UKC

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-32978355

To be fair, I am not an educationalist so my uneducated common sense is speaking here, but how is this supposed to work? Is there really a private industry of exceptional educationalists chomping at the bit waiting to turn around failing council led schools? And given that academies don't have to follow the national curriculum, what is the point of it?

I can't help feeling that this is a privatisation of our eduction under the banner of promising to try and improve things.

In reply to ByEek:




Aagghhh, privatisation! fetch the cross and the garlic…..

I think the local authorities are seen as part of the road block to improving standards in schools. Therefore the aim is to bypass them and let others, particularly head teachers and teachers drive, improvements.

In reply to Postmanpat:

Indeed, it's more about letting heads manage their own school as they wish than being all that important as to who is behind it.

Neil

In reply to ByEek:

Tory policy that every child must be above average !

Been wanting to ask the same question myself - what is so good about academies that the right to object to them must be removed ?

In reply to Neil Williams:


Yeah - that makes sense. But are there enough head teachers that have the necessary skills? Teaching is a bit like IT. Those who end up in management positions are not necessarily the best managers.

In reply to Postmanpat:


But central government is clearly much better?
Choice for parents. Except where they make the wrong choice?
And, coming back to the OP, where have all these educational geniuses been hiding up until now?
Secretary of State "did not give a number" for failing academies.

I'm not convinced.

In reply to Neil Williams:

Giving heads more power will not necessarily improve standards - reducing class sizes and teacher workload is the proven method of increasing standards.

In reply to Chris the Tall:


Every child must be given a fair chance. Tory scum for even thinking it.


What is so bad about them that failing schools be protected against them? Couldn't just be because they're private could it?

In reply to ByEek:

The education secretary was asked this morning how many academies were "failing" and she refused to answer. Presumably it's roughly the same proportion as in non academy schools.

Since schools have been turned round without needing to be renamed as "academies" it does seem somewhat unnecessary.

In reply to Bob:


GIven you might expect the rankings to be somewhat gamed to favour the government's pet project, this seems particularly telling.

In reply to Postmanpat:

The line that really worries me is "The Education and Adoption Bill will also scrap the requirement for academy sponsors to consult locally on whether they should take over schools."

For sponsors, read churches, private business, pushy parent associations, local nutjob organisations and anyone else who can butter up the education secretary to give them a shot at turning out fine Tory supporters of the future. In return they will get wads of cash and a mandate to run the school however they like with little or no accountability.

In reply to ByEek:


Yup, because the State knows best. Don't trust those pesky people, especially the teachers, eh….

In reply to Postmanpat:

are you saying the Church, pushy parents or Tory cronies know what's best?

In reply to higherclimbingwales:

We should not bury our head in the sand and pretend that is the only way, though.

Neil

In reply to higherclimbingwales:


I'm saying that they have as good a chance as a State bureaucrat hamstrung by the received wisdom of his overseers.

In reply to ByEek:

In the same breath many then argue for better business links in education, to bridge the skills gap. It's also not like churches are not already embedded. The CofE provides over 22000 governors to schools (and educate c. 1million pupils) - good governors are a much needed and resource difficult to recruit. Church schools could definitely improve the ratio of FSM/Ever6 pupils they educate however.

In reply to ByEek:

the general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said: “Campaigners will not take any lectures from Nicky Morgan on social justice. There are academies deemed inadequate by Ofsted. A change in structure is not axiomatically the path to school improvement. It is irresponsible to tell parents otherwise.

“A pledge to convert up to 1,000 schools is as irrational as it is impractical. Headteachers are already in short supply, so the promise to sack more of them will simply exacerbate the problem. Where does Nicky Morgan imagine that new teachers and heads will come from?”

http://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/jun/03/education-bill-loopholes-a...

In reply to Neil Williams:

I'm not saying academies are a bad idea but forcing schools into them because they are failing without looking at the reasons first is shortsighted. There are academies that are failing too

In reply to higherclimbingwales:

Couldn't agree more. Sadly your straight talking and common sense will get you no where!

In reply to higherclimbingwales:


What do you think the main reasons for failure are? There are failing academies too, and they should be just as accountable as any school. They usually fail for the same reasons, which in the main link back to poor leadership.

In reply to higherclimbingwales:


If a company (or FIFA!!) is failing, you change the management. Why shouldn't the same be true of education?

In reply to John Roberts (JR):


I think that is the problem. The wrong questions are being asked. There is no silver bullet "fix all" solution. Each school has its own problems which are wide ranging and diverse. I will throw my hat into the ring by suggesting that changing all failing schools to academies will not dramatically improve matters as the government hopes.

The problem with politicians is that they like simple narratives which sadly never solve complex problems.

In reply to John Roberts (JR):


you forgot: impossible targets, too much emphasis on testing and not enough time to prepare for said tests, poor teacher morale due to workload and poor pay, substandard teaching environments and huge class sizes - all these add up and it's possible becoming an academy might change some of these things through better funding but it isn't the complete answer. I don't know what the complete answer is, I'm just a supply teacher, but I know what the issues are.

In reply to Postmanpat:

There is no evidence to suggest becoming an academy improves standards. In fact, there are many examples of the opposite.

