Data to be released next week looks set to reignite questions over Labour's education policy.
Data to be released next week looks set to reignite questions over Labour’s education policy
The ongoing debate over Free Schools has once again been fired up by claims of radicalisation in Birmingham. This comes hot on the heels of the government finally beginning to act to ban the teaching of creationism.
However the creation debate pans out, the general point remains – since free achools are allowed wide scope to set their own curriculum, this opens the door to education being more about what parents (or certain groups) want children to know (or what they do not want them to know), rather than what the collective would deem appropriate.
For Labour – a party of the masses – this is ideologically difficult.
There have also been broader issues that have caused rifts in the coalition parties, one being the employment of unqualified teachers. While some have argued that free schools allow for those who are great at a subject to teach it without red tape getting in the way, most see it as a lowering of standards, and a basic failure of providing education. For many, it undermines the education profession.
The facts are stark. Ofsted inspections are being failed at three times the normal rate by free schools, with a smaller percentage attaining a good or outstanding rating compared to state schools. If it was an issue of quality then the creation of free schools has been found wanting, if it is an issue of filling a gap of provision then it has also not achieved that either.
Parliamentary papers showed that in 2012 an NUT report argued that “many of the existing 24 free schools or those that are due to open later this year will have a negative impact on existing good or outstanding local schools.” Also that “NUT’s request for details of impact assessments made by the education secretary had been turned down by the DFE”
If this is true, then free schools are actually hampering state schools in areas that had been doing well. As well as this, the refusal to show the impact assessments may point to an awareness that free schools are not having a positive effect. And yet in September 2014 there will be 102 new free schools being opened, despite the events that have happened and despite public feeling.
Even before some of the more recent issues became known, public support for free schools had been dropping. In October 2013, YouGov released data that showed opposition to free schools had gone up to 47 per cent, and support for them had dropped to 27 per cent. The data also showed that, across the political spectrum, all four main parties had at least 65 per cent believing that only those that are formally qualified should be able to teach. The parties also did not drop below 56 per cent in their support for all schools following the national curriculum.
Labour needs to bear such feeling in mind. The Labour History Research Unit at Anglia Ruskin University has spent the past month surveying over 400 Labour councillors in marginal constituencies ahead of the next election. This data, to be released in full next week, shows that over 50 per cent of those surveyed support scrapping free schools, or at least putting them under the control of the Local Education Authority.
Almost a third (30 per cent) would consent to their retention, but demand further regulation.
And equally, when offered a choice of a range of pledges from committing to scrap the bedroom tax to freezing energy bills, precisely zero Labour councillors plumped for the current line on free schools as the most obvious vote winner for Labour on their patch.
And it’s arguably little wonder. Labour does not yet seem to have a clear policy on free schools, other than their general disapproval of instances of obvious malpractice.
With widespread feeling amongst the public against free schools, and the same amongst Labour councillors, it would seem that taking a decisive stance against them could prove not just a vote winner, but also something that would help unite the majority of the party. The data suggests action is necessary.
Josh Younespour is a history student at Anglia Ruskin University and research assistant at the Labour History Research Unit (LHRU). He writes in a personal capacity. The LHRU will release full data from a survey of Labour councillors next week.
14 Responses to “What should Labour be saying on free schools?”
Paddy Briggs
Our education system is so serendipitously diverse that almost any change is tinkering. From Independent Schools, through Grammar Schools, and Academies and Free Schools to Faith Schools and High Schools and Comprehensives… There is no consistency – even in curriculum. It’s a shambles. Which means that the only criterion has to be performance. Good Schools versus Bad Schools. If a Free school is a good school it would be folly to close it for ideological reasons. The reverse applies as well.
swatnan
… that Education should be free and in non-religious, non-selective state comprehensives.
Leon Wolfeson
Except things like streaming are known to hurt kids educational chances as a group.
Robin Thorpe
Where is the evidence for this? From what I have seen and understand streaming is an effective way of ensuring that every child gets taught at an appropriate level to help them be the best that they can be. Surely it is only bad if it is strictly controlled and there is no capacity to move between levels.
Robin Thorpe
The problem with Free schools (that Tristram Hunt has failed to emphasise) is that all too often occur in places where there is no pressure on school places, that the positive freedoms that they offer could have been achieved within the state system and that they have been far too expensive. The Free School policy has resulted in millions of pounds being spent on new schools where they aren’t needed and they do not offer value for money as they often start out nearly empty and could take years to fill up.
The budgetary control and freedom to appoint could have been achieved within the state system – the total school budget is controlled by LA or EFA but each school can choose how they spend it – schools can choose to pay individuals with additional industrial experience above the pay grade attributable to their teaching experience. They could therefore take them on as trainee teacher, undertaking a SCITT or Graduate Teacher Training course, but pay them to attract good people from industry.
Of course what many people who set-up free schools were interested in was operating outside the national curriculum, which they could anyway as an academy. Free Schools are a pointless exercise. If pushy parents want to get involved in improving the school they already can as a parent governor.
Hunt has failed to castigate the ConDems for this farcical policy, at times on TV/Radio he has even contradicted previous statements and agreed with parents that free schools are sometimes appropriate; he did this just to appear as though he was on the side of these parents rather than explain why they are not necessary.