Agricultural department says multiple states will be affected, forcing a brainstorm of backup plans
The tiny, half-pint cartons of milk served with millions of school lunches nationwide may soon be scarce in some cafeterias, with districts across the country scrambling to find alternatives.
The problem is not a shortage of milk itself, but the cardboard cartons used to package and serve it, according to dairy industry suppliers and state officials.
Continue reading...School leaders say parents should do their own homework to build an accurate picture of which is best for their child
If Ofsted inspection reports do not paint an “accurate picture” of schools in England, how are parents able to choose one that suits their child? Headteachers and existing research suggests Ofsted judgments may not play as large a role as its defenders think.
Chris Ashley-Jones, the executive head of Hitherfield primary school in Streatham, south London, said he had shown 100 parents around the school during recent open days. “Not a single one of them mentioned Ofsted,” he said.
Continue reading...Abby Zwerner was hospitalized for two weeks after the January shooting and is suing school administrators for negligence
A teacher who was shot by her six-year-old student in Virginia can press forward with her $40m lawsuit against a school system over claims of negligence by school administrators, a judge ruled Friday.
The surprise decision by the Newport News circuit court judge Matthew Hoffman means that Abby Zwerner could get much more than just workers’ compensation for the serious injuries caused by January’s classroom shooting.
Continue reading...Camfed calls for six-year plan to get 6 million girls into school, warning that drop-out rate is limiting children’s chances
Governments and donors need to redouble efforts to encourage girls back to school across Africa after the cost of living crisis pushed many to spurn education for low-paid work or early marriage, a charity has warned.
Camfed, which operates in five African countries, said its partnership model proved this could be achieved and called for a six-year plan to get 6 million girls into school.
Continue reading...Sir Michael Wilshaw says Ofsted’s headline judgments ‘provide parents with false comfort’
The former chief inspector of schools Sir Michael Wilshaw has poured scorn on Ofsted’s judgment that almost nine out of 10 state schools in England are “good”, describing it as “complete nonsense”.
According to the latest official statistics, 88% of schools were judged to be either “good” or “outstanding” by the schools inspectorate as of the end of last December, but Wilshaw told MPs that having visited some of those awarded a “good” rating by Ofsted, he did not agree.
Continue reading...Education secretary’s letter emphasises copyright cannot be used as ‘excuse’ to withhold RSHE teaching resources
Gillian Keegan has written to schools in England ordering them to make the materials used in children’s sex education available to be seen by parents, warning headteachers there can be “no ifs, no buts, no more excuses”.
It is the second letter the education secretary has sent to schools on the issue, which has been seized upon by some backbench Conservative MPs amid claims that children are being exposed to inappropriate material during relationships, sex and health education (RSHE) at school.
Continue reading...AQA awaits regulator approval for on-screen assessment of reading and listening components
GCSEs in Italian and Polish are to be assessed digitally in England from 2026, with plans to move at least one large-entry subject such as English to partial digital assessment by the end of the decade, a major exam board has announced.
England’s largest exam provider, AQA, said that subject to regulatory approval, the reading and listening components of the two language GCSEs would be examined through digital assessment for the first time.
Continue reading...Head of Honywood school says building of temporary structure is a near miracle after crisis it faced
“Three and a half weeks ago, there was nothing here,” said James Saunders, the headteacher of Honywood school, looking with pride – and disbelief – at the scene unfolding in front of him. “It was a field!”
Before us is a brand new school, built in the space of six weeks – a temporary home for the 800 pupils at Honywood in Coggeshall, Essex, one of the schools most severely affected by the recent concrete crisis that threw the start of the new term across England into chaos.
Continue reading...Survey finds less than two-thirds say they enjoy PE in schools, down from 74% in 2016
Girls’ enjoyment of physical education in school has declined over the past six years, with a lack of confidence, concern about periods and anxiety about their appearance holding them back, according to research.
Less than two-thirds of girls and young women (64%) who took part in a survey this year by the UK charity the Youth Sport Trust (YST), said they enjoyed PE, down from 74% when the poll began in 2016.
Continue reading...Labour leader’s pledge for English primaries as part of a wider dental plan labelled ‘window dressing’ by union chief
School leaders have accused Labour of “window dressing” after Keir Starmer pledged to introduce supervised toothbrushing for young children in England’s primary schools.
While the policy has long been supported by the dentistry profession as a way of curbing decay, headteachers said it was not appropriate for their staff to check whether pupils had cleaned their teeth.
Continue reading...Head of National Education Union says new qualification would need 5,300 additional teachers in England
Rishi Sunak wants to scrap A-levels and replace them with a single qualification that includes compulsory English and maths, bringing upheaval to sixth-form education in England that would last a decade.