Everyone agrees our schools need more teachers (my wife has a class of 35!) and more money. Just give it them and watch standards go up. Lets not pretend this is about standards.

In reply to Postmanpat:


Do you? Surely you look at why the company is failing and then make the necessary changes based on the specific set of circumstances?

If that is your solution to complex problems, I suggest you become a government minister - you will thrive!

In reply to Postmanpat:

I don't think anyone is arguing with management changes. Most probably don't have a problem with academies as such either. It is the proposed top-down change, ignoring parents' wishes that are of concern.

Academies get better funding. Is it not probable that this is responsible for better performance* as much as the structure?

*If there is any - the SoS doesn't seem to have evidence for this at her finger tips, which is a bit odd wouldn't you say?

In reply to higherclimbingwales:


+1

As stated higher up in the thread, Nikky Morgan steadfastly avoided giving the number of failing academies, perhaps somebody should've mentioned this report to her

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/not-good-enough-...

In reply to Postmanpat:

What do you mean by "failing" ?

Does it include reference to league tables ?

In reply to ByEek:


Yes, and why can't new management do that?

In reply to Chris the Tall:


There are league tables of companies?

If you mean "how are schools rated", I believe it is normally by Ofsted.

In reply to XXXX:


Actually there is plenty of evidence but it is not yet conclusive.


Ah, that simple eh? More teachers? Supposing the teachers are teaching the wrong things in the wrong way and encouraged thus to do?

In reply to higherclimbingwales:

You're not wrong, I deal directly with all these issues every single day, and don't disagree that many of those challenges exist, but why do some schools (both academy and non) succeed in such environments? There is no silver bullet, or single reason, it's highly complex, but there are some reasons for failure that crop up many more than others, poor leadership being one that they often link back to. Irrelevant of structures, recruiting excellent headteachers/leaders is going to be a significant challenge with the teacher retention/recruitment issues on the way.

In reply to Postmanpat:


Change of management is easily possible without converting to an Academy.

If BT was in trouble it wouldn't change structure to become a charitable trust, it'd sack the CEO and get another team in

In reply to Postmanpat:

Football teams that are failing have a tendency to change management in the hope that will bring about an improvement. Sometime this works, sometimes it doesnt (sacking two managers this season didn't stop Tranmere failing).

At the end of the season 2, 3 or 4 clubs can be judged to have failed and are relegated. The same number each year. But if you improve , someone else has to take your place (yes, thank you Ronnie Moore!). Shareholders, like fans, may clamour for a change of management, and they have every right to, but again a improvement in one companies fortunes is likely to come at the expense of another.

Is this a good model for education ?
Is it not inevitable that a certain proportion of schools will be judged as "failing" each year ?

In reply to Andy Hardy:

In principle it is yes, but only if it has good governance, and above that accountability from the LA (or chain/trust/sponsor and ultimately DfE in case of academy). What the conversion does is give the school an opportunity to change both. Of course, it doesn't always work.

In reply to Andy Hardy:

You are comparing apples with pears - Education is not and shall not be run like a FTSE 100 company (or any company for that matter) or a premiership football club, Though there are some schools that seem to think they are with lovely advertisement campaigns to get yet more pupils in their classrooms.

Schools are not run for-profit and while leadership undoubtedly has a huge effect, just sacking a head that's in a poor performing school misses other factors that might be in play.

In reply to MG:


Nicky Morgan was particularly striking on that this morning on the Today Programme.


Neither is Graham Stuart, (Tory) chair of the Education select committee.

In reply to higherclimbingwales:

I was trying to point out to PP that change didn't *have* to equate to becoming an academy

In reply to The New NickB:


Ex-chair

In reply to Postmanpat:


Because it is quite likely they don't have the domain knowledge specific to that particular organisation - and whilst the new managers are taking their time to bed in, nothing changes.

It is also possible that the problem is not at the management level. As someone above has suggested, providing more teachers and reducing teacher work load is one proven way of improving success rates. You can change the management all you like but if there are too few teachers to do the job and those in the job are stressed to the teeth, you ain't going to solve anything.

In reply to Postmanpat:

Where's the evidence then?

As a member of a governing body who has considered conversion to academy status for the school in the last year and rejected it because of a lack of evidence for any improvement, I'd love to see it.

There is a lot of evidence of schools who were once outstanding, being graded as requires improvement, made an academy, given loads of extra cash and reverting back to their previous outstanding standard. But that doesn't cut it.

We are going to wake up one day to find all of our children coming home in sponsored uniforms.

In reply to higherclimbingwales:



Oh FFS, of course I'm not suggesting schools should be rated by the same criteria as companies so stop pretending I am. I suggesting that when organisations of any type "fail" the governance and senior management will often benefit from a change. This is for many reasons, not least because they have no vested interest in the status quo and can bring a fresh approach.

In reply to ByEek:


You mistake leadership for management. The former is far more important.


Correct - though a major challenge when there's not much money available.

In reply to XXXX:


Nothing much definitive either way yet.

https://www.lkmco.org/article/sponsored-academies-have-improved-faster-othe...

In reply to Postmanpat:

There's no need to get het up. Calm down, it's only a discussion!

