The likelihood is that the governors of Hove Park School will decide to convert the school into an academy. If so, the decision will be wrong. Not because - or not just because - academies are a fundamental anti-democratic perversion of schools with a track record of serving local communities. It will be the wrong decision because of the way it has been reached: a one-way conversation, frequently conducted behind closed doors by people who appear - if only by their muteness - to be deaf and blind to the concerns of a significant proportion of parents, staff, and the wider citizenry. There may be arguments for poorly-performing schools to be turned into academies. That is not the case here. Hove Park School is on the way up. Radical action was required some years ago, when still-silent Conservative and Labour councillors said and did nothing. Still, they say nothing. Except to intervene - against political intervention. In politics. Every institution is improved by being more open and more democratic. It seems to be the only lesson unlearned at Hove Park School.