What does it mean to become an academy?

In the next five or six years all schools will be turned into academies Credit: PA

Radical plans to pull every school in England out of the control of local councils and transform them into academies will change the country's educational landscape - but, what does the term 'academy' mean?

The big change between schools and academies, is the independence from local authority.

Funding for academies will be received directly from central government, and the day-to-day running of the school will, in theory, be put in the hands of teachers.

They can choose to opt out of the national curriculum and will have more freedom to innovate.

Overseeing the academies will be individual bodies known as trusts, which, in some instances, will be part of a larger academy chain. These trusts and chains will provide support, expertise and a strategic overview - and will have complete control of the admissions process.

Who will end up monitoring these schools?

These many thousands of schools will not all float around like apples in a bucket. Instead they will usually join what is called a chain - it allows them to share some back office functions and be given overall direction.

Some worry these chains could end up being too much like the local authorities they are replacing. The chief inspector of schools, Sir Michael Wilshaw, has already raised concerns that these chains may not be good enough for the current set-up, let alone this expanded role. Last month he wrote to education secretary Nicky Morgan, saying: "Many of the trusts manifested the same weaknesses as the worst performing local authorities."

Could academies solve teacher recruitment?

Part of the problem here is that it isn't very easy right now to recruit superb maths teachers. Teaching can’t compete in salary terms with the City and finance for maths graduates.

But in the future a head could decide they want to boost salaries for maths teachers and so boost maths teaching. That’s just one example. It could be anything. The point is that they will get the chance to vary what they teach and how much they pay.