No expansion in academies or free schools

Councillor David Williams, leader of the Green Party group on the County
Council, is calling on the Council to condemn and dissociate itself from
the continued expansion of the Academy and Free Schools programme, as
recently announced. David Williams explains:

"Green Party County Councillors are calling on the County Council  to write
to the Secretary of State for Education to follow the example of the
Swedish Government and end this experiment in Academy and free schools. All
schools to democratic control and accountability through local  education
authorities(LEAs). These schools, like all existing state schools, should
have clear universal professional standards, commitment to a similar
curriculum, non-selective criteria  and general equity in funding.

"The County Council should be concerned at the billions of pounds that have
been diverted from mainstream education to try to make Academies and Free
Schools work and the dramatic impact this has had on LEA schools funding.
This massive imbalance in expenditure is still being undertaken with very
little to show in terms of real improvements to educational outcomes.  We
do not see this type of failure visited upon schools in Oxfordshire, and on
to our children.

"The Council should be concerned that the obvious advantages in
collectively improving the quality of local education provision provided
via the LEA are being wasted in the fragmentation and atomisation that
Academies and Free Schools generate."