Collaboration, Conversion, Coercion & Confusion

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

Your network: driven by your needs and

interests

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

Confusion

Can we do nothing?

Question 1

Which way should we go?

Question 2

Depends on where you want to be

Answer…

How do we do more with less?

Consider

How do we accelerate improvements in our

schools?

Consider

How do we protect and develop what we

value?

Consider

How do we become the drivers not the

driven?

Consider

How do we make the most of our assets

and expertise?

Consider

How do we meet the needs of our students now and in the future?

Consider

Conversion

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

Coercion

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

The squeezed middle

• Diminishing services

• Paying more for less

• Where’s your support coming from?

Collaboration

‘The era of the stand alone primary school is

coming to an end' Russell Hobby NAHT

Horses for courses

Autonomy versus ability to act

Minimal disruption v transformation

All together v as and when

Choice v fear

Loose to tight spectrum

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

Message