Irish foreign minister says he does ‘not anticipate any particular difficulties in respect of the EU side’
Back at the home affairs committee James Daly (Con) asks why so few police investigations end up in people being charged.
James Cleverly, the home secretary, says the Crown Prosecution Service is independent. He wants to make sure investigations are as professional as possible.
Continue reading...Committee calls on government to heed widespread concern and consider a more nuanced inspection system
The government should stop the use of single-word judgments such as “inadequate” or “outstanding” in Ofsted’s headline grades of schools in England, a committee of MPs has urged.
MPs on the education committee said relations between Ofsted and teachers had become “extremely strained”, with trust in the watchdog “worryingly low” in the wake of the headteacher Ruth Perry’s suicide last year after a traumatic inspection.
Continue reading...Opposition day motion seeks to create a council-maintained register of children in England not on the school roll
Labour is planning to use an opposition day debate motion to bring forward legislation for a new register of children who are not in school as part of plans to tackle persistent absenteeism.
New Labour analysis found that “one in three children currently sitting their GCSEs have missed nearly three months of secondary school since the pandemic” and said this was likely to affect academic attainment.
Continue reading...Worries about impact on neighbouring schools of money for Malmesbury primary in Wiltshire, near Dyson’s campus
A £6m donation from Sir James Dyson to help fund the expansion of his local state primary school has been approved by the government, despite concerns about the potential impact on neighbouring schools.
The education secretary, Gillian Keegan, announced on Monday that she had given the green light for the inventor’s donation to Malmesbury Church of England primary school in Wiltshire, which is close to Dyson’s research and development campus.
Continue reading...Safeguarding staff say they can’t get referrals for serious cases and don’t have the expertise to give pupils the help they need
Increasing numbers of children suffering from domestic abuse, serious neglect and homelessness are being refused help from over-stretched social services, schools across England have told the Observer.
Child protection cases that would automatically have prompted intervention from social workers a few years ago are now routinely being passed back to schools to deal with themselves. The inability to obtain help for children whom schools think are in urgent need is taking such an emotional toll on education staff, who say they have neither the expertise nor the resources to cope, that some schools are bringing in counsellors to prevent their safeguarding teams becoming traumatised.
Continue reading...Prime minister says he wants first flight to leave ‘as soon as practicably possible’ but will not give date
Q: When you said you would stop the boats, people thought that meant reducing them to negligble numbers. That is not going to happen, is it?
Sunak says he is proud of the progress he has made. He always said it would be difficult.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Unpublished OECD data on students’ motivation and sense of belonging at school calls into question validity of national rankings, experts say
More than three-quarters of Australian students say they didn’t fully try in the latest Pisa tests, unpublished data reveals, calling into question the real source behind a continued decline in rankings.
The Programme for International Student Assessment has measured the academic performance of 15-year-olds every three years since 2000, providing the most comprehensive international rankings in science, reading and mathematics.
Continue reading...Research by Sutton Trust finds disadvantaged students less likely to get into top performing schools in England than their peers
Some comprehensive schools are more “socially selective” than grammar schools, according to new research which has called on the government to review the admissions code in England to improve access for poorer pupils.
While grammars are inherently selective, as admission is based on passing an 11-plus examination, comprehensive secondary schools admit local children, regardless of academic ability or social background, based on a school’s admissions policy.
Continue reading...Kevin Hollinrake, the minister for postal services, says a government announcement on the scandal is imminent
Here are some more lines from Bridget Phillipson’s speech and Q&A this morning.
Phillipson, the shadow education secretary, said keeping schools open should be a priority if a future pandemic ever required another lockdown. She said:
When the Government first reopened schools for most of our children, the pubs had already been open for weeks.
That was entirely the wrong way around. And I tell you today, that if I’m secretary of state for education, if and when such a national crisis comes again, school should be the last to close and the first to open.
Phillipson said the fact that Gavin Williamson, the former education secretary, did not give evidence to the Covid inquiry in person showed how schools were sidelined by the government. She said:
It says a lot that the Covid inquiry isn’t even taking evidence from Sir Gavin Williamson. I don’t blame them because he wasn’t important.
