Freddie Whittaker

  • Ban mobile phones to protect pupils, minister tells schools

    The culture secretary Matthew Hancock wants more schools to ban mobile phones in order to help protect children “in the digital age”. Writing in the Telegraph, the senior cabinet minister said he admires headteachers who “take a firm approach” in refusing to allow pupils to use mobile phones during the school day. Schools already have the freedom…

    0.01 Jun. 20th, 2018 | News

  • NHS funding settlement poses 'quite severe challenges' for the DfE

    The government’s pledge to pump an extra £20 billion into the NHS will put pressure on the Department for Education, MPs were warned today. Luke Sibieta, from the Institute for Fiscal Studies, told the parliamentary education committee that the policy announcement “poses quite severe challenges” for the DfE and other high-spending Whitehall departments. In the…

    12.30 Jun. 19th, 2018 | News

  • Suffolk council to vote on swingeing cuts to rural school transport

    Suffolk council is preparing controversial cuts to school transport that will “significantly impact” pupil numbers at schools around the county. The council’s cabinet will vote on Tuesday on whether to introduce changes that will mean children only get free transport if they attend their nearest school – the minimum service that must be provided by…

    5.00 Jun. 15th, 2018 | News

  • Councils begin to top-slice from school budgets to replace ESG funding

    More than 60 councils have been given permission to top-slice money from school budgets to make up for cuts to a central government grant. Councils stopped receiving the education services grant (ESG) last September, and the 2018-19 financial year is the first without transitional funding in place to soften the blow. The money town halls…

    11.19 Jun. 13th, 2018 | News

  • Two Stoke studio schools near their end

    Two studio schools in Stoke-on-Trent will close by next summer amid dire problems with recruiting students. Stoke-on-Trent Studio College for Construction and the Built Environment (CaBE) will close this August, while its sister college for Manufacturing and Design Excellence (MaDE) will close the following year. These are the 25th and 26th of this type of…

    11.31 Jun. 12th, 2018 | News

  • Dominic Herrington to succeed Sir David Carter as interim national schools commissioner

    Dominic Herrington, the regional schools commissioner for the south east of England and south London, will be the new national schools commissioner, Schools Week can exclusively reveal. The civil servant will replace outgoing commissioner Sir David Carter in September, but has only been appointed on an interim basis for six months, retaining his regional duties at…

    9.32 Jun. 12th, 2018 | News

  • Rye Studio School to close over low pupil numbers

    The Rye Studio School in East Sussex will close this summer after it failed to recruit even half of the pupils it needed. It is the 24th studio school – 14-to-19 institutions with a vocational curriculum – to close or announce plans to close since the inception of the project. According to trustees, the school…

    10.52 Jun. 11th, 2018 | News

  • Hinds to tell professionals to 'play your part as governors'

    Professional workers will be asked to “play their part” to improve the education of children by signing up to be school governors and trustees. The education secretary Damian Hinds will use his speech to the annual conference of the National Governance Association for a “call to arms” to “businesses and skilled professionals” to get more…

    0.01 Jun. 9th, 2018 | News

  • Chris Husbands and Mary Beard top Queen's Birthday Honours list for education services

    A leading academic and a renowned classicist are at the top the list of those recognised in the Queen’s Birthday Honours for their services to education. Chris Husbands, the vice-chancellor of Sheffield Hallam University and a former director of the UCL Institute of Education, has been knighted, while Mary Beard, professor of classics at the…

    22.30 Jun. 8th, 2018 | News

  • Ministers’ school visits show ‘ideological obsession’ with academies

    The education secretary has visited more than twice as many academies and free schools than maintained ones – and just one special school – in the first four months of his job. Details of Damian Hinds’ visits were released to Schools Week as part of a Freedom of Information request. Between January and the end…

    5.00 Jun. 8th, 2018 | News

  • Revealed: Bolton Wanderers Free School's £380k deficit

    A free school linked to a former premier league football club had a deficit of more than £380,000 when it shut its doors, accounts reveal. Bolton Wanderers Free School closed last summer, less than three years after it opened. It had been branded ‘inadequate’ in all areas by Ofsted in a 2016 report which described a “culture of low aspirations”. Last…

    21.26 Jun. 7th, 2018 | News