and no disagreement that this should be strongly opposed.
The meeting also heard from parents, including an ex-governor, about the undemocratic ways that the school was now being run with no parent voice on the Interim Executive Board (IEB) and with no substantive head causing real difficulties with communication.
One parent reminded the audience that academies don’t have to have qualified teachers – a way of saving money but bad for the children’s education.
Parents wondered why there was no substantive headteacher as Mrs Graham had left over a year ago.
Jean Roberts, who chaired the meeting, confirmed that it was common practice for the head to be pressured to leave unless they supported an academy and then not to replace them.
This made it easier to put in an Interim Executive Board (IEB) to run the school and have temporary heads who would do as they were told. Among other speakers Pete Murry, Secretary of the Green Party gave the party’s support to parents for the campaign and said that the Green Party were totally opposed to the academisation of state education.
Dawn Butler, prospective Labour MP for the constituency, said that she was shocked to hear that parents had not been given a voice in any decision about the school becoming an academy.
A teacher from a Brent school which had been forced to become an academy warned parents that class sizes, for example, could rise as they had done since his school became an academy.
The meeting concluded with a rallying call for action to stop the academy. Teachers are currently being balloted for strike action and from what was said in the meeting this action is being supported unanimously.
Meanwhile, the National Union of Teachers (NUT) has rejected the conclusions of a new Policy Exchange report that supports privately-run ‘free schools’.
Commenting on the report, A Rising Tide: the competitive benefits of Free Schools, NUT Deputy General Secretary Kevin Courtney said: ‘The NUT does not accept the conclusions of this report.
‘The findings claimed by the authors are not supported by the “evidence” presented in the report itself and the authors themselves admit that no link can be made between the cause and effects that they nevertheless seek to claim for the free school policy, stating: “It should be obvious – but bears setting out explicitly – that such data cannot demonstrate conclusively that any changes seen are as a response to the new Free School”.
‘The samples on which the authors base their recommendations are tiny as they admit in the report and can in no way be considered statistically robust.
‘Despite the spurious claims that free schools raise performance among lower performing schools that are closest to them, the authors are forced to concede that, “higher performing schools make less progress and the very highest drop back”.
‘It is worth noting, though not commented upon by the authors of this report, that over half of the primary free schools and just short of 30 per cent of the secondary free schools are in London where academic results and progress are much higher than the national average.
‘Comparing the performance of the lowest performing nearest schools to the national average and then claiming that the presence of a free school improves their performance fails to give a true picture of overall local performance.
‘A real comparison would be the performance of similar local authority schools which, inexplicably, the report does not do in relation to lower performing schools.
‘The recommendations in the report include giving free schools the absolute first priority (ahead of NHS or housing) when disposing of public sector land in areas of so called “educational underperformance”.
‘To be clear: this means giving away public land to build new schools in areas where there is not necessarily a need for new school places.
‘The one interesting fact revealed in this report is the changing composition of groups approved to open free schools this demonstrates very clearly what the NUT has said all along: that academy sponsors have come to dominate the sponsorship of free schools.
‘This programme was never about creating a “parent led” school revolution but always about handing over public assets and the management of schools to unaccountable academy groups who, if the Conservatives have their way after the general election, will be given free rein to profit from our education system.
‘The NUT maintains that the free school policy has diverted funds into a small number of schools and prevented local authorities opening schools where most needed. Free Schools do not raise standards. What does is teaching.
‘Supporting teachers in developing their classroom practise through high quality CPD (continuing professional development) and more time to teach, rather than meet arbitrary government targets, should be the aim of any government, not introducing market forces into education.’
• The government’s excessive focus on apprenticeships as an answer to youth unemployment risks making them less attractive, warns a report from the House of Commons education select committee released today, Monday, 9th March.
The University and College Union (UCU) said the report was right to highlight that apprenticeships aren’t working well enough for young people and backed its call for high-quality careers advice for all young people.
The UCU also called for an urgent rethink of government policy that will focus much of future education budgets into apprenticeships at the expense of other important areas of learning.
UCU general secretary, Sally Hunt, said: ‘The government’s efforts to expand apprenticeships should be applauded but ministers must recognise that one size simply doesn’t fit all.
‘Flexibility is crucial in order to cater for the needs of different types of students and employers. Linking apprenticeships to youth unemployment and stripping away funding for other types of courses risks damaging their status as a high-quality training option.
‘We welcome the report’s emphasis on the importance of careers advice and support moves to ensure all young people get better advice from an early age.’