Academies and Free Schools have better record for discipline

Although conforming to the rules will be far from the minds of pupils as they enjoy their summer holidays, a recent report has found that academies and free schools score better for discipline than local authority schools.

According to analysis of the latest Ofsted figures by the Department for Education (DfE), 39 per cent of academies and free schools are rated ‘outstanding’ for behaviour by inspectors, compared to only 31 per cent of local authority schools.

Ministers attribute this success to the “freedoms” given to headteachers to make their own priorities, including tackling poor behaviour, while one academy leader accused council-run schools of passing the buck to local authorities for shortfalls in the running of the school, whereas, in academies, the buck stops with the principal for behaviour.

The head added that taking full control of a school’s own destiny by becoming an academy means breaking out of ‘local group think’ as to what is acceptable behaviour and making sure that behaviour is the very best it can be for learning.

Meanwhile, another principal argued that academy freedoms have empowered heads to be able to deal with behaviour in the most appropriate way and added that a no-excuses policy at school best prepares children for the world of work and life generally.

Commenting on the analysis, Nick Gibb, school reform minister, said that the Government has given teachers more powers to control the classroom. He congratulated the academy and free schools for making good behaviour a priority.

There are currently more than 4,000 academies and free schools in the UK and around 16,000 schools that are run by their local authority.