By December 2020 there were 557 free schools, out of a total of 24,000 schools, with a further 229 in the pipeline. Only about a third of free schools were “innovator” schools, with a novel approach to the curriculum or ethos. Moreover, free schools, which have more autonomy and flexibility than maintained schools, are barely mentioned by ministers these days. According to the New Schools Network, free schools are more likely to be rated outstanding than other types of school, and when the early free schools GCSE results were published in 2017 Young, who founded West London free school, proclaimed that free schools were “the most successful education policy of the postwar period”. But the Education Policy Institute, which has been tracking attainment and progress in free schools since 2017, suggests a more nuanced picture, in which primary free schools perform below the national average but secondary free schools perform above.

Source: The Guardian February 09, 2021 07:30 UTC