Author: Freddie Whittaker

A government scheme which promised schools up to £25,000 each to help improve the literacy and numeracy of year seven pupils has been unceremoniously scrapped, months after bidders were supposed to hear back. Last autumn, the Department for Education invited bids from teaching and research schools for “year 7 catch-up training”. Successful bidders would use […]

Nick Gibb will face questions from MPs about curriculum and assessment, teacher recruitment and retention and school accountability next week. The schools minister will appear in front of the parliamentary education committee on Tuesday May 22 at 10am. According to a committee spokesperson, the meeting will likely focus on what the government is doing to […]

Compulsory relationships and sex education will now “almost certainly” be delayed until 2020, after the government failed to meet a key milestone. Schools had been due to start teaching a compulsory RSE curriculum from September 2019, for which the government promised to publish guidance in “early 2018” to aid preparations. However, the response to a […]

Supporters of the Careers and Enterprise Company have been urged to tweet their backing for the under-fire organisation after MPs questioned its impact and transparency. In an email sent to “friends” of the organisation and seen by Schools Week, Claudia Harris, the company’s chief executive, asks supporters to “join us on twitter tomorrow to celebrate […]

Two new maths hubs will open in Cheshire and central Lancashire, taking the total number operating nationally to 37. Nick Gibb, the schools minister, will announce today that £1.75 million of existing funding will be handed to the two projects in the north of England. Maths hubs are each run by a lead school or […]

The Careers and Enterprise Company faced MPs’ questions over its “giant and confusing” structure and a lack of transparency over its spending of public money. One member of the parliamentary education committee suggested that the CEC, set up in 2015 with tens of millions of pounds in government funding, is an “over-bloated quango” that cannot prove if […]

Ministers claim not to know how many new schools will open now it’s easier to found new voluntary-aided institutions. The government has offered “support” to groups wanting to set up new VA schools as a compromise after it abandoned plans to scrap the 50-per-cent cap on faith-based admissions at over-subscribed free schools. The move is particularly […]

The schools minister has refused to say whether more cash will be made available for larger pay rises for teachers. Nick Gibb used education questions in the Commons today to dodge questions on schools’ ability to afford pay rises now that the public sector pay cap has been lifted. This year, the School Teachers Review […]

Damian Hinds will meet MPs to discuss the “savage cuts” proposed by a prominent university-backed academy chain. The University of Chester Academies Trust today confirmed that it is considering cutting 24 support staff and 19 teaching roles across its seven schools in Cheshire and Staffordshire. The trust is also in discussions with the Department for […]