In reply to XXXX:



Of course it's about standards. Actually the evidence suggests that academies overall improve GCSE results although this can be explained in various ways.
But of course you are missing or avoiding the point, which is making schools into academies removes the dead hand of the local authority, weakens the capacity of vested interest in the unions to block improvements. This is a long term process of trying to find and then establish best practice, not a quick fix for decades of educational failure.

In reply to Chris the Tall:




It is a specious comparison. As far as it goes the comparison should be about governance.
Do you want a Massimo Cellino owning and "governing" your club or do you want a Stan Kroenke?
Would you think that the State running all sports clubs is the way forward?

You need diversity of provision within the framework of basic requirements outlined and measured by the State.


Probably, but the percentage can be reduced.

In reply to John Roberts (JR):


That'll teach him for speaking out of turn!

In reply to Postmanpat:


Fine. But that isn't a reason for forcing academy status on a school when it is opposed by local parents and tax payers. Rather than top down, state-knows-best diktats about how to run a school, why not give parents a choice? Or are parents at failing schools too dim to know what is best for them?

In reply to MG:

Exactly. Schools can become academies now, if they choose.

This change is the removal of choice in the matter.

In reply to MG:


The bill is not refusing to give stakeholders a say. It is trying to curtail the excessive resistance that blocks improvement.

As an aside about parents, sadly they sometimes are. An old mate is deputy head of a school which was asked to step into a neighbouring school that was "failing". Cue uproar at failing school: demos from parents, teachers threatening to resign etc etc.

A year later the school was achieving a remarkable turnaround, the said teachers had either left or been asked to leave and the parents were all saying how wonderful the school was becoming. They simply didn't realise how bad it had been.

In reply to Postmanpat:

Your're sounding very like a big-state supporter today. What's happened?

In reply to MG:

One of the reasons this is coming about is because of a single school's case. If the governors vote in favour but a single parent 'blocks' it what do you do?

http://schoolsweek.co.uk/government-to-rewrite-academy-rules-after-staff-me...

In reply to Postmanpat:

I only have experience of our local secondary school, which became an academy and parted company with around half of its teachers - either deadwood that the LEA wouldn't face down or people who didn't like the changes.

They also started buying services like payroll, HR, H&S from private contractors, rather than using the LEA/ council. A friend who is a governor tells me the quality of those services has improved, for lower cost. The savings are diverted back to education, (The sponsor is a very wealthy almshouse charity)

Standards and morale have risen significantly in the school.

What's not to like? (Other than perhaps vague concerns about 'privatisation')

In reply to blurty:

Nobody is denying there are some excellent academies out there. The issue is the FORCED transition this bill will impose on failing schools rather than being given the choice.

I'd really like to see comparitive figures for the number of failing schools under state and academy governance.

In reply to MG:




It's about the State trying to divest power and it needs to use its own powers to do that. Somewhat ironical I agree. This is the culmination of a decades long battle by central government (notably David Blunkett, bless his cotton socks) against local authorities and the teaching unions. Essentially the last government decided that if you couldn't beat them just bypass them.

In reply to Postmanpat:


This is all good rhetoric but it is full of assumptions which I feel are misguided i.e.
- That all authority schools are somehow failing - they are not - this therefore invalidates the "dead hand of the local authority" idea.
- That there is no best practice and one needs to be invented - anyone would have though that schools had just been though of.
- That there have been decades of educational failure - again complete nonsense. We have seen rising standards across schools for the last 20 or 30 years.

Every government that comes in, talks of broken Britain and how they are going to fix it. It doesn't need fixing - it just needs tweaking here and there. Large scale reform risks (and does) undermine all that is good in a system whilst generally failing to change what is bad - and I am getting fed up of these grandstanding schemes that only serve the people who implement them.

In reply to ByEek:

It lets local groups manage their own school and bypasses objection from local groups who don't want to....oh...err

In reply to higherclimbingwales:


That's what was being asked of the SoS this morning but she couldn't or wouldn't answer it. As MG suggested, this may be because the figures don't support the political decision.

Even if the figures were provided you'd need to consider teacher-pupil ratios; annual spending per pupil along with any other variables.

In reply to Bob:


Agreed - and even then, I doubt you could draw any firm conclusions. Education is so varied and complex.

In reply to ByEek:



Depends which local authority doesn't it.


Sheesh. You're not really up on this debate are you. There has been an ongoing battle for decades over what constitutes best practice.


The UK comes out pretty poorly in international comparisons. 16.6% of children are functionally illiterate for starters.


Well if you think failing a huge cohort of children and encouraging an unequal and unfair society is acceptable, so be it. It is one of life's ironies that it was the left that pushed hardest for the working classes to have educational opportunities to match those of the better off but now wants to deny their modern equivalents the same thing. Weird.

In reply to Postmanpat:


So presumably there are some local authorities for which all of their schools are failing? It seems to me to be there is a healthy dose of "correlation is not causation" being spread around in order to suit which ever argument is being pushed.


Exactly - but you seemed to suggest that changing all failing schools to academies would bring in a new better best practice that had never been though of.


Looks like you like many are falling for the Pissa test trap. Interesting debate about why they are not the be-all-and-end-all of education attainment here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01mlxhv


I don't want to see a failing education system. But similarly I don't want to see something done for the sake of doing something. Dare I say it would be nice to see some evidence led policy being implemented in this case?