The new baccalaureate-style Advanced British Standard, which Sunak announced in his speech to the Conservative party conference in Manchester, would also kill off the T-level vocational qualification the government launched just three years ago.
Continue reading...Prime minister says HS2 move will release £36bn, that he will raise smoking age by one year, every year and announces five-subject qualification
Andy Burnham, the Labour mayor of Greater Manchester, has been giving interviews about HS2 this morning. He told BBC Breakfast that cancelling the link to Manchester would show that the north of England did not get the same priority as the south. He said:
It just proves there’s still so many people in politics, many of them in the Tory party, that think they can treat the north of England differently to the way they treat other parts of the country. It’s just so wrong.
I’ve been in politics 30 years, I’ve never seen a party come to a conference and leave an axe hanging over the place they’re in for the whole week. And then actually drop it on that place.
I’ve had so many contacts over the past few hours from people who are concerned as I am that we are using this culture war battleground to no good effect at all and we’re actually hurting people.
And we shouldn’t be doing that as Conservatives. That’s not the Conservative party I joined and I think we’re better than that.
Luckily that’s not going to happen … because I believe in the ultimate common sense of the party. Also, I very much hope that Suella Braverman learns about the power of her words and moderates her tone.
Continue reading...Unesco analysis shows that sub-Saharan Africa accounts for a third of the shortfall, but that Europe and North America are lacking too
The world needs 44 million more teachers if education is to be provided to every child, according to new figures from Unesco.
The education and culture agency said 9% of primary school teachers quit the profession in 2022, almost double the rate of 4.6% in 2015.
Continue reading...Louis Feutren joined a nationalist group in occupied France and went on to teach at a prestigious Dublin school
There was never any mystery about the fact that Louis Feutren, a French teacher at St Conleth’s school in south Dublin, was a Nazi collaborator.
He had a taste for violent punishments and bizarre humiliations that terrorised pupils. He liked to reminisce about the second world war, when he had joined a Breton nationalist group that fought on the side of Germany. And he showed pictures of himself in uniform.
Continue reading...Most schools had policies before government’s plan, and there are concerns about safety and implications for carers of outright ban
Glyn Potts, head teacher at Newman Roman Catholic College in Oldham, could not hide his irritation at the morning headlines announcing a government ban on mobile phones in state schools in England.
His school, like the vast majority, already has a mobile phone policy. “All banned and have been for 10 years,” he said, dismissing the announcement by the education secretary, Gillian Keegan, as a “smokescreen” to distract from the real challenges facing schools, such as underfunding, teacher recruitment and providing for pupils with special educational needs.
Continue reading...LSE research suggests faith-based admissions requirements deter disadvantaged children
Church of England and Roman Catholic primary schools take fewer pupils with disabilities or special needs than other local schools in England, according to research that suggests faith-based admissions requirements deter pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds.
The findings led the author, Dr Tammy Campbell of the London School of Economics, to conclude that faith schools “serve as hubs of relative advantage” for children from more affluent families who were less likely to have special needs.
Continue reading...Shadow ministers used ‘charitable status’ as shorthand for main goal of introducing tax changes
Has Labour flip-flopped on stripping private schools in England of their charitable status? Senior party figures from Keir Starmer down have certainly been guilty of using loose language, conflating such a move with their plan to apply VAT to private school fees and other tax breaks.
Starmer said in July last year: “When I say we are going to pay for kids to catch up at school, I also say it’ll be funded by removing private schools’ charitable status.”
Continue reading...PM wants pupils in England to study a wider range of subjects including maths and English until they are 18
The A-level system in England could be reformed with a new style of British baccalaureate in which children would study more subjects after the age of 16, according to reports.
The proposals include English and maths becoming compulsory up until the age of 18, the Times said. Students would also be required to study a wider range of subjects in post-16 education.
Continue reading...Dozens hurt, at least five of them badly, after vehicle carrying students from Long Island to a band camp in Pennsylvania collided
A charter bus carrying schoolchildren to a band camp crashed on a New York highway on Thursday, killing one person and hurting dozens of others, police said.
The wreck happened on Interstate 84 in the town of Wawayanda, about 45 miles (72km) north-west of New York City, state police said.
Continue reading...Rishi Sunak’s government seen as less competent that Boris Johnson’s administration
The UK economy is set to witness the highest inflation rate of the world’s G7 advanced economies this year, according to new forecasts, PA Media reports. PA says:
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) also increased its predicted average UK inflation rate for 2023 compared with its previous estimate.
Economists at the globally recognised organisation also reduced their UK growth forecast slightly for next year amid pressure from higher interest rates.
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