Our Community, Our Schools is taking the step of
publishing an open letter to you for two reasons.
Firstly, we have been contacted by a number of concerned
parents from St Mary’s school asking for our advice on the ramifications of
Academy Conversion. We have now published this advice here.
Secondly, we are publishing this advice because we
believe that the proposal to convert these schools to being part of a
Multi-Academy Trust is one that affects all of us in Waltham Forest.
As you are well aware, the issue of the freedoms of Free
Schools and Academy schools is very rarely out of the news at the moment. Their
academic performance is being questioned, academy chains are coming under
tremendous fire and academy and free school governing bodies are being
scrutinised for mismanagement, high senior staff salaries and allegations of
cronyism.
Our research leads us to believe that one of the most
important reasons for this is the structural weaknesses of both Academies and
Free Schools - legally the same thing.
If St Mary’s and St Saviour’s schools do decide to become
academies we believe they will be taking a major gamble and the effects of
failure will be felt not only by the school’s children, but by all the whole
community and all our schools.
For these reasons, at the very least, we believe it is
absolutely vital that the school governors consult widely and meaningfully with
the whole range of stakeholders in the community and to reflect in an open
transparent way on the responses they receive.
Please feel free to contact us if you want more
information.
Our Community, Our Schools
Download our briefing here.