The education secretary – he wasn’t at the table. Ministers failed our children in their greatest hour of need.
She condemned parents who take their children out of school for holidays, saying that was a sign of disrespect. She said:
Cheaper holidays, birthday treats, not fancying it today – these are no excuses for missing school.
Penalties must be part of the system, but they can never be the answer alone. Allowing your child to skip school without good reason shouldn’t just be cause for a fine. It’s deeper.
She said Labour would introduce a single number, like the NHS number, to hold children’s records across different services together. She said:
Labour will bring a simple single number, like the NHS number that holds records together and that stops children’s needs falling between the gaps within schools and between them, between all of the services that wrap around them. That linkage allows us not just to support children with the issues that they face today, but to help identify the challenges of tomorrow.
She said Labour would “always be the party of family”.
She suggested Labour would take steps to ensure parents cannot avoid paying VAT on private schools fees by paying all fees in advance. This is from the BBC’s education editor, Branwen Jeffreys.
Will labour apply VAT on school fees retrospectively if parents try to pay fully in advance @bphillipsonMP says will make sure there isn’t avoidance
She praised Michael Gove, the Tory former education secretary, for bringing energy and drive to the department.
Continue reading...Latest attempt to tackle pupil absences criticised as failing to tackle the magnitude of the problem
The government is to make a new effort to repair sagging school attendance figures in England, with the education secretary to announce funding for “attendance mentors” in some of the worst-affected areas.
Pupil absences remain stubbornly higher than before the Covid pandemic, and during a visit to Liverpool on Monday Gillian Keegan is expected to announce plans for caseworkers to offer one-to-one support for pupils in 10 areas including Blackpool and Walsall, where rates of unauthorised absences remain far above national levels.
Continue reading...Beijing steps up its efforts to tighten control of what is taught in its classrooms, deterring western teachers from working in the country
A new “patriotic” education law is set to put a squeeze on British schools in China as Beijing steps up its efforts to tighten control of what is taught in its classrooms.
Less than five years ago, the Chinese and British media were full of reports about the “boom years” of British education in China. Elite British schools had seized the commercial opportunity of opening campuses to cater to wealthy Chinese families and the children of expats, and were opening new branches at a rapid clip.
Continue reading...Party has asked former Ofsted head Sir David Bell to find new ways to increase levels of childcare
Labour is considering creating thousands of nursery places inside existing primary schools in England and has tasked the former Ofsted head Sir David Bell with finding new ways to increase levels of childcare.
In the latest evolution of Labour’s policy in an area that still has a widespread shortage of spaces, plus a lack of affordability and staffing, Bell will advise on potential ways to tackle this, with detailed policies set out nearer the election.
Continue reading...How to make sense of some of the key passages from long-delayed guidance
The UK government finally published its long-delayed guidance for England’s schools on youth transition. The document promises a clear set of principles for teachers and staff as they wrestle with the needs of children who are questioning their gender identity. According to the education secretary, Gillian Keegan, the guidance “puts the best interests of all children first”.
But while the guidance has been broadly welcomed by those who believe that it is too easy for young people to “socially transition” at school, there are others who disagree vehemently. They see the government’s approach as informed by an underlying hostility to trans people, and scepticism about whether they even exist. And although the guidance does not include an outright ban on allowing social transition (said to have been under consideration until it was found to be unlawful), it clearly creates new barriers for teenagers who want to talk to teachers about their gender without fear of being outed at home.
In recent years, we have seen a significant increase in the number of children questioning the way they feel about being a boy or a girl … This has been linked to gender identity ideology, the belief that a person can have a ‘gender’ that is different to their biological sex.
We have not used the term transgender to describe children. Under UK law children cannot obtain a Gender Recognition Certificate and therefore cannot change their legal sex.
As part of testing whether this is a sustained request, schools and colleges should seek to understand societal or other factors that may have influenced the child, for example:
Has the child been influenced by peers or social media?
Parents should not be excluded from decisions taken by a school or college relating to requests for a child to ‘socially transition’.
