Expert Contributor | Schools Week

Keeping schools mentally healthy: sometimes young people just need to talk

Sometimes young people just want to talk, says Lisa Fathers, who explains how the devolved administration in Greater Manchester has trained up teachers and peer mentors to provide mental health support in schools The recent figures from the Children’s Commissioner highlighting that a third of areas in England are reducing real-terms spending on vital mental […]

If schools want more money from government, they must use funds efficiently

The government’s scheme for providing financial advice to schools is helping them redirect more resources to the frontline, argues the academies minister, Lord Agnew School resource management advisers are part of a package of support to help schools get the best value out of their budgets. Their work is not something that should be viewed […]

PRUs shouldn’t just be part of the flowchart

England is recreating the old grammar and secondary modern system, only this time, based on behaviour not attainment, says Jules Daulby ‘Jules, if you create a system, people will use it.’ A wise deputy head said this once when I enthusiastically suggested a flow chart to explain to teachers when they could send students to […]

Here’s the Lib Dems’ vision for the school system of the future

Teachers are overworked, undervalued and underpaid and we need to resource them better, says Layla Moran, setting out the Lib Dems’ vision for the school system Some new teachers are barely earning the National Living Wage because they are overworked and underpaid. That was the warning from the NEU’s joint General Secretaries this week. I […]

The edtech strategy is a great leap – but backwards

A new government edtech strategy has been released, but does it stand up to scrutiny? Tony Parkin isn’t convinced… Perhaps I should begin by saying that, having spent my career working in supporting and promoting education and information technology for schools, I am naturally delighted when any government sits up and shows an interest in […]

The school appeals system is cementing inequalities: it’s time for the government to rethink admissions

The promised review of the school admissions system needs to materialise if the government wants to fulfil its social mobility ambitions, says Emily Hunt Each year, thousands of families receive the news they hoped they would avoid: they have failed to secure their first choice of secondary school. While the majority of families in England […]

Schools and their pupils are clear – no one is an outsider

For the UK’s LGBT+ educators, these past few weeks have felt like going back in time. But equality is not up for debate, says Matt Hood When I started primary school in 1990 ‘section 28’ as it was known, prevented teachers from ‘promoting homosexuality’ or the ‘acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship’. By […]

Boys Don’t Try? Rethinking Masculinity in Schools

This book opens with stark facts about the gender gap – not only in school, but in society: 96 per cent of our prison population is male. The two schools-based authors write chapters in turn. In chapter one, Mark Roberts tells of his early success as a teacher with a reputation for teaching boys well […]

Exclusion or poor mental health: which comes first?

Children excluded from school are more likely to have poor mental health than their peers, but the direction of causality is hotly debated, says Tamsin Ford How much can and should we do to prevent exclusions? How do we balance the needs of the student who struggles to cope in school with those of their […]