The GMB trade union, which represents thousands of school support staff across the West Midlands, has written to all schools calling on head teachers to admit to parents and staff if they have applied for their schools to become publicly funded independent schools.
More than 1,000 school heads and governors have ‘expressed an interest’ in taking their school out of the control of local councils since the new Tory/Liberal coalition government decided that those ranked by Ofsted as ‘outstanding’ could be fast tracked through the process and apply to become academies as early as September.
The Department for Education (DfE) is refusing to reveal the names of the schools, or even to give the number from each county, while county councils are in the dark because they have no role to play in the process.
The situation has led the GMB to call on the government and the schools to come clean.
So far, head teachers have been tight-lipped and a DfE spokesman said: ‘We will not be publishing the names of the schools at this stage.’
Brian Strutton, National Secretary for the GMB Public Services Section said: ‘The GMB calls for the names of schools who want to be academies to be published, so that parents and staff can start a dialogue with their heads and governors.
‘They should come out of the shadows, tell their communities and start answering questions, because there is too much at stake for schools to stampede over the rights of everyone involved.’
