Beccy Earnshaw
SCHOOLS NorthEast
The future of our region is in schools
Collaboration, Conversion, Coercion & Confusion
Background
•Unique – no other region has a network•Established 2007•Board 28 Head Teachers all sectors & phases•Patron Lord Puttnam•Small team•Link schools to region’s economic & social development•Common purpose and collaboration•Inclusive and independent
What we do
•Provide strategic voice + influence
•Focus on specific regional issues
•Create channel to facilitate innovation, large scale projects and additional funding
•Facilitate sharing intelligence & experiences
•Connect you to each other and external organisations for mutual support
The changing educational landscape: drivers
• International comparators - OECD• Autonomy and accountability• Competition/collaboration• Raise standards .. ‘rigour’• Improve teacher quality• Reduce bureaucracy• Behaviour and attendance• Improve social mobility• More local/less local?? • Increase efficiency – QUANGO cull
Academies……’the only show in town’
What is an academy?
1. Old style (sponsored)
2. Converter
3. New sponsored
• = Got piles of cash!
• = ‘Performing well’ – 1513 schools nationally
• = Going with sponsor – Chain/high performing school
Academies
How do they differ from LA schools
• Are run by a Charitable (Academy) Trust
• Have control over land and assets and is also an admissions authority
• Outside of LA, funded directly by DfE
• Do not have to abide by the School Teachers’ Pay + conditions
• Freedom on curriculum
• Control over budget (suppliers etc.)
• Change terms & school days
• Money previously spent by LA into school (LASCEG)
Academies…
What stays the same..
• Bound by the Schools Admission Code and the same exclusions guidance
• Are all ability (unless they are not!)
• Are inspected by Ofsted
• Must offer a broad and balanced curriculum (Academies without a religious character will teach the locally agreed syllabus for RE)
• Must follow the special educational needs (SEN) Code of Practice
All schools can become Academies. Some schools must become Academies.
Schools that are ‘performing well’
Can convert to Academy
status
Schools that are not ‘performing well’ but are
above ‘the floor’
Can convert in a chain with a strong
school
Schools that are below the
‘floor’
Can convert in a Multi-Academy Trust (chain)
with a strong school
Continue to be tackled through Sponsored
approach
Worst performing
schools
‘performing well’ is determined by: Ofsted rating; exam results; comparison to similar
schools
Schools are below ‘the floor’ if both exam results and pupil progression is below a certain level.
Converting to an academy…
…is like leaving home, you have more freedom but you also have to look after yourself…
•Legal costs
•Building maintenance
•School improvement
•Staff costs
LA does retain some funding for services that it has to continue to provide incl: Some SEN related provision, PRUs, prosecution of parents for non attendance
Why convert?
Money
Curriculum
Staffing
Autonomy
Closure threat
Support another school
Why not Get support
Michael Gove – today
“We are accelerating the academies programme as fast as we can - taking
chronically under-performing schools out of the hands of the bureaucracies which have failed
them, either removing their leadership or providing their leaders with new support, and
placing the schools in the hands of those with a track record of educational success.”
‘Forced academies’
• A primary school will be below the floor if fewer than 60% of pupils achieve the basics standard of level 4 in both English and maths – and fewer pupils than average make the expected levels of progress between Key Stage 1 (KS1) and KS2.
• Schools in Ofsted Categories .. 2x Satisfactory from September“we will seek sponsors for every primary school in the country
which is in Special Measures or the Ofsted category Notice to Improve”
• The DfE says there are around 1,400 primary schools below the primary floor standard, based on the 2010 results.
• Continual process…
What we know:
• Civil Servants given this task as a priority in Spring 2011
• 200 primary schools below all three criteria for floor standards (as they stand today) for five years or more forced to seek sponsored academy status
• 220 of most ‘chronic under-performing primary schools have agreements in place to become sponsored academies
• Further list of schools below all three floor target criteria for two or three out of the last four years in targeted areas
What we know: options
• Oppose – ‘enemies of promise’ and ‘happy with failure’
• Your choice? Two options for ‘forced academies’:
• Successful local school (in Jan only 18 of the 1194 converter academies are sponsoring other academies)
• Academy chain/sponsor "urgent priority" to identify new sponsors for these schools
• Department aim for a ‘local solution’
• Opposition to national chains - some schools in the region have already chosen national chain route. There are local chains of schools emerging.
• DfE has veto
• More choices for next tier schools- may be able to plead mitigation
• DfE will have a watching brief and encourage partnerships
Issues
• No set formula – be creative!• Shortage of sponsors – new fund
announced• Successful schools not stepping
forward to sponsor• Chains don’t travel well and there is a
limit to their effectiveness in expansion
The squeezed middle
• Diminishing services
• Paying more for less
• Where’s your support coming from?
Horses for courses
Autonomy versus ability to act
Minimal disruption v transformation
All together v as and when
Choice v fear
Models in actionLocal clusters
Collaborative trusts
Multi Academy TrustsFederations – hard/soft
Chains
‘Challenge partnerships’
School companies
Areas for collaborations
• Corporate Governance
• School Improvement – support + challenge/identification/brokerage/match making
• Quality assurance – peer review
• Shared support services/joint purchasing
• Curriculum development
• Staff development – coaching/peer 2 peer/communities of practice/hot housing
• Leadership development
• Deployment of staff
• Sharing expertise/resources
• Identify common development areas
• Develop evidence base
• Joint projects + initiatives (bids)
• Specialist services
• External relations – business etc.
• Whatever else the members want/need
Areas for collaborations
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