Category Archives: Teaching

From field to classrooms in six weeks: Raac-hit Essex school’s new home

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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.

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Teachers deride Starmer’s plan for supervised toothbrushing in schools

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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.

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World needs 44m more teachers in order to educate every child, report finds

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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.

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Schools concrete crisis is risk to pupils’ mental health, headteacher warns

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Leader of a secondary school in Essex warns upheaval could have similar negative impact to that caused by Covid lockdowns

A headteacher whose 830 pupils must learn semi-remotely for at least a term because of the schools concrete crisis has warned that the upheaval could cause a recurrence of the negative mental health impact of Covid lockdowns.

James Saunders, the leader of Honywood school in Coggeshall, Essex, fears that year-seven students entering their first term at secondary school could face future struggles after the Department for Education last week ordered the closure of 22 classrooms as part of a nationwide safety alert.

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More English schools could close due to crumbling concrete, minister warns

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Nick Gibb says buildings continue to be surveyed for risk of collapse after over 100 were told to shut

The schools minister has warned more schools in England could face closure after more than 100 were told to shut just days before term starts for thousands of pupils.

The government has refused to publicly reveal the 104 education facilities that have been told to shut buildings due to the presence of reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC), a material at risk of collapse.

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‘Something that actually matters’: four retirees on why they’re becoming teachers

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The over-55s account for biggest rise in trainee teachers in England, with a 75% increase in applications

The work and pensions secretary, Mel Stride, recently suggested that unemployed people over 50 should consider delivering takeaways.

But the army of missing workers Stride was seeking are looking to do something more productive with their time: this year, the over-55s accounted for the biggest rise in new trainee teachers in England, with a 75% increase in applications.

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Relief as teachers in England settle for 6.5% – but there may be battles ahead

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While many welcome the end of strike action, the campaign for fair pay and better funding for state schools looks set to continue

Ministers will have heaved a huge sigh of relief to see teachers and school leaders in England vote to accept a 6.5% pay offer and end strike action in state schools in England.

After months of disruption as a result of strikes by members of the National Education Union (NEU), there were real fears in government of an escalation of the dispute, with coordinated strike action in the autumn term by four unions.

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Rishi Sunak driving doctors out of NHS with pay offer, say union leaders

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Public service workers in England offered 5%-7% rises but departments must fund them from existing budgets

Health union leaders have reacted furiously to a warning from Rishi Sunak that his offer of a 6% pay rise this year was final and that “no amount of strikes” would change his mind, as they began their longest walkout yet in England.

The British Medical Association said the government was “driving doctors away” from the health service and had missed an opportunity to put a credible pay offer on the table to end strikes when it accepted all the recommendations of the pay review bodies.

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Teachers in England vote for strike action in autumn over pay

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Members of NASUWT give ‘largest mandate in a decade’ for action over pay, workload and working hours

Members of the NASUWT teachers’ union have voted in favour of industrial action over pay and workload, raising the prospect of mass strikes and widespread disruption across schools in England this autumn.

After months of stalemate with no progress over teachers’ pay, NASUWT members voted decisively for industrial action, with 88.5% of eligible members voting to support strike action and 94.3% supporting action short of strike.

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English teaching unions to strike during Tory conference if pay deal rejected

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Action could be directed at Rishi Sunak’s keynote speech, seen as vital in run-up to general election campaign

Teachers are preparing to target Rishi Sunak’s make-or-break Tory conference speech with strike action this autumn, amid growing cabinet support for a compromise to end months of public sector walkouts.

Should ministers fail to support a deal that would hand teachers a 6.5% increase this year, all major teaching unions in England are increasingly confident that their members will back more strikes when the new school year begins.

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New Ofsted report upgrades headteacher Ruth Perry’s school to ‘good’

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Perry took her own life in March after Caversham primary school was downgraded from outstanding to inadequate

Ofsted has replaced its “inadequate” rating that may have contributed to the death of headteacher Ruth Perry after a new inspection praised staff for addressing previous weaknesses at the school in Reading.

Perry died this year after an Ofsted inspection downgraded Caversham primary school in Berkshire from outstanding to inadequate, with Perry’s family saying the grading was a factor in her taking her own life.

