Members of Conisbrough and Denaby Parents' Action Group have posted a fake advert on Internet auction site Ebay offering Conisbrough's Northcliffe School for sale for just ten pence.

The publicity stunt was a protest against the proposed takeover of the school by the Emmanuel Schools' Foundation, part of the controversial Vardy Foundation which places a strong emphasis on religious teaching.

The advert on the website reads: "For a ten per cent contribution, you too could take over a comprehensive school and turn it into an academy!

You can teach whatever you please and the government won't bat an eyelid! In fact they will praise you for it!

"This is our local comprehensive school. An organisation called the Emmanuel Schools' Foundation wants to take it over. The Doncaster LEA and the government don't seem to mind that these people are Christian fundamentalists. They will teach creationism on the quiet. The children and staff at the school don't want it, most parents don't want it. We don't have any choice."

The foundation will invest £2million, which will be boosted by a £20million grant by the government, to build and run a new city academy on the site.

But parents fear that the foundation's strict Christian ethos will be forced on pupils and that the opinions of students and staff will be ignored.
The foundation has already started work on building a new academy on the site of Thorne Grammar School.

The Trinity Academy is set to open in September next year.

*The Vardy-run Emmanuel College, in Gateshead, reported that 97 per cent of its GCSE students achieved five or more A* - C grades this year. The college, which runs a selective admissions policy, saw students achieve A grades in one in three exams. Kings Academy, Middlesborough, which is also run by the charity, saw an overall five A* - C rate of 34.4 per cent.