Michael Gove unveils plan to convert weakest primary schools into academies

[T_i_B]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/jun/16/michael-gove-weakest-primary-schools-acadamies

The 200 weakest primary schools in England will be placed under new management by 2012, the education secretary, Michael Gove, will say on Thursday.

It is the most direct intervention in primary schools by a government that has so far mainly focused on intervening in secondary schools.

Gove wants as many schools as possible to become academies in the belief that the system has transformed secondary education and could do the same for primary schools. The weakest 200 primary schools will be converted from September next year.

The announcement coincided with reports that an accounting blunder by the Department of Education has left many existing academies with more funding than they are entitled to, prompting Gove to claim that the coalition government had inherited a "flawed system" from Labour.