Warning from local education figures over school academy conversions

A recent academy show in London attended by West Berkshire Council’s education team highlighted the extent to which businesses can exploit a growing gap in the market of offering services to schools which make the switch to academy status and can run their own affairs free from local authority control.
Payroll, IT, school improvement services and human resources could all be up for grabs by private companies when schools split from the local education authority, but the promise of saved cash and a greater freedom in daily management could prove a double-edged sword for schools which would not have the safety net of the council to fall back on if things go wrong.
A spokesman for the south east NASUWT teachers’ union, David White, said that schools risked becoming “as privatised as the railways”, as those running them look to drive down costs. “These companies will look to make profit and take money out; they won’t run schools as a public service.
"The profits will be taken away from money currently being used for the children’s development,” he said. “Companies exist to make money. Cutting corners in schools is not acceptable.”
The district council’s executive member for education, Irene Neill (Con, Aldermaston), said that she too was concerned over the impact of private companies setting themselves up as a body running a group of schools in an umbrella or collaborative chain.
She said: “In this case, the objective of having their autonomy goes out the window as the company would be more or less in the position that the education authority was and could have the actions dictated to them by that company.
“I am still concerned that there doesn’t seem to be a definitive answer to the question of who will take responsibility for standards in a converted academy which might fail in the future.”
Her fears were echoed by the shadow executive spokesman Alan Macro (Lib Dem, Theale), who said that there was a lack of clarity over who new academies were answerable to.
“The big concern is when you get companies offering to run academies, or groups of schools, I am worried about that,” he said. “It amounts to privatisation and I don’t feel comfortable with the idea of running schools for profit. I would ask the schools if there is a problem, would they rather deal with their local council 10 miles down the road, or would they like to deal with Whitehall, 60 miles away?”
There are currently five schools in West Berkshire that have converted to academies – Trinity School, Park House School and St Bartholomew’s School, in Newbury, Kennet School, Thatcham, and Denefield School, Tilehurst. A sixth, Fir Tree Primary School (pictured), is also expect to change.
The Newbury school has been in talks with the governors from Shaw secondary school Trinity, which announced recently that it was also to convert status, about a partnership and is expected to change in February.
Until then, Fir Tree will be a sponsored academy, with Trinity School pulling the strings.
The chairman of the governing body at Fir Tree, Paul Dick, who is the former executive headteacher of Trinity School and headteacher at academy Kennet School, said that it was a great day for both communities.
“Improvements in the quality of education at Fir Tree over the past 18 months have been phenomenal, and these will be underlined by some excellent results in the summer, from the children across the whole school,” he said. “Fir Tree has worked hard to examine the best opportunities for its pupils, present and future, and is delighted with this news.
“We look forward to strengthening our excellent partnership with Trinity, to our mutual benefit. Trinity School was recently approved by the Secretary of State for Education Michael Gove to convert into an academy, with effect from July 1.
The headteacher, Charlotte Wilson, said: “Fir Tree children transfer smoothly to Trinity as it is and we already work very closely with their staff, to assist in the all-important task of driving up standards and boosting personal confidence amongst students.
“Working together in the academy framework will strengthen our resources and allow us to focus even more clearly on these key goals.