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Press Release

'Secretary of state's statement on academies is blatant propaganda'

4 October 2011

Commenting on the release by the Secretary of State for Education of statistics regarding academy schools, Chris Keates, General Secretary of the NASUWT, the largest teachers' union, said:

“Michael Gove has reeled off statistics about the number of academy schools and the number of pupils in them. So what?

“There is not one single scrap of evidence that such structural change raises standards and, therefore, in that context the figures are meaningless.

“Teachers working in academies are as dedicated and hard-working as any other teachers and, therefore, as for all other schools, any success is down to them, not to what a school is called.

“Evidence shows that the rationale for schools converting to academy status was not a belief that it would raise standards, but, in the face of savage cuts to the education budget, nothing more than a desperate attempt to secure more money, hardly something of which a Secretary of State for Education should be proud.

“Today's statement, with its wild claims of better paid teachers, smaller class sizes and higher standards, is nothing more than blatant propaganda.

“When will this Coalition start telling the public the truth?”



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