Author: John Dickens

School performance tables should be overhauled to get rid of the perverse incentives that see a minority of schools “do the wrong thing”, according to ASCL leader Geoff Barton. Addressing the second annual ethical leadership summit in London today, Barton will throw down the gauntlet to the government to act to discourage “unacceptable practices” amongst […]

The government reduced its monitoring of rising levels of SATs cheating due to “unplanned resourcing constraints” – in the same year it paid out £3 million to education giant Pearson over an outsourcing legal wrangle. Ofqual had asked the Standards and Testing Agency to strengthen its oversight of test administration amid a 56 per cent […]

Controversial head teacher Barry Smith is to leave the Great Yarmouth Charter Academy. Schools Week previously revealed that Smith had not been in charge of running day-to-day activities at the school, in Norfolk, since early December. Sources said it followed an incident involving the restraint of a pupil. Smith did not respond to a request […]

Ark Schools paid £200,000 to a former staff member in a non-contractual severance settlement relating to “shortcomings in its HR process”, newly-published accounts show. The figure is believed to represent one of the largest settlements recorded by an academy trust. The sum, approved by the Education and Skills Funding agency as required for any pay-offs […]

The performance of children in the north of England is not “much different” to that of those based in London once pupils’ backgrounds are accounted for, a new study has claimed. The findings follow a story in the Sunday Times, which claimed was a “huge gap” in attainment between the south and north, leaving “thousands […]

Lord Agnew says his money-saving experts have now found £172 million of potential savings in schools. But a new evaluation report of the school resource management adviser pilot shows just 16 per cent of the savings have actually been enacted by schools. Advisers, who are usually school business leaders, identified £35 million of savings after […]

The government will today finally publish its evaluation on the school resource management adviser pilot. Schools Week has been closely following the scheme, where the government pays to send school business experts into trusts to help them find savings. We’ve revealed the alarming advice in some reports, how schools wanting repairs cash now have to […]