Freddie Whittaker | Schools Week

Reception baseline assessment: 8 key findings from the DfE’s pilot report

The Department for Education has published a report on its pilot of the new reception baseline assessment, which will be rolled out to all schools this September. The National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) was tasked with carrying out the process, which consisted of a trial with members of the September 2018 intake, and then […]

All schools should block employees from working as Ofsted inspectors, say leading heads

A group of leading headteachers has written to every school in England urging them to block their employees from working as Ofsted inspectors, as a dispute over the watchdog’s approach to inspection grows. The Headteachers’ Roundtable (HTRT) launched its #PauseOfsted campaign with an article in Schools Week earlier this month, amid growing concerns that inspections […]

Let MAT CEOs become national leaders of education, says DfE advisory group

“Transformative” academy trust chief executives and improvement directors should be allowed to become national leaders of education (NLEs), a government advisory group has said. Admission to the NLE programme, which involves leading headteachers using their skills to support challenging schools, has traditionally been restricted to the headteachers of individual schools who meet certain eligibility criteria, […]

Variation requests soar as primaries downsize, and 6 other OSA annual report findings

The official in charge of regulating schools’ admissions arrangements has published her annual report. Shan Scott, the chief schools adjudicator for England, said her report gave an overall impression of an admissions system “that as a whole works effectively in the normal admissions rounds, and in those rounds, the needs of vulnerable children, and those […]

EEF research to investigate impact of three-year GCSEs

The Education Endowment Foundation has commissioned research into whether teaching GCSEs over three years boosts pupils’ grades. The charity has enlisted the National Foundation for Educational Research for the study, which aims to give schools more evidence of the impact of their decisions. Schools have traditionally taught a three year key stage 3 between years […]

Ten things we learned from Ofsted’s school funding study

Ofsted has finally published its long-awaited research into the impact of funding pressures on schools. The study was not supposed to be released until a few weeks’ time. But the watchdog accidentally published a blog by chief inspector Amanda Spielman about it earlier this week, leading to widespread media coverage and criticism of her comments […]

DfE dismisses ‘unrepresentative’ Ofsted school funding study

The Department for Education has dismissed the findings of a damning Ofsted report on school funding, claiming it is “based on a very small and unrepresentative sample”. The watchdog’s study, which was published this morning, is based on a survey of 201 headteachers, telephone interviews with 18 other school leaders, focus groups of inspectors and […]

Ofqual consults on new ‘clearer’ malpractice and maladministration guidance

The exams regulator Ofqual wants to replace its current guidance on how exam boards should tackle malpractice and maladministration, amid fears it is currently too simplistic. Current guidance is made up of a list of “dos and don’ts” to help exam boards meet “condition A8” – one of eight “general conditions of recognition” they must […]

School staff should look after ‘every penny like their own’, says academy trust CEO

School staff should treat “every penny” of funding as if it was their own and apply the same “discipline” to financial management as they do to improving educational performance, an academy trust CEO has said. Tes reported earlier this week that the David Ross Education Trust has asked its schools to consider using cover supervisors […]