In reply to ByEek:

It's quite possible that in some areas some schools do OK despite rather tha because of the LEA.


Read what I said above. It's a process and a structure which enables best practice rather than having to fight the received wisdom to achieve it.


No, PISA is just one metric of many: the centre for social justice report on educational inequality , Eurostat league tables, Moser report on basic skills. Govt numbers suggest almost half the working population have only primary level maths skills. Only 22% have GCSE C level maths and 57% English.
We have had universal education up to 16 since the 1970s and 16% are still functionally illiterate and literacy appears to worse amongst the young than the old. (a sheffield uni study suggested this reached 22% amongst 16-19 year olds!)

You are living in cloud cuckoo land.


Evidence based? We suffered 6 decades of "progressive education" on the basis of political prejudice and stuff all evidence and when most of the evidence suggests its basic assumptions are wrong. What they are hoping to implement is exactly that, evidence based education practice.
.

In reply to Postmanpat:



In fact compulsory education until 16 wasn't enacted until 1971 in the UK.

In reply to Andy Hardy:

Yup, my mistake. No time to factcheck.

All the more depressing that we seem to have regressed. I have a copy of letters in 1911 between my grandmother who left school aged 12 to become a seamstress, and her father. God knows when he left school. Perfect grammar, spelling (and handwriting) by both. I rather doubt the modern day equivalent could match it.

In reply to ByEek:

Ultimately most schools will become Academies and things will be back where they started, just that the influence of the LAs will have been shrunk, which is the ideological bent of the whole idea.

It was Thatcher that kick started the idea in 1988 and it was actually then aimed at under performing schools, that could see investment from private firms and philanthropists.

The problem was that the money didn't show up and Labour brought them under the Academy framework, which didn't need the startup funds. They looked like half decent schools because they were just expelling the bad kids, that's why the Academies had to make some effort to stick to the Admissions Code.

Now the Academies are sitting on £2.5 billion of unspent funds, whilst syphoning £100s millions out of the system that would have been spent on the failing schools.

The schools have been bad for a long time and we have half a dozen Academies in special measures, including one of the Thatcherite CTCs and one run by a Russell Group university.

In reply to ByEek:


Let's just get this straight.

Academies are not private. They are, in practice, almost 100% state funded. The 'sponsor' may give some money towards the school, but the reality is that this promised money is not, in many cases, forthcoming. Thus, some unaccountable entity gets 100% control of a state-funded school for a pittance.

And the controlling entities have their own agendas, which may be contrary to the wishes of those in the catchment area. And, if the proposal to make the transfer unopposed goes through, how to those in the catchment area object?

In reply to ByEek:
Failing schools don't just convert to academy status. As they are failing, they are taken under the wing of a "sponsor" trust. They then belong to that trust and their budget is controlled by the trust. Google 'top-slicing'. Make no mistake, this is privatisation by another name - corruption on a large scale.

As well as controlling the budget, the trust owns all of the assets - the buildings and the school grounds etc. They are also able to 'restructure' and get rid of qualified teachers - replacing them with unqualified staff for half the price.

In reply to ByEek:

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jun/03/nicky-morgan-wrong-evi...

In reply to higherclimbingwales:


LOL. Based on Ofsted reviews. They're part of the problem!

In reply to Morty:


Can you elaborate on what you mean by "corruption"


What is your evidence for this actually happening?

In reply to MG:

If all the failing schools become academies, where will all the money for better funding come from?

In reply to marsbar:

No idea. Ask the SoS.

In reply to Hat Dude:


I'm sure she said 750 when I was listening. Did I mishear, or was no one else paying attention?

In reply to ByEek:
Just as an aside, can anyone explain why Academies don't have to follow the national curriculum? I don't happen believe that changing funding and governance of schools is the way to increase attainment (I just can't follow the logic, sorry), but that aside, surely ditching the NC depending on your funding model is just batshit mental? Why or how could that be good? If the NC isn't benefiting kids, then surely, change it?

The whole thing stinks. It's not evidence-based, it's ideological change and while it might achieve excellent results in some cases it also allows absolute bullshit (e.g. religious schools not following the NC, god help us) into the education system.

Yes of course crap schools have to change. But can we please find out what works, and implement that, while keeping all of the great things about state schools and learning from how the brilliant ones achieve their results (presumably they do this by being well run and being full of excellent teachers)?

In reply to Jon Stewart:


"The Department's argument for Academies' curriculum freedoms is that these schools have a particularly disadvantaged pupil intake and therefore may need to spend more time on literacy and numeracy or find new ways to engage pupils in their learning.[48] The Department expects that as Academies drive up performance they will offer the full National Curriculum to the large majority of their pupils. In the meantime, however, it deems Academies' curriculum freedoms to be essential if these schools are to raise standards.[49] Furthermore, in his evidence to us the Minister was not concerned that Academy pupils' access to a broad and balanced curriculum, or coverage of particular key topics, was in any way under threat from the curriculum freedoms that these schools enjoy:"




It is intended to allow schools to adopt better teaching practices which have been resisted by unions, local authorities and educational colleges for decades. The nostrums of the past five decades have been largely discredited by just the evidence based work that you keep asking for.

