Hampshire Senate

December 2011

Academies in Hampshire

What are academies ?

Academies are ‘state funded, non selective, independent schools’.

There is some central direction from the Department for Education (DfE), there is auditing of their financial practices by DfE, and monitoring of their progress and performance by DfE.

They are independent of local authorities except where they choose not to be – although they continue to have a duty to co-operate with local arrangements to secure children’s wellbeing.

Key Points

1. Small but significant number of academies in Hampshire

2. Difference between ‘converter’ academies and ‘sponsored’ academies not well understood

3. County Council ‘neutral’ in its stance on academies, ‘open’ to schools’ conversion and for their business once they have converted

4. Growing numbers of academies would impact on the capacity of the local ‘elected community’ to affect schooling in the county

5. No evidence to date that converting academies will improve the system – nor any that they won’t.

Hampshire Schools (estimated position: 1 April 2012)

5.7%

93.3%

Academy

Non academy

Hampshire Pupils (estimated position: 1 April 2012)

Hampshire Secondary Academies (estimated position: 1 April 2012)

Secondary Academies by District• Basingstoke and Deane: 1 (9%)• East Hants: 4 (80%)• Eastleigh: 3 (43%)• Fareham: 1 (17%)• Gosport: 1 (33%)• Hart: 1 (20%)• Havant: 3 (33%)• New Forest: 6 (75%)• Rushmoor: 0 (0%)• Test Valley: 2 (33%)• Winchester: 1 (20%)• Hampshire: 23 (33%)

Converter and Sponsored Academies

• Converters become academies by choice and are ‘outstanding’ or ‘good’ schools – tend to be in leafier areas – and have a direct relationship with DfE

• Sponsored academies usually have that status thrust upon them because they are not good enough. Their governors lose control of the school and governance and oversight is handled by the sponsor

• Sponsors are accredited by DfE and tend to be charities, religious foundations, or businesses

• Sponsors take between 1.5% and 6% of the school’s budget for running costs.

Converter and Sponsored Academies

• Of the 23 Hampshire secondary schools which are, or expected to be, academies by April 2012, 21 are converters.

• Havant Academy and Everest Academy are sponsored and it is likely that there will be 3 or 4 more sponsored secondary academies soon.

Hampshire County Council• Neither encourages nor discourages schools to convert to

become academies• Seeks to find the best sponsors for those very few schools

that need them because they can’t improve on their own• Continues to maintain a relationship with each academy in

the interests of Hampshire children – that includes challenge where necessary

• Continues to trade with academies when academies want to continue to buy services – and at the same price as to other schools

• Is working with networks of schools that decide not to convert.

Potential challenges for the Future• The County Council has a continuing duty to promote

excellence in education and champion the interests of children and parents

• If large numbers of schools become academies the capacity of the County Council to act on behalf of the Hampshire population in respect of schools and schooling would be severely tested

• Each time a school becomes an academy it takes a proportion of the resource that supports this activity – and a number of others concerned with the health of the system.

Last Ofsted Inspection of Hampshire schools compared with schools in England

The bottom line

• School systems have to be judged by how well the population is educated not by the processes put in place to try to achieve that

• This particular educational reform has never been tried before anywhere in the world

• No effective school system, anywhere in the world, operates without a ‘mediating layer’ between central government and individual schools – so there are some risks

• There is evidence that sponsored academies generally work. It will be some time before there is evidence, one way or the other, of the effect of the other reforms.