Author: Freddie Whittaker

Just one per cent of private school pupils come from the most disadvantaged households, the chair of the Independent Schools Council revealed today. Barnaby Lenon admitted to the parliamentary education committee this morning that just 6,000 of more than half a million pupils at ISC member-schools receive a 100-per-cent bursary for their school fees – […]

The Social Mobility Commission has published its annual “state of the nation” report. Here are the key findings and recommendations about schools: Findings Geographical differences in attainment for children on free school meals have increased over the past decade, “despite government efforts to boost learning for disadvantaged children”. London has broken away from the rest […]

Regional schools commissioners should be given responsibility for “monitoring and managing” the supply of teachers in their areas, the Social Mobility Commission has said. In its annual state of the nation report, the influential commission, chaired by the former Labour minister Alan Milburn, warned of large geographical variations in teacher supply and quality. For example, […]

LocatED, the Department for Education’s property firm, has published its first annual report and accounts, giving a glimpse into the inner-workings of the secretive company set up to buy free school sites. 1. LocatED had no targets last year, but it does now The report shows that the company had no key performance indicators in […]

The government’s long-awaited industrial strategy white paper has been published by the business secretary, Greg Clark. Here are the most relevant bits for schools… 1. Performance measures to recognise T-levels The government’s new vocational T-level qualifications will be introduced in 2022 for 16 to 19-year-olds, with funding of £500 million a year. But there have […]

Ofsted is to take steps to “publicly acknowledge” the work of entire school management teams, to address a tendency to pin successes and failures on headteachers alone, Amanda Spielman has said. The chief inspector of schools told the Ark Schools Teach 2017 conference in Birmingham today that she was “all too aware” of a tendency […]

Multi-academy trusts are “not going to be the only answer” to collaboration between schools “any time soon, if ever”, a regional schools commissioner has admitted. Christine Quinn, who oversees all the academies and chains operating in the West Midlands, said today that although multi-academy trusts are the “best” option for encouraging schools to connect and work […]