Academies and Lies

The tale of a north London primary school which resisted Michael Gove’s forced academy programme has been captured in a powerful new documentary. MATTHEW BROWN reports. In September 2011, pupils and teachers returned to Downhills Primary in Haringey, north London, for the start of a new school year full of hope and optimism about...

Case Studies of Co-operative Schools

Enforced academisation is not the only way to transform attainment. Co-operative schools raise attainment from within, rather than through the government’s preferred options of involving charities, businesses and for-profit providers. Meanwhile, the co-operative multi-trust model, where a number of schools team up to form a co-operative trust and share resources and expertise, is becoming...

Present prospects, future hope

“We meet on a weekend of elections,” said ILP chair David Connolly as ILPers and friends gathered in Scarborough on 5/6 May for the organisation’s annual weekend school of political debate and discussion....

A New School for Democratic Socialism

KEN CURRAN introduces a new political education initiative set to launch in Sheffield this autumn Socialism as an idea and as a movement has a long history. But as a consequence of Thatcher’s election in 1979, the triumph of neo-liberalism and the collapse of Communism after 1989, socialism became unpopular. Key figures in Labour...

Education is a social good, not a commodity

On 7 December, former New Statesman editor Peter Wilby wrote in The Guardian that Ed Miliband was wrong to oppose the government’s proposals to treble tuition fees. Here, BERNARD HUGHES says his argument is based on a view of education as a commodity not a social good. Peter Wilby’s argument has two main problems....

Education for people not profit

Compass has published a statement protesting at the government’s education reforms. We reproduce the statement here and provide a link to the Compass page where you can sign the petition. If you agree that education should remain a protected public good sign our petition! There is widespread anger over the government’s higher education reforms...