Academies Giveaway A Desperate Act

Schools are being given away to the highest bidder by a desperate government in a belated bid to boost its stalled academies sham. Ditching the £2m set-up fee, school secretary Ed Balls has been forced to own up to a miserable failure. The fag-end government has resorted to freebies to foist on the public a flagging flagship of its failed New Labour brand.

Teaching unions have branded plans to scrap the £2m up front set-up costs for academy sponsors as a "sign of desperation" just to keep the discredited scheme going.

Balls says academies are moving into a "new phase", NewLabourspeak for failure.

At £2m a pop, only wealthy charities and sponsors could beg or borrow the cash, now a non-starter in recession depression.

Making it easier for private sponsors to rule the roost in English state schools, is a shameful way of playing politics with pupils.

The government is bent on privatising schools by the back door and bent on switching "failing" schools to its discredited costly PFI academies sham, handing control over to big business backers and government sympathisers.

Far from getting to grips with a class divide with any kind of level playing field, New Labour academies spin has made things worse with extra cash pumped into academies having a divisive impact on other schools in that area.

Protests from parents who have to put up with the hype of shallow academies and heavy-handed plans for more, often fall on deaf ears.

Many academies have been oversubscribed - creaming off the best kids to make them look good, leaving the dross to rot in underfunded and under-resourced bog standard comps.

Ramming dodgy ideals down gullible young throats so sponsors can get off on a high school high is despicable. Increasing the number of undemocratic, unaccountable schools makes a mockery of any pretence of listening to local opinion.

Schools are left to fight a government obsession with league tables, to produce record GCSE results, to stave off closure and meet unrealistic targets.

Refurbishment is out of the question. There's not the money to be made or favours to dole out.

What's the cost of building, equipping and staffing a new school, £10m? £170m has been squandered on ubiquitous management consultants to help them bid for shiny new schools under Building Schools for the Future, with little to show for it, according to figures obtained by the Tories under FoI.

So 170 new schools could have been built or refurbished, instead of throwing more money at New Labour cronies in a management consultancy money-spinning venture.

The then schools supremo, Andrew Adonis, surprised many when government moves to privatise state schools and hand them over to undemocratic business backers, were revealed last year with plans for a huge expansion of the flagging academies programme.

The Orange Party is incensed by the idea of more New Labour academies spin and a further 'focus on failure and closure' with a ruthless switch to discredited academies.

What was a twinkle in Blair's starry eyes became a byword for sleeze. City academies were at the centre of the 'Cash for Honours' political scandal when academy business backers were given peerages in return for New Labour Party loans.

Academies are nothing more than a shabby sham with smoke and mirrors accounting to hide away public spending and debt. The programme is a not-so-clever way of building schools under the discredited PFI scheme, to keep the building off the public balance sheet.

Pupils are handed over to an army of non-elected education consultants and bureaucrats in privately managed academies, out of the control of the local education authorities. Pupils are 're-educated' to suit dodgy ideals. Targets are manipulated by sympathisers to suit their own ends.

The government has already earmarked 638 schools in England as 'failures' under the National Challenge programme. They face funding cuts and a switch to the academy programme, unless they meet unrealistic GCSE targets and toe the line. Expanding the academies programme further will result in more schools branded as 'failures'.

But desperate times call for desperate measures if the fag-end government is to press ahead with its private plan to build shiny new temples to New Labour.

Read More...

Monkey Business Has No Place In School Science

A nutty professor has crawled out of the 19th century again with the audacity to suggest creationist belief should be taught in the 21st century school science lab. What a load of old monkeys. The Darwin caricature (opposite) may be offensive to some today but not to the Victorians. For some die-hards, the creation versus evolution debate just hasn't moved on.

Leading the foray into this hairy old chestnut is the Rev Professor Michael Reiss, director of education at the Royal Society, who is neither a physicist nor a chemist. 

Hiding behind the mantle of the auspicious Society, Reiss is well-known for his creationist views in science teaching and for dumbing down science in schools for Blair's government, as outlined in this 2006 Guardian interview.

