Colleges welcome restrictions on academies opening small sixth forms

Academies will only be able to open sixth forms if they expect to have at least 200 students and offer 15 A levels, new Department for Education guidance reveals
14th April 2016, 4:53pm

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Colleges welcome restrictions on academies opening small sixth forms

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Colleges have welcomed new restrictions on academies opening their own sixth forms.

Academies should only be allowed to open a sixth form if it will have 200 students and offer 15 different A levels, according to new government guidance.

They will be required to prove there is sufficient demand for post-16 provision, and demonstrate its “financial viability and value for money”, new criteria from the Department for Education makes clear.

The guidance marks a clean break from policy under the Coalition, under which schools were encouraged to open sixth forms. Between 2010 and 2015, 169 new school sixth forms were opened. However, the number of 16-18 students declined during the same period. According to the Association of Colleges, this has resulted in 1,180 school sixth forms having fewer than 100 students.

Guidance published in September for the area reviews of college provision raised concerns about the “costs, breadth of offer and outcomes” of small school sixth forms.

And the new document outlines a series of criteria academies are expected to meet when opening a sixth form. These include:

  • Only applications from schools rated good or outstanding would “normally” be considered;
  • There should be “an expectation of around 200 students or more, either in the institution or through partnership”;
  • Students should be able to choose from “around 15 A levels across a range of subjects”;
  • The application should demonstrate “demand, including any shortage of post-16 places, and assessment of the quality of level 3 provision overall in the area and the impact of the new provision on other providers”;
  • The academy is also required to prove the project’s “financial viability and value for money, including testing financial resilience should student numbers fall,and considering the degree and impact on 11-16 education, of cross-subsidisation of funding from the school’s other budgets”.

‘Overloading the system’

Local colleges affected by the application should also be consulted. The final decision on any application would be made by the regional schools commissioner, according to the guidance, which was published on the DfE website last month but has only just come to light.

The guidance was welcomed by Julian Gravatt, assistant chief executive of the Association of Colleges. “This is a pretty big change,” he said. “The DfE hasn’t been clear on this issue for many years.

“Half of secondary schools are academies. The presumption was that they should always be allowed to have sixth forms.

“But there’s a declining pool of money, and there’s been a static group of 16-18s which is going to diminish over the next few years. Meanwhile, they’ve been overloading the system by creating new sixth forms.”

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