This article is from the source 'guardian' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.
You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/nov/21/heads-profiteering-academies-payout-state-schools
The article has changed 3 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.
| Version 1 | Version 2 |
|---|---|
| Fat-cat heads are profiteering from academies | Fat-cat heads are profiteering from academies |
| (about 2 months later) | |
| As increasing numbers of schools become academies – there are now more than 8,000 academies across England – state education seems increasingly to resemble the business world, with empires of schools rising and falling under the stewardship of dynamic individuals, hostile takeovers not unknown, and the public often struggling to understand what are sometimes hugely complicated ownership structures, agreed in private. | As increasing numbers of schools become academies – there are now more than 8,000 academies across England – state education seems increasingly to resemble the business world, with empires of schools rising and falling under the stewardship of dynamic individuals, hostile takeovers not unknown, and the public often struggling to understand what are sometimes hugely complicated ownership structures, agreed in private. |
| Former academy head given £850,000 payoff | Former academy head given £850,000 payoff |
| The latest revelation, in what seems an endless list of recent scandals, came on Monday as it emerged that one of two charities associated with a primary school in south London is paying off an £850,000 end-of-contract package to its former headteacher. | The latest revelation, in what seems an endless list of recent scandals, came on Monday as it emerged that one of two charities associated with a primary school in south London is paying off an £850,000 end-of-contract package to its former headteacher. |
| The payment by Durand Education Trust, based at Durand Academy in Stockwell, was made under the terms of an agreement signed in 2012, under which a company owned by the headteacher, Sir Greg Martin, would manage a leisure centre and student accommodation on the academy’s site. It would be paid a management fee for this, and also benefit from a lump sum payment whenever the contract finished, calculated as a percentage of gross turnover generated on-site. | The payment by Durand Education Trust, based at Durand Academy in Stockwell, was made under the terms of an agreement signed in 2012, under which a company owned by the headteacher, Sir Greg Martin, would manage a leisure centre and student accommodation on the academy’s site. It would be paid a management fee for this, and also benefit from a lump sum payment whenever the contract finished, calculated as a percentage of gross turnover generated on-site. |
| The commercial management of the site clearly produced investment for the school – a 2016 Charity Commission report on these arrangements stated that they had led to £3.7m being invested in the academy since the mid-1990s – but also benefited Martin himself. The report found that the contract as originally agreed would have led to an unconditional payment of “at least £1.8m” to Martin’s company at its end. In the event, following the Charity Commission’s intervention, a reduced cap of £850,000 was agreed with Martin. The report concluded that trustees had not put the decision to award the management contract out to tender, seemingly taking on board a belief that the headteacher was “priceless” to the organisation. | The commercial management of the site clearly produced investment for the school – a 2016 Charity Commission report on these arrangements stated that they had led to £3.7m being invested in the academy since the mid-1990s – but also benefited Martin himself. The report found that the contract as originally agreed would have led to an unconditional payment of “at least £1.8m” to Martin’s company at its end. In the event, following the Charity Commission’s intervention, a reduced cap of £850,000 was agreed with Martin. The report concluded that trustees had not put the decision to award the management contract out to tender, seemingly taking on board a belief that the headteacher was “priceless” to the organisation. |
| Durand Education Trust’s latest accounts state that the contract was terminated on 1 December 2016, triggering the £850,000 termination fee. They document that, in addition, £718,267 had been paid over the period 2015-17 to companies controlled by Martin to provide management services to the trust. As of 2014, Martin was also receiving almost £230,000 in annual pay and pensions payments in his role as Durand’s executive headteacher. | Durand Education Trust’s latest accounts state that the contract was terminated on 1 December 2016, triggering the £850,000 termination fee. They document that, in addition, £718,267 had been paid over the period 2015-17 to companies controlled by Martin to provide management services to the trust. As of 2014, Martin was also receiving almost £230,000 in annual pay and pensions payments in his role as Durand’s executive headteacher. |
| Michael Gove enthusiastically endorsed Durand Academy under Martin’s leadership during his time as education secretary, to the extent of supporting plans for it to set up a boarding school for children from Lambeth in the Sussex countryside. But it later closed, after Durand’s relationship with the Department for Education soured post-Gove. | Michael Gove enthusiastically endorsed Durand Academy under Martin’s leadership during his time as education secretary, to the extent of supporting plans for it to set up a boarding school for children from Lambeth in the Sussex countryside. But it later closed, after Durand’s relationship with the Department for Education soured post-Gove. |