Reiss, a practising priest, is professor of science education and head of the school of mathematics, science and technology at the Institute of Education. The Rev Reiss should heed this little ditty:

There was a young man from Trinity

Who took the square root of infinity

But the number of digits

Gave him the fidgets 

So he dropped maths

And took up divinity

There is a place for creationism in schools. It's in Bible Studies and Religious Education.

It's bad enough having to put up with our children being indoctrinated and manipulated by creationist evangelists in Blair's Academies run by his creationist pals and obscure establishment orders. 

But trying to sneak in this belief, masquerading as science and placing it on the school science curriculum would create a dangerous precedent.

It would take a blunt and eloquent Professor Richard Dawkins to give the best put down for this crazy idea, as he did in a recent TV series. 

To suggests that creationist belief is a science and as such it should be taught alongside Darwin's evolutionary science, is a nonsense.

Darwin's personal angst to reconcile his Christian belief and emerging hard scientific evidence is worth a discussion as part of his evolutionary theory. The famous US Stopes 'Monkey Trial' of 1925 is a useful part of a socio-political discussion. 

Creationist pundits like Reiss are welcome to dwell on the subject but not force their beliefs on innocent and susceptible children and not in a school science lesson. 

Einstein posed immaculate questions about God and the Universe but as a mathematician and theoretical physicist.

Medical advancements in the field of genetics could not have happened without the scientific groundwork of Darwin. Do we really want to take such a retrograde step?

Read More...

Adonis Arrogance Over Academies

The Blairite Adonis plan for a huge expansion of City Academies, revealed in yesterday's Sunday Times, took many in government and the Labour Party by surprise. Adonis and his pet project have been lying low recently.

Schools minister Lord Adonis, the architect of the programme, had the arrogance to say:

“My motto as an ardent Blairite is, in the master’s words, what matters is what works ... We will make a political decision in due course on where we go beyond 400. On the basis of the results and the demand, the only issue is how far. We have 100 opening in 2010. ”

Many have seen through the academy programme as nothing more than a clever way of building schools under the discredited PFI scheme, to keep the building off the public balance sheet. 

Then handing them over to an army of non-elected education consultants and bureaucrats in privately managed academies, out of the control of the local education authorities. Pupils and targets are manipulated to suit their own ends.

As observed here, expanding the academies programme further will result in more schools branded as 'failures'. 

The government has already earmarked 638 schools in England as 'failures' under the National Challenge programme. They face funding cuts and a switch to the academy programme, unless they meet unrealistic government GCSE targets.

Adonis is well-suited to the task. As Andrew Adonis, Blair gave him a peerage in 2005. A neat way of getting Blairite sympathisers into the heart of govenment. His elevation to the House of Lords, paved the way for his appointment as a government minister. 

So here we have a non-elected, non-democratic minister, not an MP, coming up with a plan to increase the number of undemocratic, unaccountable schools. That's probably why he's comfortable using the royal 'we'.

The teaching unions and true Labour Party members are incensed at the idea of more Blairite academies spin and see it as a further example of the Blairite stranglehold on the New Labour government.

In a delicious twist of irony, it was the city academies which first blew the whistle in the 'Cash for Honours' political scandal - when academy business backers were given peerages in return for New Labour Party loans - first exposed by the Sunday Times. 

Read More...

More Schools To Be Branded 'Failures'

Government moves to privatise state schools and hand them over to undemocratic business backers, are revealed in today's Sunday Times, with plans for a huge expansion of the flagging academies programme.

Last week's GCSE results showed, once again, how schools are being forced to play the education system and fight government obsession with league tables, to produce record GCSE results, to stave off closure and meet unrealistic targets. 

The government has already earmarked 638 schools in England as failures under the National Challenge programme. They face funding cuts and a switch to the academy programme, as the government hands them over to the vast army of education consultants and bureaucrats in privately managed academies.

Now the Sunday Times reports that Blairite academies architect, schools minister, Lord Adonis, is planning an expansion of the academies beyond the current target of 400.

