Victory for anti-forced-academy campaign as controversial sponsor pulls out

Campaigners were celebrating last night as the proposed “sponsor” of a forced academy –poised to be set up in the backyard of one of the sector’s most notorious failures –pulled out.

The New Collaborative Learning Trust has withdrawn from the move to take over Crigglestone Mackie Hill junior and infant school in Wakefield, west Yorkshire, following months of sustained opposition within the community.

The Regional Schools Commissioner is now insisting that she is under a duty to press on with the school’s academisation under another trust, although questions could be asked as to whether the law is quite as rigid as is being suggested. (See below)

As Education Uncovered reported last October, there had been fury over the plans to academise the one-form-entry primary school after it had failed an Ofsted inspection in December 2017.

This was due to have happened under a proposed incoming trust which, it was claimed at the time, had expertise only in post-16 education.