themselves behave like private companies." Academies - state schools handed over to private companies. They are funded directly by government, and set up under private school legislation so they fall outside the legislative framework which governs other state-maintained schools.
This means they are not subject to LEAs and have complete freedom to, for example, devise the curriculum. The aim is 50 academies by 2007, and so far three have opened: Bexley, Haringey, and Middlesbrough. Sponsors are required to pay 20% of the capital costs of the school, around 2 million, and the government pro vides funding of up to f20 million. In return the sponsor can appoint a majority of the school governing body.
Ownership of the land and buildings of the existing state school, currently the property of the local council, is transferred to the new Academy, so in effect sponsors
e being handed a school at one-fith of is question of profitability is decisive. Private companies will only invest in education i they can make more profit there than else where. (Of course, that may entail los: leader' operations to gain a foothold in the market.) A report on public sector outsourcing b Capital Strategies, a British corporat finance company, in April 2002, showe that during the period from january 2000t April 2002 shares in Intrastructur Management companies had outperforme the FTSE index (the stock exchange aver age) by 49%. Discussing future trends, th report forecasts Particularly fast growth i the provision of Infrastructure Managemen services to the Health, Education and ra sectors.' "Education is not for sale
This has been a slogan of the anti-global sation movement from Porto Alegre, wher the second World Education Forum thi January attracted an incredible 15,000 pec ple, to Florence, where it was the theme several meetings, with 600 people takin part in the biggest
But up till now campaigns against creef ing privatisation in education in Britain hav largely been restricted to the local, and hav had litte success. Only a fusion of the ant globalisation movement and trade unio action in a local and national campaign ca defend education as a public service. Th will be one of the themes of the ne European Social Forum in Paris November.
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