Teaching unions and true members of the Labour Party will be incensed by the idea of a further 'focus on failure and closure' to switch to academies and see it as another example of the Blairite stranglehold on the New Labour government. 

Adonis, is quoted as saying: “My motto as an ardent Blairite is, in the master’s words, what matters is what works ... We will make a political decision in due course on where we go beyond 400. On the basis of the results and the demand, the only issue is how far. We have 100 opening in 2010.”

So just who is the royal 'we' that Adonis refers to? Certainly not the non-Blairites in the government or Labour Party, the teaching unions or the parents who have to put up with the hype and spin of the shallow academies. 

Read More...

Inflated GCSEs Let Everyone Down

The government's obsession with GCSE targets is an inflatable joke. They've let the schools down, they've let the pupils down and they've let themselves down.

Schools are playing the education system and fighting government obsession with league tables, to produce record GCSE results, to stave off closure and meet unrealistic targets. A view shared by the leader in  today's Independent.

With the spotlight on school league tables, today's GCSE results show more and more pupils are being entered for soft option and 'pointless' vocational subjects to boost results and school performance. The biggest jump in top grades since 1990, according to the BBC. 

Traditional tough subjects like physics and chemistry and being replaced by the easier combined science and languages shunned altogether. Single subjects are being rebranded as 'studies' which require less rigourous academic study.

Schools, afraid of being branded failures, are coming under increasing pressure, as the government tries to switch schools to its flagging Adonis academies programme - using PFI schemes to keep public spending off the balance sheet and handing control over to big business backers, sympathetic to the government. 

In June, it was highlighted by the Orange Party here, that the government is planning a cull of one in five secondary schools in England, unless they make the grade and hit the benchmark targets of 30% of pupils gaining five good GCSEs including maths and English. 

In a desperate attempt to boost targets, the government has already threatened to take funding away from so-called 'specialist schools', which promote themselves in areas like arts, technology, unless they deliver.

These schools face being stripped of funding and placed under the control of New Labour sympathisers as part of the 're-education' process.

The 638 schools targeted are being unfairly stigmatised as 'failing' as an excuse to hand them over to the vast army of education consultants and bureaucrats in privately managed academies.

Teaching unions are rightly indignant and reject this "focus on failure and closure".

Meanwhile, the government is trying to massage the GCSE figures by introducing course-work modules and more retake opportunities for students. 

In an attempt to produce a meaningful 16+ examination and counter the spin, some schools have started to switch pupils to the International GCSE which is more akin to the old 'O' level.

Today's artificial 'record' GCSE results come hard on the heels of last week's artificial 'record' A-level results. Both spun in a desperate attempt to prop up the government's failed education policies which are failing our children. 

Read More...

Ministers 'Failing' Schools Gimmick

Schools secretary Balls' latest academy plan for 'failing schools' is a cheap gimmick, a government wheeze to privatise state education and put it in the hands of the 'education' business.

New Labour has squandered millions of pounds on education over the past decade and little has been achieved. How embarrassing.

The much vaunted 'flagship' plan for academies is stalling. It's not working fast enough for its architect, Lord Adonis. So schools are being unfairly stigmatised as 'failing' as a pathetic excuse to hand them over to the vast army of education consultants and bureaucrats in privately managed academies.

This has nothing to do with raising standards or performance and everything to do with the half-baked ideas of politicians who are systematically undermining English state schools to save face and put their own political self-interest over the education of children.

The cull is targeting one in five secondary schools in England, so in two years time (election time?) almost one in 10 secondary schools will have academy status.

The teaching unions are rightly indignant and reject the "focus on failure and closure". These schools are not failing. They just haven't met the ridiculous and unrealistic targets set by this government.

The education of our children should not be in the hands of politicians looking for cheap headlines and education consultants after a quick buck. Academies and trust schools are part of the problem, not the solution.

Maybe Edward Michael 'call me Ed' Balls (independent public school and Keble College, Oxford) and Andreas 'Lord' Adonis (independent public school and Keble College, Oxford) should listen to what the real and realistic education professionals have to say, starting with the Campaign for Real Education.

Read More...