In reply to Postmanpat:


The trouble is, I don't believe it. The drafting there is amazingly fishy. Having first hand experience of the way the Minister gathered and responded to evidence, I hold absolutely no stock in his lack of concern. Nor do I understand how the NC can hold back disadvantaged pupils - and if it's doing so, then it needs changing. I think the motives are concealed.


I really struggle to get to grips with your views on education and on health. I went to a truly comprehensive state school and achieved top grades and with many of my colleagues, went to a top university. It was great. The other Sheffield schools my mates went to were very similar. There was no systemic failure (but the buildings were pretty grotty, now fixed up nicely). Equally, when I go to hospitals either as a patient or in a professional capacity, I'm extremely impressed. I don't believe that there is systemic failure due to fundamentally ineffective funding structures and governance because that doesn't chime with my experience. I just think that there is an appreciable spread which means some crap schools and some crap hospitals (as well as some really excellent ones) which need to be improved.

In reply to Postmanpat:

Further up the thread you say that "Actually the evidence suggests that academies overall improve GCSE results"

Interested in your source. Can you supply it please?
Ta

In reply to Greenbanks:




The Economist: their sources are "Chain effect" by the Sutton Trust, and an LSE study by Professors Machin and Eyles.

In reply to Postmanpat:

Thanks - appreciated

In reply to Postmanpat:


Ok - so by going down the academy route, you cut out the local authority, but how do you get around the unions?

In reply to ByEek:


With difficulty, but you break the nexus of local authority and union and give the right to for schools to make their own decisions which weakens the ability of unions to block improvement.

In reply to ByEek:
As an experienced primary teacher I have read comments with interest. There has been a lot of discussion of failing schools but almost no understanding in the media or wider public about what failing actually looks like on the ground. The ability of a school to succeed or fail depends on a wide range of factors beyond the quality of teaching and learning. My school has a hardworking and caring staff who are completely committed to raising aspirations of our pupils. There is no 'dead wood' within the teaching team.

We do however have a number of factors which contribute to results which don't always reflect aspirations, quality of teaching and the caring, safe nature of the school. These are:
More than 60 percent of our pupils have english as an additional language and are counted in our results after only two years in school.
High levels of criminality within the community.
Low levels of literacy within the community.
A much higher than average level of children under child protection.
A much higher than average level of looked after children.
Our ward is within the poorest 1% in the UK.
High unemployment and very low aspiration within the community.
High levels of drug and alcohol use.

In addition to these factors we always have small cohorts so individuals feature prominantly in statistics.

In spite of these factors we received a good in our last OFSTED and have had results above the floor target for the last three years. We are always very close to this target and this year will be very close. If we fell below this arbitatry target would that mean that we have suddenly begun to fail our pupils? Would becoming an academy make the children perform more capably or fix their environmental factors?

I am sick to death of hearing that our worst teachers are teaching in our worst performing schools. This is ridiculous. We need our most inspirational, tough and caring individuals on the front line in our most deprived communities. The feeling of constant attack from Gove and then Morgan will make it increasingly hard to recruit those most inspirational individuals into our most needy communities. I enjoy immensely working with our children and I for one feel that we are already providing a nurturing, caring, inspirational and aspirational education! I would love to have Morgan in school for a week so that she could come to her own conclusions.

We, after much deliberation are becoming a co-operative trust school which will provide us with protection from academy status and will enable us to keep the school at the heart of the community.

James

In reply to james mann:
>
>
The curious thing about co-operative schools is that they sound remarkably like a form of "free school" and embrace the concept of devolving power to the governors, heads and teachers that is behind much of the free school movement. How do they differ?

In reply to Postmanpat:


No idea - but governors, heads and teachers are generally more accountable to the community they serve compared to religious organisations, pushy parent groups or sponsoring businesses with their own agendas.

In reply to ByEek:


Actually that's not necessarily true, but anyway, cooperatives include the pushy parents.
That's part of the point of them.

In reply to Postmanpat:

You have said that the LEA and particularly the unions are a block and are holding back children. That, by extension, means you think teachers are putting their own personal interests above the children they teach. I suggest you spend even five minutes in a school where they buy clothes and food and give the love and security that they often lack at home. This idea is demonstrably wrong and the love and affection teachers have for their children is obvious.

Everyone within education wants children to do well.

In reply to XXXX:
>

Bollocks. That's a non sequitur. I'm not saying that at all. The union leaders are largely politically motivated but that doesn't mean teachers are. I don't doubt for one moment that the vast majority are keen to do a good job. Whether they have been given the training and the tools to do that job is another question.

In reply to Postmanpat:

But teachers are members of those unions and even historically moderate (and non-striking) unions have supported industrial action.

Teachers will support any action that increases the chances of the children they teach, but go into schools and you'll find they don't support the ideas of the current administration.

Something isn't adding up.

In reply to XXXX:

Why does this tell you the teachers' don't want to do a good job?

I think you'd find there are far more "shy Tories" in teachers' common rooms than you suspect. But that apart, that they disagree with government policies doesn't mean they are right. Anybody who has attempted to achieve change in an organisation will have experienced internal resistance. Why do you think that teachers are resistant to the idea that there should be less but clearer guidance, more flexibility, and more disciplinary powers and that their schools be given more autonomy?