Schools and colleges should engage parents as a matter of priority, and encourage the child to speak to their parents, other than in the exceptionally rare circumstances where involving parents would constitute a significant risk of harm to the child.
[Schools] may conclude that the impact on the school and college community is such that it may not be possible to agree to support a request [for a change in how a pupil is treated at school].
Schools and colleges should only agree to a change of pronouns if they are confident that the benefit to the individual child outweighs the impact on the school community. It is expected that there will be very few occasions in which a school or college will be able to agree to a change of pronouns.
This is non-statutory guidance from the Department for Education. Its focus is to provide practical advice, which we expect schools and colleges to follow.
Continue reading...Focusing on poorer children’s social and emotional learning barely helps their results catch up with those of better-off peers
Teaching character, grit and resilience in schools is valuable to children but is unlikely to play a major part in eradicating the attainment gap between disadvantaged pupils and their wealthier peers, according to research.
In recent years, policymakers in England and elsewhere in the world have focused on social and emotional learning, and the importance of developing character, determination and self-belief as a way of improving learning, particularly among children from lower income backgrounds.
Continue reading...Parent volunteers and students claimed polychlorinated biphenyls leaked from the firm’s light fixtures made them sick
A jury in Washington state on Monday ordered Bayer’s Monsanto to pay $857m to former students and parent volunteers of a school north-east of Seattle who claimed that chemicals known as PCBs made by the company leaked from light fixtures and made them sick, according to an attorney for the plaintiffs.
The jury found the company liable for selling polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) used in the Sky Valley Education Center in Monroe, Washington. The verdict included $73m in compensatory damages, and $784m in punitive damages, according to Henry Jones, an attorney at the law firm Friedman Rubin, who represents the plaintiffs.
Continue reading...London boroughs among hardest hit due to falling birth rate and family struggles with Covid and rising costs
Primary schools are being closed, merged and shrunk as councils across England respond to falling numbers of pupils due to the falling birth rate as well as family upheaval triggered by rising costs, Brexit and Covid.
London boroughs are among the hardest hit, with thousands of school places being lost, but the closures and cuts extend to other cities and areas as they adjust to fewer children being born or moving into their catchment areas.
Continue reading...Lords report says there is too much learning by rote and many key Tory changes should be reversed
A major parliamentary report has called for an urgent overhaul of secondary education in England that would reverse many of the Conservatives’ key education changes of the past decade.
The House of Lords report says the education system for 11- to 16-year-olds is too focused on academic learning and written exams, resulting in too much learning by rote and not enough opportunity for pupils to pursue creative and technical subjects.
Continue reading...Family of headteacher who killed herself calls on Amanda Spielman to resign over inadequate response to coroner’s verdict
Ruth Perry’s family has called on Ofsted’s chief inspector to resign immediately after it was revealed its lead inspectors will spend just 90 minutes on a briefing to address concerns raised by the headteacher’s suicide.
Julia Waters, Perry’s sister, said the “shocking” response showed that Amanda Spielman had “lost the plot” as chief inspector and should resign now ahead of her term finishing at the end of the year.
Continue reading...Inquest examined watchdog’s role in Ruth Perry’s decline after Reading primary school’s rating was downgraded
A headteacher killed herself this year after an Ofsted inspection of her school downgraded it from “outstanding” to “inadequate”, a coroner has concluded.
Heidi Connor, the Reading coroner, found Perry’s suicide was “contributed to by an Ofsted inspection carried out between 15 and 16 November 2022” and that “during and after this inspection Ruth’s mental health deteriorated significantly” before her suicide on 8 January 2023.
Continue reading...Human Rights Watch warns bar on women means unqualified men now teach boys, fewer subjects are taught and beatings are routine
The Taliban is causing “irreversible damage” to Afghanistan’s education system through the reintroduction of corporal punishment, curriculum changes and the use of unqualified teachers to replace women, most of whom have been barred from schools, Human Rights Watch has warned.
After taking power in 2021, the Taliban banned girls from secondary schools. A new report from Human Rights Watch (HRW), published on Wednesday, warns that boys’ education has also suffered under the Taliban, although this has gone largely unreported.
Continue reading...