| What are the lessons from this complicated case? Many will point to Durand’s establishment as an academy, a school run independently of local authority oversight, in which unpaid charitable trustees are accountable for school governance. In this case private income-generation on the site well predates the school taking on that status in 2010, but the pressure on schools to become academies has encouraged an entrepreneurial approach to school management, which has sometimes resulted in huge rewards for school leaders. | What are the lessons from this complicated case? Many will point to Durand’s establishment as an academy, a school run independently of local authority oversight, in which unpaid charitable trustees are accountable for school governance. In this case private income-generation on the site well predates the school taking on that status in 2010, but the pressure on schools to become academies has encouraged an entrepreneurial approach to school management, which has sometimes resulted in huge rewards for school leaders. |
| This case typifies the blurring of the line between public and private in the education sector that we’ve seen since increasing numbers of schools have become academies. For example, Wakefield City Academies Trust – which has since been forced to give up all of its 21 schools – reportedly paid almost £440,000 to companies owned by its former chief executive, Mike Ramsay, and his daughter. Two weeks ago, another academy “superhead”, Liam Nolan, was banned from teaching after he was found to have been drawing a second salary of £160,000 over two years, in addition to his £120,000 annual headteacher salary, via a company providing services to his school. | This case typifies the blurring of the line between public and private in the education sector that we’ve seen since increasing numbers of schools have become academies. For example, Wakefield City Academies Trust – which has since been forced to give up all of its 21 schools – reportedly paid almost £440,000 to companies owned by its former chief executive, Mike Ramsay, and his daughter. Two weeks ago, another academy “superhead”, Liam Nolan, was banned from teaching after he was found to have been drawing a second salary of £160,000 over two years, in addition to his £120,000 annual headteacher salary, via a company providing services to his school. |
| Advocates of academies point to leaders with noble motivations taking advantage of its freedoms to improve schools. But academies’ defining set-up, whereby a few close associates can set up a trust to run groups of schools, subject to remote, politicised and over-worked regulation from Whitehall, bakes in risk. Governance arrangements often are not robust enough to prevent conflicts of interest arising, especially when friends and relatives are allowed to be in control. Complicated organisational arrangements seem to leave space for questionable practices. | Advocates of academies point to leaders with noble motivations taking advantage of its freedoms to improve schools. But academies’ defining set-up, whereby a few close associates can set up a trust to run groups of schools, subject to remote, politicised and over-worked regulation from Whitehall, bakes in risk. Governance arrangements often are not robust enough to prevent conflicts of interest arising, especially when friends and relatives are allowed to be in control. Complicated organisational arrangements seem to leave space for questionable practices. |
| Above all, policymakers endorsing the academies scheme have seemed spellbound by the qualities of dynamic, sometimes entrepreneurial, headteachers. But a succession of these individuals have come crashing to earth, exposing the limited checks and balances that apply to academies and raising questions about whether there is sufficient financial accountability for public funds. With schools currently in the grip of real-terms spending cuts, any scandal is particularly likely to create anger. | Above all, policymakers endorsing the academies scheme have seemed spellbound by the qualities of dynamic, sometimes entrepreneurial, headteachers. But a succession of these individuals have come crashing to earth, exposing the limited checks and balances that apply to academies and raising questions about whether there is sufficient financial accountability for public funds. With schools currently in the grip of real-terms spending cuts, any scandal is particularly likely to create anger. |
| Should headteachers first be businesspeople, or educators? Many will conclude that the answer is the latter, and that entrepreneurship, if it is to happen at all outside the private sector, needs to come with much greater degree of scepticism attached. | Should headteachers first be businesspeople, or educators? Many will conclude that the answer is the latter, and that entrepreneurship, if it is to happen at all outside the private sector, needs to come with much greater degree of scepticism attached. |
| • Warwick Mansell is a freelance education journalist and writer/editor for the website Education Uncovered | • Warwick Mansell is a freelance education journalist and writer/editor for the website Education Uncovered |
| Academies | Academies |
| Opinion | Opinion |
| Schools | Schools |
| Education policy | Education policy |
| Michael Gove | Michael Gove |
| comment | comment |
| Share on Facebook | Share on Facebook |
| Share on Twitter | Share on Twitter |
| Share via Email | Share via Email |
| Share on LinkedIn | Share on LinkedIn |
| Share on Pinterest | Share on Pinterest |
| Share on WhatsApp | Share on WhatsApp |
| Share on Messenger | Share on Messenger |
| Reuse this content | Reuse this content |