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Teachers in England strike as minister says it is ‘impossible to say’ if pay recommendation will be accepted – live

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Robert Halfon says government cannot promise to accept pay review body recommendation, as NEU members strike again

Q: My fear is that sewage in water could lead to a typhoid problem?

Ferrari asks if Labour favours water nationalisation.

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Pay rise of 6.5% would stop teaching strikes in England, union boss suggests

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Mary Bousted urges ministers to publish recommendation from pay body, thought to be 6.5%, and fund schools to pay it

Ministers could ward off potential teachers’ strikes in the autumn term in England if they accept a salary increase recommended by the teachers’ independent pay review body, the head of the biggest education union has said.

Teachers who belong to the NEU continued industrial action on Friday. Mary Bousted, the joint general secretary of the union, said: “This could stop. What the government must do is publish the independent pay review body recommendations.”

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Keir Starmer refuses to commit to free school meals pledge

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Labour leader says ‘money is a big factor’ as he also declines to promise 6.5% pay rise for teachers

Keir Starmer has refused to commit to supporting free school meals for all primary school children, as he stuck to a tough fiscal position despite pressure from inside and outside of his party.

The Labour leader also declined to commit to a 6.5% pay rise for teachers as he urged the government to resolve the dispute at the centre of strike action.

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Striking teachers in England accused of undermining pupils’ pandemic recovery

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Gillian Keegan says she ‘can’t think of a worse time’ for action by NEU members

The education secretary, Gillian Keegan, has accused striking teachers of undermining children’s recovery from the Covid pandemic, saying she did “pretty well” at winning extra funding for schools from the Treasury.

Keegan told a conference in Bournemouth: “Let me be clear, we should not be having these strikes in general, but certainly not now. Children have been through so much in the pandemic and I can’t think of a worse time to be willingly keeping them out of school.”

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Sexual harassment of girls is a scourge at schools in England, say MPs

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Commons committee’s report calls for government strategy to engage with young boys to tackle problem

Sexual harassment of girls is “a scourge” in England’s schools, according to MPs, who have called for a government-led strategy to focus on boys who are failing to engage with relationship and sex education.

MPs on the women and equalities committee said in a report that there should be training for all teachers to help them hold conversations with boys and young men about sexual harassment and gender-based violence, in a way that challenges prevailing gender norms and ideas of masculinity.

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Former Ofsted chief: school inspections should change after headteacher’s death

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Sir Michael Wilshaw says he now thinks differently about use of one-word headline grades in England

The former chief inspector of schools in England Sir Michael Wilshaw has said Ofsted’s style of school inspections needs to change after the death of the headteacher Ruth Perry.

Wilshaw, who led Ofsted until 2016, said Perry’s death, following an inspection that downgraded her school from “outstanding” to “inadequate”, had changed his mind over the use of one-word headline grades to rate schools in England.

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Record numbers of teachers in England quitting profession, figures show

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Department for Education survey finds that 40,000 – almost 9% of workforce – left state schools in 2021-22 before retirement

Teachers in England are abandoning their profession in record numbers, according to official figures, with Labour claiming that “incompetent” government policies were to blame.

The latest workforce survey by the Department for Education (DfE) found that 40,000 teachers left state schools last year – almost 9% of the teaching workforce, and the highest number since it began publishing the data in 2011 – while a further 4,000 retired.

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Senior doctors in England to vote on industrial action

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BMA says consultant pay has declined by 35% since 2008-9

Senior doctors in England are to vote on whether to strike amid the continued row over pay in healthcare, as teachers’ unions also plan to hold a ballot for industrial action.

The ballot will open on Monday until 27 June as the British Medical Association urges members to approve.

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Sister of Ruth Perry urges headteachers to resist Ofsted ‘culture of fear’

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Julia Waters criticises ‘fatally destructive’ inspections and calls on school leaders to refuse to cooperate with watchdog

Headteachers should undermine Ofsted’s “culture of fear” by refusing to cooperate with the schools inspectorate or work as inspectors, the sister of headteacher Ruth Perry has told a conference of school leaders.

Prof Julia Waters said her sister had been “destroyed” by Ofsted’s critical inspection of her school late last year, which downgraded it from outstanding to inadequate, and that her family had been left with an “intense, painful, overwhelming” sense of loss after her death.

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