Alix Robertson | Schools Week

Governors ‘must have mandatory pre-appointment training’

Governors should be required to have “pre-appointment training” before they sit on school boards, paid for by the government, so they’re not forced to learn on the job. New board members sometimes take up to 12 months before they can be effective due to a total absence of training, Jo Penn, a national leader of […]

Major MAT Progress 8 scores tumble when accounting for ex-pupils

The progress scores of major multi-academy trusts including Harris Federation, Outwood Grange and Delta all drop off if they include pupils who leave before the end of year 11. Researchers at Education Datalab have “reweighted” the performance data of the 62 trusts in MAT league tables last year to include the GCSE results of pupils […]

Teachers ARE motivated by pay, research shows

The idea that teachers are not motivated by pay is misleading and not backed by evidence, according to a leading researcher. In fact, teachers with degrees that could let them earn more money in another job are more likely to leave the profession, Sam Sims, a researcher at Education Datalab (pictured below), has found. His […]

Teachers are entering and leaving the job at the same rate – and other school workforce findings

The Department for Education published the 2017 school workforce census figures this morning. Schools Week has the key findings: 1. Teacher recruitment and retention has reached ‘one-in one-out’ The same proportion of teachers are now entering the profession as leaving it. The number of full-time, qualified teachers entering teaching in state schools has fallen since 2015, […]

A third of state schools allow pupils to opt out of languages in year 9

Over a third of state schools now allow pupils to opt out of studying a language in year 9, a new report has revealed. In fact, 34.5 per cent of state schools are not teaching modern foreign languages (MFL) to entire groups of students at that level, up from 29 per cent in 2017 and […]

Adopted children need better support at school

Schools should give teachers more training to help pupils who have experienced trauma, a leading charity has said, after a survey found almost three quarters of adopted children want more support from their schools. Adoption UK wants a new continuing professional development programme to help teachers support adopted pupils, and says schools should appoint a designated governor […]

Government plans a review of children’s physical activity at school

Schools’ efforts to engage their least active pupils in physical activities will be reviewed by the government as it embarks on the second phase of its childhood obesity plan. The first phase, published in 2016, promised a ‘healthy schools’ rating scheme for primaries, and a new interactive online tool to help schools plan at least 30 minutes of […]

Exam stress ‘isn’t new’, and two other things we learned from ministers at education questions

MPs grilled education secretary Damian Hinds at the House of Commons this afternoon, alongside the children’s minister Nadhim Zahawi, the schools minister Nick Gibb, and the skills minister Anne Milton. Issues including T-levels, GCSEs and exclusions were on the agenda, as well as other topics such as the swimming curriculum. Here’s what we learned. 1. […]

DfE rubber-stamps closure of troubled studio school

The troubled Isle of Wight Studio School will close next summer, the Department for Education has confirmed. Closure was proposed in April, when Inspire Academy Trust, which runs the school, announced that ministers had approved the plans to wind it up in 2019 “in principle”. This was followed by a four-week consultation. The school will shut […]