In reply to Postmanpat:

My evidence is the evidence of personal experience. And no, I wouldn't like to elaborate for you. This has been widely reported over several years if you are interested in doing a little research.

In reply to Morty:


Oh I've done some research and it suggests you don't understand how the conversion works, don't understand top slicing, don't understand the difference between leasing and owning (usually the assets are leased by the academy) and instinctively confuse "private" with "corrupt"

As for replacing teachers, I doubt they do it for half the price, but part of the point is to enable the teaching staff to be improved.

I may, of course, have inferred wrongly but since you seem to be generalising from a particular that you won't divulge we'll never know.

Complete speculation to back up your point of view. Go into any school staff room anywhere in the country and I doubt you will find much support for ofsted or the Tory education policies. This may sound like complete speculation too, but I know a quite a few teachers and I don't know any that support what is considered, by the vast majority of the profession, the dismantling of our comprehensive system in favour of privatised schooling.

Just before the news international phone hacking scandal hit the fan, it was alleged that Gove was making moves to push the acadamisation of a group of London schools. Apparently, the company that was going to run them was in someway linked to news international (goves' former employer). A few other associated companies that were going to provide the IT systems were also linked to news international. I can't remember the exact details, but it was all soon ditched when Murdoch became even more toxic. They were all in each other's pockets as advisors here and consultants there and that's were the money would have gone.

If you think all of this is in done in the interest of the children in these schools and for the sake of standards then start digging a little, and try to avoid confirmation bias.

In reply to Jack:

I know a few, and many will admit that, despite his persona etc, actually a lot of what he did needed doing. I suspect they don't say it in the common room though. Polls apparently suggest about 30% of teachers voted Tory, so it's hardly a tiny minority.
Anyway, of course many/most won't. It's an upheaval, requires extra work as a result, and confronts much of what their received wisdom about teaching. The common room provides whatever confirmation bias is needed. If they are of leftish persuasion anyway their perception of the reforms is heavily skewed by the sources of information they prefer.


Talking of complete speculation

>

In reply to Postmanpat:



Its not speculation. Goves' links to Murdoch are well documented, as are Murdoch's plans to get involved in the academy system (encouraged / facilitated by Gove). Now, have a think - Is Murdoch the kind of person you would like involved in education?

In reply to Jack:

Probably not. But we don't know what was discussed. I'd guess Gove was exploring whether they could give his schools policy some momentum. Bad idea but he wasn't exactly Robinson Crusoe in dealing with Murdoch.
I guess you could argue that Ministers shouldn't meet any businesses involved in their area of responsibility but it might make their jobs a bit tricky to do.

In reply to james mann:

Good post.


Not sure that this is necessarily the outcome - isn't it just more likely to trigger an OFSTED visit?

In reply to Postmanpat:

I'm sorry but I'll stop you just there. Teachers and other school staff in general are committed to improving standards. They are not lazy and much of their 'perceived wisdom' is based strongly on what actually works well in the class room. This is something teachers know much about and Gove knows nothing of as he has never ever built a relationship with learners, nurturing and developing knowledge and understanding.

Gove asked for advice about reforms but only from those he thought he would be receiving the 'right' answer from. When he received an answer he didn't agree with he ignored it under the guise that the individual involved didn't care about raising standards. One of the results of this is that children in primary schools can largely only learn about the history of only Britain and then before 1066. As a teacher in Plymouth this means that studying the armada and the tudors cannot happen if we also wish to study the second world war. This is entirely down to Gove's retarded vision of education. This was protested against by a large number of academics. He didn't listen. Perhaps you think that this kind of national curriculum is what is needed to raise standards but I don't.

Have you ever used a calculator. Gove says we don't need these in our primary schools. Children should learn without them. This hinders the teaching of Maths as children don't get the opportunity to use their great knowledge and understanding of inverse operations and apply them to larger and smaller numbers. It is these erosions of teacher's judgements that Gove enjoyed and oversaw. I for one can't wait for laser eye Morgan to further develop his poorly conceived vision for our young people.

If you can't understand these arguments and you think that they are just excuses for a lazy, backward looking approach to education then I suggest you volunteer in a local school. This would begin to provide you with a viewpoint which might just clarify your dreadfully biased and poorly informed opinions.

James

In reply to Postmanpat:

Every child isn't given a fair chance in the academies that are cited as wonder solutions.

Mossbourne is always cited but actually the first thing Wilshaw did was get rid of failing students with unsupportive parents. Meanwhile the area became more gentrified anyway. It raised exam results. It didn't change the problems it just moved them on elsewhere.

The bottom line is those kids end up somewhere. Eventually all the schools will be academies and then they won't be able to get rid of those kids.

In reply to james mann:

Gove is a 4 letter word.

In reply to marsbar:







This is absolutely true, not to mention that Wilshaw didn't exactly build relationships with his staff based on mutual support and respect. It is his ethos which makes the scrutiny of staff such a counterproductive and damaging process in so many schools. Teachers are often only told about what they need to improve. They are not told about their strengths and successes.

It will also be quite interesting when free schools begin to have their first sets of published results scrutinised. This should happen before the end of this parliament and should prove illuminating.

