ASCL | Schools Week

School sixth form funding down 21% since 2010, IfS finds

Funding for students in school sixth forms has plunged by 21 per cent since 2010–11, new research has found. Government funding for 16 to 18 year olds has been cut “much more sharply” than funding for pupils in pre-school, primary, secondary or higher education, according to the ‘2018 Annual Report on Education Spending in England’ […]

Set up ‘Teach First-style’ scheme for school mental health specialists, says report

A scheme modelled on Teach First should be set up in schools to train mental health specialists to work with young people, research has suggested. The training would involve learning how to manage problems that children face at school such as “bullying, exam stress and low moods”. Proposed in a new joint report from school […]

Hinds challenged over ‘dangerously inadequate’ SEND funding

A coalition of trade unions and 39 local authorities have written to the education secretary to warn of “dangerously inadequate funding” for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). The School Cuts Coalition was first formed in November 2016 and now includes NEU, NAHT, ASCL, Unison, GMB and Unite. In a letter to Damian Hinds, the […]

Heads launch legal tool to beat supply agency fees

Schools are being encouraged to team up and use a special legal mechanism to avoid “exorbitant” supply teacher agency costs. The Headteachers’ Roundtable think-tank has published a legal template that schools can use to get supply agencies to waive costly “transfer fees”, which are charged when they hire ex-supply teachers. Results of a headteachers’ survey […]

Don’t boycott SATs, heads tell parents

Headteachers have warned parents not to take part in a planned boycott of this year’s SATs. The campaign group Let Our Kids Be Kids is gearing up for a boycott of key stage 2 SATs, which begin in primary schools in mid-May. The group has even published a template for a withdrawal letter for parents of […]

ASCL calls for education ethics committee to guide government decision making

The government needs a committee on the ethical implications of changes to education policy, the ASCL’s ethical leadership commission has concluded. This ethics committee would consider the “emerging system-wide issues” in education – including the “unintended consequences and perverse incentives” created by recent changes in policy. While it wouldn’t operate as a regulator, a body […]

Urgent action needed to save MFL from ‘extinction’, claims expert

GCSE entries to modern foreign languages continued to fall this year, in a dropoff that could even see some subjects becoming “extinct” in schools, according to one expert. Overall, MFL entries were down by 7.3 per cent this year at around 300,000 in total, while the drop in the population of 16-year-olds in England sat […]

Geoff Barton, general secretary-designate, Association of School and College Leaders

Geoff Barton strides around his school with the pride of a parent whose child has won a prize for being the best in everything. As he paces the corridors, talking about the debating team’s successes, espousing the virtues of a Shanghai exchange programme and introducing pupils left, right, and centre, it is hard to imagine […]

Who started the Association of School and College Leaders?

Geoff Barton has emerged as victor in the battle for the coveted general secretary post at the Association of School and College Leaders. He takes over from interim general secretary Malcolm Trobe, who took over from Brian Lightman, who took over from John Dunford. In a world where we increasingly worry about women’s place in […]