TEACHERS are to strike over plans to replace their school with a privately-sponsored academy as part of a flagship Government initiative, The Northern Echo can reveal.

Members of the National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers (NASUWT) will stage their one-day walkout at Belmont School, in Durham City, on Thursday.

Simon Kennedy, NASUWT regional organiser, said: “Our members are doing this with heavy hearts, but they have been left with no alternative.”

The move follows a unanimous strike ballot that was due to be announced tomorrow.

The decision will come as a blow to Durham County Council, which last month backed plans to close six secondary schools, replacing them with three academies It is a reorganisation that could cost up to £75m and affect thousands of families.

Meanwhile, this weekend the National Association of Head Teachers overwhelmingly passed a resolution at its annual conference backing a potential boycott of primary school Sats. The National Union of Teachers is to hold a similar ballot over the tests.

Supporters of the academy scheme in County Durham argue they will create better quality schools that will generate £10m of extra investment.

MPs Hilary Armstrong, Kevan Jones and Dr Roberta Blackman-Woods all support the academies, which will be independent state-funded schools, co-sponsored by the county council and outside groups.

But opponents say the schools listed for closure are improving, and that turning them into academies will remove them from local control.

Officials are looking into where the academies should be built.

Councillor Claire Vasey, the council’s cabinet member for children and young people, has pledged to work with teachers’ unions, saying their priorities were her priorities.

However, Mr Kennedy said: “Regrettably, we have been left with no option but to take strike action. Our members are angry that they have been put into this position.

“They are angry that the parents, the staff, the children and the local community have been ignored.”

The vast majority of teachers at Belmont are members of the National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers (NASUWT), and the school will now draw up plans to react to the strike.

The union said its members would leave the picket lines to teach pupils preparing to sit their GCSEs, but whether other classes will be able to continue is unclear.

No one at Durham County Council was available to comment last night.

But David Williams, the council’s director of children and young people’s services, previously said that the possibility that trade unions might strike was disappointing and warned that such action could harm the education of young people.

Mr Kennedy said: “The blame for the disruption needs to be laid squarely at the door of the county council.

“We have sought to avoid this.

“We have lobbied, petitioned and held meetings to make sure our voice was heard. Now our members have been left with no alternative but to withdraw their labour.”

The proposals would mean academies – independent state-funded schools – being built in Durham, Consett and Stanley, co-sponsored by the council and an outside group.

In Durham and Consett, it would be the Durham Excellence in Education Partnership, led by Durham University. In Stanley, it would be New College Durham.

All three would cater for students aged 11 to 19.

In Durham, an academy would replace Belmont School Community Arts College and Durham Gilesgate Sports College and Sixth Form Centre.

In Consett, Moorside Community Technology College and Consett Community Sports College would close; and in Stanley, Greencroft Business and Enterprise Community School and Stanley School of Technology would close.

The Association of Teachers and Lecturers union said there was anger at the changes among its members.

The council could take decisions on where the academies should be built in August, with the new schools opening as early as September 2012.