It is easy to blame Gove for everything but what we must remember is that he didn't think up this bonkers system. City academies and faith schools were part of Blair's vision for Britain. The blame in terms of fragmenting the education system lies at his door also.

In reply to Postmanpat:


I know quite a few too. The "all teachers hate Gove" narrative only seems to be true of the vocal ones.

In reply to james mann:


And I'll stop you there. Might I suggest you read what I wrote " I don't doubt for one moment that the vast majority (teachers)are keen to do a good job", (and possibly what Gove said) rather than what you think I wrote. I assume that most teachers work hard and want the best for their students.
No minister of health has been a doctor, no chancellor has been a banker, and no foreign secretary has been a diplomat, so why single out one minister for this criticism?


Well, except that he did listen. The criticisms of the draft specifications primary school curricula in Feb 2014 led to it being radically revised and being far less prescriptive. There are opportunities to study both post 1066 and non British topics.


Actually he said they mustn't be used in exams. You don't think that excessive use of calculators hinders the practise of mental arithmetic?

>
Well, actually they are partly based on people who have taught in schools and found that the practices that worked best were not the ones that had been prescribed. They are also based on academic research and cognitive psychology as opposed to the political prejudices of the progressive consensus.

I don't understand why you think anyone is calling teachers "lazy". "Backward looking", possibly. One third of pupils leave school without basic maths and English schools. Do you think the current teaching practices are a success?

But to go back to my earlier question, if you think that teachers know best why do you rest the devolving of power towards them?

In reply to james mann:


Wow. Just wow. Utter tripe that is laden with emotive terms and betrays a total lack of understanding of mathematics.

What about - radical suggestion - the children learn how the operators manipulate the numbers and symbols so that they can apply them to numbers of any scale with ease? The fact that you think a calculator is needed to appreciate addition and subtraction being opposite is ludicrous - a calculator can show the child that they are opposite for what ever particular numbers the child puts in, but it is only through performing the maths themselves that they come to understand why they have this relationship.

Even worse - to "show" the child that multiplication and subtraction are thus related, the calculator has to hide complexity from them (rounding to more digits than are displayed.)

If they have a "great knowledge and understanding" they won't need to use a calculator to see it, because they will intuitively understand why certain operations act as they do, and they will be able to do the maths in their head or on paper.

If they need a calculator to add and subtract two integers of arbitrary length then they are severely - severely - limited in even the most basic of mathematics, and are certainly not showing "a great knowledge and understanding". Tripe and nonsense.

Funnily enough, mathematics as taught at the junior school level has been understandable to many generations without calculators.

If you want to argue that sums should be reduced to a vocational skill and the use of machines taught as part of that, then go for it, but in such cases the calculator is anachronistic and outdated...

In reply to Postmanpat:

Until we remove education from being a part of the political agenda and have decisions made as part of a truly coherent strategy which can be developed over time based on actual empirical evidence we will never make the progress that we could. You state that health ministers have never been doctors and this is true. I would argue that health ministers have never laid out guidelines about which operation should be carried out for a particular patient. Gove was certainly extremely close to doing this in education terms. It is deemed acceptable to prat about with education on the basis that everyone has been to school. I have been on many aeroplanes. Would this qualify me to drive one? No.

In this same way you have drawn a number of conclusions based upon no personal experience of your own. You are entitled to your opinions but in the end they are just that. Having seen schools and teachers decimated by bullying and nasty management practices as recommended by Gove and Wilshaw I am sorry to see education in this state.

James

In reply to Postmanpat:


One of the current Ministers for Health is - Dr Dan Poulter, I believe that's why they call him Doctor Dan.


That has nothing to do with removing education from LEA control, which is entirely based on political prejudice.

Academies are an intervention on a scale that the LEAs are prevented by Statute from taking so there is no opportunity to make a comparison with other types of possible interventions. That's the sciencey bit.

In reply to winhill:

Well spotted :-0


No, it's really just a practical strategy. As I said above, successive education ministers of different political hues had been defeated by the entrenched powers of the LEAs and their union chums. The obvious strategy was simply to bypass them.
Despite the claims (as much from the opposition as from the supporters) that academies are some sort of magic bullet, the reality is just that they are just a way of enabling change. There are obviously risks involved in change.

In reply to ByEek:

A lot (not all) failing schools have their problems because of the environment that their children are brought up in. Often the direct family life (whether or not the area is disadvantaged). The best solution is addressing the early years provision and I certainly don't mean giving formal literacy and numeracy from a young age. Social skills are what need to be developed - both for the children and (in far too many cases) their parents. What are the government proposing to do about this? Slashing Early Years budgets, reducing local authority budgets so that they are forced to close Childrens' Centres. It isn't going to get any better, but then governments aren't interested in long term solutions or anything that can't be "accurately" measured.

Academies really are not the solution for primary schools and I'm not that convinced for secondaries either.

In reply to james mann:

>
>
So basically your position is that extensive research based on analysis of practices and outcomes across a wide range of educational institutions globally, combined with the anecdotal experience of actual teachers, should be ignored in favour of one person's personal experience. ie. Yours ?

Has it struck you that on this basis we might as well stop educating anybody completely since what they are basically learning is second hand knowledge and experience.

