Trusts & Academies… the fragmentation, marketisation and privatisation of education

1. Trusts & Academies…the fragmentation, marketisation and privatisation of education

2. The NUT View… The ACADEMIES and TRUSTS agenda has NOTHING to do with EDUCATION STANDARDS… …and EVERYTHING to do with the drive to PRIVATISATION

3. Government by bullying & blackmail Many Local Authorities have had an Academy forced on them – threatened with having Building Schools for the Future (BSF) funding withheld Not so much an Academy Award as an Academy Imposition – A Gordon rather than an Oscar

4. The “post-war consensus”Victory of fascism... the demand for change & post-war reconstruction • The economy needed an advanced, newly skilled working class • Workers demanded educational opportunity and fundamental social change • All sides – employers, government and workers - were aware of the political significance of a literate, skilled, educated working class

5. A new Britain... 1944 and all that • The 1944 Education Act • GCT Giles, President of the NUT... • A “reconstructed, unified, democratic system of education” • “Can equality be achieved within the three school types?” • The need to develop “a school of a new type” to “reconcile the claims of vocationalism, citizenship and general culture” • “(There are) those that argue that the experiment cannot flourish within a State system. How little they know of the rich and varied history of State schools” • Education, “a necessary condition of developing and broadening democracy” • “The reactionary die-hard forces, which too often in the past have succeeded in strangling educational & social progress, have not undergone a sudden and miraculous change of heart.” • “We will need all the strength, experience & leadership of our great Union and of a united profession… and the active sympathy & co-operation of a public opinion more enlightened and more determined than ever before to sweep aside the obstruction of vested interest and privilege.”

6. 11+ & the fight for comprehensives 1960s & 70s • agitation, research, campaigning & struggle for comprehensive education • Govt. Circular 10/65 instructed LEAs to begin • 1969 & 71 “The Black Papers” counterattack • 1970 Tory Govt (Education Sec Thatcher) • 1975 Labour Govt (Ed Sec Shirley Williams) • Threats of legal action against non-compliance • 1976 PM Callaghan launches “The Great Education Debate” • 1979 Tories elected with PM Thatcher

7. The Tories gave us… Defence of Grammar Schools Assisted Places scheme subsidising private education Local Financial Management & then LMS Funding famine Compulsory Competitive Tendering “Opting Out” City Technology Colleges EAZs SATs & League Tables Punitive Ofsted Inspection “Parental Choice” Outsourcing of LEAS Private Finance Initiative Thatcher arrives...

8. ..and then came Tony CCT footage from the crime scene “Education, education,education” • “Essential challenges of modernisation… • …to create an economy fully attuned to a new global market… • …to fashion a modern welfare state where the role of government changes so it is not necessary to provide all social provision... • …the process is irresistible and irreversible” Speech to TUC 1997

9. ..which brought usthe Government’s 5 year strategy • ‘Diversity & Choice’ attack on “bog standard comprehensives” • Extension of PFI - “Building Schools For The Future” (BSF) • Specialist Schools • Extension of “Foundation Status” for schools • Further reduction in the role of LEAs and increase in outsourcing • City Academies - now “Academies” and even “Skills Academies” • Workforce Remodelling – through “Social Partnership” divide & rule • Enforced school staff pay restructuring & attacks on pensions • “Academic & vocational ‘pathways’ at 14” • Schools run by private companies, individuals, voluntary groups, parents, faith groups • Higher Education fees & increasing student debt

