About to attend a meeting brought together to decide if my local High School should become an Academy, I don’t fully understand all the pro’s and con’s of becoming an Academy. 😯

There is a big question mark currently hanging over the school about it’s viability long term as it’s only got about 300 pupils. It nearly got the chop 3 years ago

Any of the STW contributers been through this?? Any thoughts??

Which one gets funding? Do you want the school to remain open?
300 pupils – surely it’s not sustainable.

Basically it generally means your school gets more money, at the expense of other local schools that aren’t academies. I’d be voting no.

I expect the head is all for it? This will have nothing to do with the fact that their salary may well double.

Who is the sponsor going to be?

Academies don’t need sponsors anymore. As a teacher at a school that’s become an academy, I can confidently say it will make no difference to your kid’s education. The govt is throwing money at them but how long that will last who knows.

what grum said unless the mor emaoney means it stays open and lessmoney means it closes in which case i would have a think

TBh Gove freed them up from legisaltion as

The Government wants to create more of a market place in education and hopes it will give parents greater choice.

If you think where you live does not curtail your ability to have a free market then you are a loon [ IMHO]. Surely everyone wants the local school to be a good one rather than this fee choice shit – it wont work as oddly everyone then picks the best school and the then give places based [ largely] on geography.
hey can also negotiate local wages, school hours and are “free” from state control and specialise
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/education/article7136833.ece
re standards

A report by PWC in 2007 found attainment in academies is improving faster than at comparable schools and the national average and pupils are doing better overall at key stage 3, GCSE and post-16 levels.

But MPs on the Commons public accounts committee said it was impossible to tell whether the success of academies was from the extra cash and enthusiastic teachers, or from the freedom given to them and warned it may not last.

Critics also accuse academies with high exclusion rates of siphoning off badly behaved pupils to improve their statistics.

http://www.antiacademies.org.uk/ obviously they are biased
Some pro stuff from give and/or DFES

It depends – though one should ask why a high performing school would /needs to leave…kind iof negate sthe argument for them really.

Do converting schools need to have a sponsor?
Schools that are performing well are not required to have a sponsor, although they are free to work with any external organisation. A school’s governing body can establish the academy trust.

http://www.education.gov.uk/schools/leadership/typesofschools/academies/academiesfaq/a0066018/conversion-process/

If the school isn’t viable it could consider federation or merger with another school. Its a way of creating scales of economy and curriculum range. I’m chair of governors at a school that was in this position. It has enabled us to keep a school open and sites in two villages so that the comunities are kept alive. If you have a good head its worth considering. (before they decide to go somewhere secure)

Merger allows you breathing space and still have the option of acadamy later if you want to. The cash benefit is pretty small. On a school of 300 I would think that it could be as low as £25k.
The way Local Authority services are imploding and the power of schools (wether they are acadamy or not) to purchase services puts them in the driving seat.

The educational benefit is very small if any at all.

I work in an Academy.

No.

Sorry mate,

The staff vote is simply lip-service. Experience tells me that long before staff are consulted on such matters, the decision to go to Academy status has already been made. Expect your school to receive pots of cash in the short term but in return the local authority has NO further responsibilty for staff, students and buildings of that school. The process also involves all employment contracts being TUPE’d across. You therefore will be working in essence for a private limited company and your employer can change the terms and conditions of employment without notice. *NB the TUPE document is only valid on the date it is written and you could find yourself with a new contract and a new pay scale within 24hrs. Remember that academies do not have to honour teachers pay and conditions (the burgundy book). All the work that Unions have undertaken to support teachers on workload and pay, pensions etc could simply be undone. Infact the TES reported this Friday about Union reps being denigned access to negotiations. Problem that your school senior management has is that if all schools in your area become academies and your school doesn’t, then you could quickly find yourself working in a sink school with a bunch of nutters that no other school will take. In my view (and in the view of ALL teaching unions, Academies are not a good thing.)

Some interesting points here, seems you’ll be dammed if you do and dammed if you don’t! I know that the local high school to which I referred in my OP is doing this to prevent it being closed. But seems that the headteacher could stand to get a substantial increase in salary!!! No wonder the primary school head wants to go for it, he’s a bit of a gold digger!!

Was in another county on friday,outside a school, and a huge sign proclaimed it to be an academy, they must have spent a load on new signs, then the children came out, it was like an episode of Glee, all the children had black blazers with red ribbon sewn round the edges,just like the kids in Glee, No Sue though.

A few things that change are the children suddenly become students, the head turn into a principle, and gets a new company car, all the heads of departments seem to aquire new job titles, and lots of new signs go up.

No.