In reply to Postmanpat:

You seem to have wilfully have missed the point of what I have just said. In order to reply to a post you have to read and digest the whole answer. This is what I wrote:

'Until we remove education from being a part of the political agenda and have decisions made as part of a truly coherent strategy which can be developed over time based on actual empirical evidence we will never make the progress that we could.'

This would mean that education policy wouldn't be based upon the opinions and predjudices of individuals or rhetoric which is currently politically popular. It would instead be something which could be built upon strong foundations to develop academic and social skills, aspirations and the ethics required to make our country and individuals within it socially and economically secure. As an experienced primary teacher I am sure that this approach whilst not being as easy as kicking around the political football would provide Britain with a solid and cohesive future.

James

In reply to james mann:


Yes, but you also made great play of the idea that Gove and others cannot have a valid opinion because they have no classroom experience, and based your own views firmly on the basis of your personal experience.
I was addressing that contradiction.

It is naive to think that education can be divorced from politics. What you teach people and how you teach them is inherently political. The "progressives" knew this very well. The ideology behind their nostrums was that the established hierarchy was "bad" and should be undermined. What they actually did, amongst other things, was create a semi educated underclass.
If this is to be redressed then clearly it is going to be political even if it based on empirical studies.

>
Which skills, which aspirations, which ethics? It's inherently political.

In reply to Postmanpat:

You are either naïve, ignorant or have a vested interest. I suppose you could be a troll.

In reply to Morty:


When I was about 6 years old children used say to each other , "I know something you don't, but I'm not telling", usually accompanied by putting their thumb to their noses and waving their fingers. I think most of them stopped doing it by the age of about ten. Not all of them, it seems.

In reply to Bingers:



Insightful post - one of the best on the thread. The Tories removed CVA, a measure that took socioeconomic factors into account in the way that they were measured against other schools, forcing many schools in inner-city areas (previously "outstanding" schools) into Special Measures. Next step from measures is an academy, normally one sponsored by a MAT. It is systematic. Now they are going after "coasting" schools. They will not be happy until all schools are academies.

In reply to Postmanpat:


I'm just not prepared to waste my time with you. Sticks and stones and all that...

In reply to Morty:

Still not telling eh,meanie

You really dont get it it, do you?

Come back when you feel able to make your case. In the meantime,
Dont forget to take your ball with you x

In reply to ByEek:

TBH I just see this as a desperate throw of the dice.

Around me we have controversial magnet and charter schools, but the state schools are attrocious and anything is better than them. I now will try to sub in those schools over the state schools for personal safety they are so bad.

Whilst they set the curriculum they still take the state and national tests in the US anyway so its no great change in actual content knowledge.

In reply to Postmanpat:

The Sutton Trust are a bit of a worry. They seem to have a concerning deficit in statistical knowledge. http://www.huntingenglish.com/2015/03/21/causation-and-correlation-in-educa...

They set up some experiment to convince people that the latest fad is working and produce shiny but dodgy data and people fall for it.

In reply to Morty:


Why thank you.

But I must own up to insider knowledge - I used to be a teacher in a failing secondary school which was taken over by an academy then merged with another academy and then eventually closed down. I got out before the taking over started, but have kept an eye on proceedings talking to my former colleagues. I also now work with a lot of teachers, TAs and schools and see the pressures that they are under and the supposed solutions. I also work a day a week in a primary school trying to do my bit to help with the social skill side. I'm lucky that somebody can see the benefit of what we do taking children outside even though it is not easily measured by the official statistics.

The business manager of a primary academy I was in recently told me that the conversion money did not go far and then suddenly you find yourself having to pay for all the services that you would have got from the Local Authority. However, fortunately some of the more experienced members of staff will be leaving at the end of the year, so they will be able to get some cheaper ones in.

In reply to Postmanpat:

I gather that instances like the Trojan Horse episode (which may/may not have been as it was described) have more of a chance of going undetected under the academy system.

In reply to Bingers:



That sounds like a terrible mess. My mum was a teacher and picked up on the children from the more deprived backgrounds having either less in the way of social skills, which restricted their progress, or more 'chaos' going on at home, which also restricted their progress.

In reply to Bingers:



The LA central services were never intended to be paid for out of the conversion money on an ongoing basis. I would trust the business manager understood this. The LA education budget is "top sliced" so that the money previously used internally for such services is transferred to the academies to be used to pay for these services. Many councils have since rejigged their budgets to reduce the top slice, in what is presumably partly a political rearguard action against the academies, thus putting financial pressure on the the academies.

This is partly why it is difficult to establish what your admirer Morty is referring to in apparently regarding "top slicing" as some sort corrupt mechanism which profits the academies.

In reply to marsbar:



I think we all understand the difference between causation and correlation. It would be more helpful if you could actually add links to the Sutton Trust work that falls foul of this fallacy.

In reply to Postmanpat:
Most of their crazy ideas...

I have the links at work not at home, sorry.

As for everyone knowing the difference, not in education circles. Academies getting better exam results is a classic.

Edit

I googled it and it seems that much of it has been removed. Triple marking is something to google if you are interested.

In reply to marsbar:

Why refer to exam results though? These are often schools which are doing horrifically bad.