16. II.1.5) Short description of the contract or purchase(s): The contracting authorities are seeking an innovative private sector partner or partners to participate and invest in a new Public Private Partnership vehicle (a "Local Education Partnership" or "LEP") to be established jointly with some or all of the contracting authorities.The LEP will provide (or arrange for the provision of) "Partnering Services", which will include (but not be limited to) the development of a strategic investment programme for:a) educational facilities;b) other facilities including but not exclusively community, health and social care;(together the "Relevant Facilities") in the contracting authorities area.These Partnering Services will also comprise the following services:a) strategy advisory services;b) programme management services;c) project development services;d) procurement consultancy services; ande) procurement and delivery or management of all services required to deliver the strategic investment programme for the Relevant Facilities (including through the provision, integration and management of supply chain arrangements). It is anticipated that such services may include:I) architectural services;II) engineering services;III) construction services;IV) technical services;V) building services;VI) hard facilities management;VII) soft facilities management;VIII) information communication and technology ("ICT") services;IX) educational support services;X) education programme development services;XI) education strategy services;for a period of up to 15 years .

17. Academies • £2m ‘donation’ from a sponsor (over 5 years & often not paid) buys control of the Academy – buildings, grounds, community use, staff • Now “Buy three get one free” (4 Academies for ‘promise of’£6 million) • Government puts in the other £30+million and running costs • 3 opened in 2002, 9 in 2003, 5 in 2004, 10 in 2005, 19 in 2006 • 2005 target of 200 by 2010 was doubled to 400 in November 2006 • What is the expansion of the programme based on? • Educational research? • Piloting and evaluation? • Or dogmatic ideological commitment to private sector control? Pictures: Des Smith, and Lord Levy (“Lord Cashpoint”) with Tony Blair. Both were members of the Specialist Schools & Academies Trust – both arrested and questioned over “Cash for Honours” issues. "I demand that Blair is arrested and treated the same way that I have been treated” Des Smith

18. Academies evidence • Educational research • OECD PISA – endorses state comprehensive education… • …so does Professor Peter Mortimore “Which Way Forward?” • “Piloting & Evaluation” • 3 annual studies by Price Waterhouse Cooper (commissioned by Govt) • 2004 “Could lead to a two-tier system based on social class, and thwart collaboration between schools” The report was not published. • 2005 highlighted staff workload, SEN admissions, bullying, impractical design, lack of representative Governors as problems • 2006 – showed very great differences in performance suggesting that Academy status was not a determining factor in educational performance • Parliamentary Education & Skills Select Committee • Proper “pilots” should be undertaken before increasing number of Academies • Raised concerns over impact of academies on neighbouring schools… • … over reducing numbers of pupils from deprived backgrounds… • … over reducing percentages of SEN pupils… • …and more concerns over the number of pupils ‘excluded’ from Academies • There is NO EVIDENCE that ACADEMY STATUS improves EDUCATIONAL STANDARDS

19. Who are the “Academicians”to name just a few… • Lord Harris of Carpet Warehouse • Sir Peter Vardy, fundamentalist Christian used car sales millionaire • The Church of England • Carphone Warehouse • Roger de Haan, Chief Exec, Saga Holidays • Amey PLC – a construction company • John Madejski OBE – founder of AutoTrader • Andrew Rosenfeld – current Chairman Minerva property developers, tax exile, and £1m lender to Labour Party • Sir David Garrard – previous Chairman Minerva property developers etc etc • ARK – hedge fund speculators • Sir Martyn Arbib, Perpetual Fund Management Company • Sir Frank Lowe, Advertising and PR agency entrepreneur • David Samworth – a sausage and pie manufacturer amongst other philanthropists…

20. Behind the scenes • In 2004, Government NO to ‘vetting’ sponsors – despite ENRON being on the list • The TES: two Academies have been discovered paying out large sums of school money to companies connected to the sponsor • West London Academy: £180,964 to businesses and a charity connected to Sir Alec Reed – the sponsor • King’s Academy, Middlesbrough: £290,214 to organisations and individuals connected with Sir Peter Vardy – the sponsor – including £14K to the Billy Graham Evangelistic Crusade • Des Smith of the Specialist Schools & Academies Trust promised “honours” to sponsors – and when arrested and questioned, demanded that Tony Blair be arrested too • Nine Academy sponsors have received honours so far

