Nicky Phillips | Schools Week

What about the pupils caught in the middle?

Should we make the GCSE pass rate harder? Click here for schools minister Nick Gibb’s response to Mark The numbers deemed a fail by the government at GCSE are likely to increase 15 to 20 per cent in summer 2017. That will mean a lot more resits in a system already under tremendous strain. And […]

Overseas teachers would ease recruitment crisis, says former superhead

A former superhead has called for the government to bring back an overseas teacher training programme amid concerns non-European Union teachers could be forced to leave the UK. Dame Sally Coates, director of United Learning’s southern academies and former headteacher of Burlington Danes Academy in west London, believes the Overseas Trained Teacher Programme (OTTP), used […]

Dylan Wiliam urges teachers to use a variety of learning preferences

The battle over whether or not teachers ought to use “learning styles” in the classroom took a new turn this week when education professor Dylan Wiliam said teachers ought to consider them in their practice even though they are now debunked. Speaking at the Festival of Education at Wellington College last week, Prof WIliam said […]

Education Bill: the school clauses explained

Education secretary Nicky Morgan carried out a second reading of the Education and Adoption Bill in Parliament on Monday, here is a short guide to the school clauses. Clause one adds ‘coasting’ schools into the definition of schools eligible for intervention. The clause says that schools will be considered coasting if the education secretary informs them […]

Rise in male STIs prompts call for school LGBT sex education

An “alarming” increase in the number of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) among gay men shows that school education about same-sex relationships is “clearly failing”, says human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell. Figures released by Public Health England (PHE) on Tuesday show a large increase in STIs among gay men, with a 46 per cent rise in […]

Only two teaching schools are in poorest areas

One of the coalition’s major engines to improve teacher training retention will not help many of the schools most in need because their efforts are concentrated in predominately wealthy areas, Schools Week can reveal. Analysis conducted with the help of Education Datalab reveals that only two of the 563 teaching schools – outstanding schools that […]

Army recruiter considers appeal to access pupil data

The Ministry of Defence (MOD) sought to appeal a rejected information request made with the intent of accessing sensitive pupil data – despite claiming the request was an ‘error’. Last month, Schools Week reported that the ministry had attempted to access the highest level of pupils’ personal information from the national pupil database in a […]

School productivity will be ‘key report’ for new education select committee

A report on school productivity will be a priority for the education select committee, says its new chair Neil Carmichael. The Conservative MP, elected last week, announced the focus during the second reading of the Education Bill on Monday. “We need to get it on record right now that we have always known about coasting […]

Lancashire primary school wins approval for punishment-free policy

A Lancashire primary school has won many admirers for its sanction-free approach to pupil learning . . . and now it can add a TV star and former Fleet Street editor to that list. During last week’s Festival of Education at Wellington College, journalist and television personality Piers Morgan was asked by Charlotte-May Tomlinson, a […]