Alix Robertson | Schools Week

Essex council plans spin-off multi-academy trust

Essex county council (ECC) is applying to set up its own multi-academy trust which, if successful, would be the first spin-off local authority trust. The move was confirmed in a council cabinet meeting held last month, and an application will now be made to the Regional Schools Commissioner. Essex is not the first local authority […]

Spare our blushes! SRE teacher training needed before 2019

Funding is available this year for second subject specialism training in maths, physics and modern foreign languages – but sex education is not an option, even though it is due to become compulsory. The lack of options for free sex education training before the policy is implemented is a worry for Caroline Lucas, the Green […]

Five things to be positive on the future of children’s mental health

An eagerly anticipated green paper is just one of the opportunities on the horizon for improving mental health provision for young people, according to a national children’s charity. Matthew Dodd, the principal education officer at the National Children’s Bureau, has laid out his top five reasons to be positive about the future of children’s mental […]

Apprenticeships a ‘fragile’ form of training, research warns

Apprenticeships may have been tipped as the future of teacher training, but new research suggests their reliance on employer involvement makes them a “fragile” form of training. A new study by Oxford University’s Department for Education and the World Innovation Summit for Education (WISE) has reviewed apprenticeship participation on a global scale. It found relying […]

Dominant multi-academy trusts risk investigation for monopolising markets

Multi-academy trusts risk being investigated by the Competition and Markets Authority if they come to dominate their local areas, Schools Week understands. As academy trusts continue to expand, with some focusing on specific areas, parents’ choice may end up limited to a set of schools run by the same organisation. Schools Week understands that the […]

Ofqual accused of ‘refusing to engage’ with colour-blindness

Exam boards are producing scripts for GCSEs and A-levels that rely on coloured diagrams to convey information to candidates, even though this will make the content inaccessible for colour-blind pupils. Colour vision deficiency (CVD) on average affects more than one child in every UK classroom – one in 12 boys and one in 200 girls […]

Numeric GCSE grades system pushing down results

The shift to a numeric scoring system for GCSEs is playing havoc with this year’s results, as Attainment 8 results drop and more schools fall below the Progress 8 floor standard. The number of schools that will fall below a Progress 8 score of -0.5 has grown by 30 per cent this year, while headline […]

T-Levels: New post-16 ‘education and childcare’ vocational route announced

“Education and childcare” will be one of the first new post-16 routes into technical education, the Department for Education revealed today. The T-level qualifications, which are grouped into 15 different groups or ‘routes’, are being developed by industry professionals and will be offered as two-year college courses or as apprenticeships from 2020. Three of the routes […]

RSC pushed to rebroker WCAT schools NINE months before official announcements

The regional schools commissioner first pushed to remove schools from Wakefield City Academies trust in December 2016, though it took nine more months before any official announcements were made, Schools Week can exclusively reveal. A report from a WCAT board meeting on December 14, 2016, obtained by Freedom of Information requests, shows that Jennifer Bexon-Smith, […]