21. Academies ‘outcomes’? • Unaccountable schools – no external democratic control • Lack of parent and staff governors – no internal democratic control • Cost on average £32m – twice the cost of a comprehensive • Undermining teachers’ national pay & conditions, increasing workload • Undermining the curriculum • In Oct 2005, 12 Vocational Academies were announced to “provide the plasterers, plumbers and bricklayers of tomorrow” • Use of Academies to further the sponsor’s business & personal interests • Undermining communities of schools working together • Pupil selection, SEN and growing “exclusion” issues • In Bristol Academy the percentage of SEN children fell from 46% to 28% and in Walsall Academy from 41% to 8% • Use of Academies for ideological education • In Vardy Academies, the Bible’s ‘creationism’ is taught • Taking our education system towards privatisation

22. …and then, directly from the New Labour-Tory coalitionThe Education Act • All schools to become “increasingly independent” • Schools to be “encouraged” to become Trust Schools – similar to Academies, but without the sponsorship money - with control over the curriculum & teachers’ pay & conditions • All new schools likely to be Trust Schools • Businesses, faith groups & “voluntary sector” to set up schools and help form clusters or federations of existing ones. • ‘Popular’ schools to be allowed to expand & to take in more pupils. • Private schools to be allowed to "opt in" to the state sector. Religious schools, in particular, are expected to take advantage of this. • ‘Failing schools’ to be given a year to improve or face closure – to be to be replaced with a new Trust School

23. A seamless transition… As Gordon Brown approached his coronation as Labour Party leader… “ I will continue to support and finance the Academies and Trust Schools initiatives… I was talking to someone only last night, trying to persuade them that it was in their interests and the country’s interests to become a sponsor of a City Academy” 15th May 2007. Radio 4 “World At One” No mention of the interests of children or teachers, then!

24. Gordon “sets out his vision for education” – October 2007 What does he have to say about Academies? • “Annual improvement targets for all schools that fall below the threshold” • “good schools brought in to help poorer schools under improvement networks run 'by schools, for schools', as the Specialist Schools & Academies Trust motto puts it” • “complete closure or takeover by a successful neighbouring school in a trust or federation, or transfer to academy status, including the option of take over by an independent school.”

25. Well done Gordon! (says Blair… I always knew you had it in you…) • “There will be 150 more Academies in the next three years, on route to our target of 400…” • “More local authorities doing what Manchester, Birmingham, Oldham and others are doing - putting Academies at the heart of their local school improvement plans.” • “And more independent schools setting up academies to take over failing schools.” So WHY is all this happening – and why NOW?

26. It’s Balls –and that’s official! • June 2008: Ed Balls names 638 “failing schools” (including 28 Academies) with less than 30% of children achieving 5 A-C grade GCSEs – threatens to replace them with Academies • Local Authorities still with Grammar School selective systems have the highest number of these schools • The 638 are in areas of greatest social & economic deprivation • The old pre-comprehensive selective system produced only 20% of children with 5 GCE “O” levels • Comprehensive schools nationally produce 60% at that standard • The 638 would all have been Secondary Modern schools in which only a handful of children mighthave taken “O” levels • Now if “only” 29% achieve 5 A-C GCSEs they are to be considered as “failures” The threat to these schools is NOTHING to do with educational standards and EVERYTHING to do with the drive to fragmentation and privatisation of education… SO WHY IS ALL THIS HAPPENING NOW?

27. Globalisation & education‘external’ pressures Andy Green, reader in Education at University of London Institute of Education. “As the national state becomes a marginal force in the new world order, so education becomes an individualised consumer good delivered in a global market and accessed through satellite and cable links. National education ceases to exist” “Education, Globalisation & The Nation State” To put it another way… “Why educate your own people when you can import some cheaper, or export the jobs?

