Failing schools could be merged

Children's Secretary Ed Balls warned that areas with academically selective education systems contain many of the worst schools in England, undermining the chances of pupils from deprived backgrounds. He said 638 schools where more than 70% of teenagers fail to meet Government GCSE targets face closure or take-over by private firms if they do not improve.

Speaking at the launch of the "National Challenge" initiative in London, Mr Balls said: "We have left the choice as to whether to continue with grammar schools to individual areas. But there are particular issues around attainment in secondary moderns and they face particular challenges."

He went on: "On average, secondary moderns have seven times more children on free school meals than grammar schools. Often when you talk to secondary modern heads one of the first things you have to deal with on day one is a group of new entrants to school who think that the reason why they're there is because they failed."

He said he would encourage grammar schools to work more closely with secondary moderns that need extra help to improve under the National Challenge initiative. This could involve grammar school headteachers working as advisers in secondary moderns and could even take the form of formal mergers or "federations".

"A number of the areas with the highest number of National Challenge schools are areas with selection - Kent, Birmingham, Lincolnshire," Mr Balls said. "So we will be looking to them for their plans and for the kind of pool of National Challenge advisers and heads.

"It may be that they will be other secondary moderns but it may well be grammar school heads. We would all be very encouraging of grammar school heads and governing bodies who want to play that role with other schools in their area.

"The evidence is it has a positive impact on both schools in the partnership. We will be encouraging that to happen in selective areas but it's really for local leadership to set the path."

Mr Balls' deputy, Schools Minister Jim Knight, said it "can only be a good thing" if grammars want to form "hard and more permanent partnerships with other schools in their area to drive improvement".

The National Challenge initiative will also see an expansion of the controversial academies programme, with up to 313 of the privately-sponsored schools set to be open by 2010. Local authorities have been set a 50-day deadline to come up with a rescue plan for each of the schools on the Government's hit list. But teachers warned that the plan must not set out to "name and shame" schools doing their best in tough areas.