28. Education for global profit • Global spending on education exceeds two thousand billion dollars • World wide there are 50 million teachers employed • Over one billion students are taught in hundreds of thousands of educational establishments • Education International - the international education union organisation says, “Some see this immense bloc as a dream market for future investment”

29. “Liberalisation world-wide” • World Trade Organisation, “General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS)…“GATS is the first ever set of multilateral, legally enforcable, rules governing international trade in services” • The European Commission publication “World Trade In Services”…“Services negotiations should extend liberalisation world-wide, creating new trade and investment opportunities in all service sectors” • The European Union Constitution and the European Services Directive reinforce these messages

30. Speaking personally... Prof. James Tooley, privatisation theorist and practitioner, Newcastle University, “We mustn’t be tempted by the reassuring spin that the public sector can hope to match the incentives of the private sector. The way forward for education is to bring in (these) incentives… Education is far too important to be excluded from the virtues of the profit motive”

31. and from the USA... Michael Milken, a leading US finance capitalist, speaking to Arthur Levine, President of Teachers’ College, Columbia University… “You guys are in trouble… and we’re gonna eat your lunch…”

32. The end of state education? As Education International puts it… “In the wake of other major public services which have been subject to extensive privatisation & deregulation, public education is being increasingly targeted by predatory and powerful entrepreneurial interests. The latter are aiming at nothing less than its dismantling by subjecting it to international competition.”

33. They know the truth... “We also fail our most disadvantaged children and young people… internationally, our rate of child poverty is still high, as our the rates of worklessness in one-parent families, the rate of teenage pregnancy and the level of poor diet amongst children. The links between poor health, disadvantage and low education outcomes are stark.” ‘The 5 year strategy for Children & Learners’

34. Spinning child poverty “Our historic aim will be for ours to be the first generation to end child poverty for ever. The child born in the run down estate should have the same chance to be healthy and well-educated as the child born in the leafy suburbs” Tony Blair, 1999

35. The reality of child poverty • April 2007 – child poverty increased by 100,000 • April 2008 – increased by a further 100,000 • The number of UK Children living in poverty – on Government figures – is now 3.9million • “In a country as wealthy as ours it is a scandal that the number of children growing up in poverty has increased. Poverty blights their life chances – poverty which for many is simply overwhelming” Martin Narey, End Child Poverty

36. The ‘haves’ & ‘have-nots’… UK Government Office of National Statistics • Richest 1% of the population owns 34% of total wealth • Richest 5% own 58% • Richest 10% own 71% • And the poorest 50% of the population own 1% of wealth between them “It’s the same the whole world over, ain’t it all a bloomin’ shame? It’s the rich what gets the pleasure, and the poor what gets the blame…”

37. …and what’s the effect? “The research shows that it is possible to combine socio-economic classification of the household with the child’s overall developmental score at age 22 months to accurately predict education qualifications at age 26 years… By age 22 months children’s developmental score is already stratified by class, and this increases significantly by the age of 10 years” Gillian Evans Educational Failure & Working Class White Children in Britain (2006)

38. Likely outcomes?The “direction of travel” • Academic, privately run, high flying “top up” fee paying schools staffed by qualified teachers, with locally negotiated pay and conditions - and financially supported by the private sector or owned by them. • “Vocational” schools, providing core curriculum - and post 14 training in FE colleges and on employers’ premises. Many classes run by non QTS staff.

39. Social Partnership… and Divide & Rule The Government attempts to incorporate potential opposition… • The Workload/Remodelling Agreement & WAMG • The School Workforce Restructuring Agreement and RIG • The pre-election Warwick Agreement …and to bully - or “kick off the bus” (Milliband) - those who refuse to collaborate.

40. Off the back foot…taking the initiative... • NUT’s “Bringing Down The Barriers” & “A Good Local School For Every Child & Every Community” • A new “Great Education Debate” • Re-organising our Unions to meet the task • Professional Unity – one education union • Broad campaigning coalitions of individuals & organisations in every community • TUC policy for “An integrated programme of educational, vocational training and youth employment”