Covid | Schools Week

Long read: Heads call for clarity as Williamson gets ready to pop school Covid bubbles

Education leaders are demanding “clarity about the road ahead” after the government all but confirmed it will scrap Covid restrictions in schools. It comes as new attendance statistics obtained by Schools Week suggest Covid-related absences almost doubled in secondary schools this week. Meanwhile school leaders have written to prime minister Boris Johnson over the “cynical” […]

Attendance: 1 in 20 pupils absent due to Covid as isolations soar

More than one in 20 pupils were off school last week due to Covid, with more than a quarter of a million children isolating due to potential contact in school, new data shows. The latest attendance survey data from the Department for Education shows an estimated 384,500 pupils, or 5.1 per cent of pupils, were […]

Schools warned Brexit driver shortages threaten meal supplies

School meals could face disruption and caterers have begun stockpiling as a driver shortage fuelled by Brexit and Covid puts deliveries at risk, a local council has warned. Sheffield City Council said cooks would be given two days’ “emergency stand-by menu items” from this week in case the national driver shortage threatens frozen and dry […]

Williamson announces autumn 2021 phonics screening check

An autumn phonics screening check will take place again this year, the education secretary has announced. Gavin Williamson told the Festival of Education this afternoon that as was the case in 2020, the check will be held in the autumn “so that any pupils who need support with phonics are spotted early”. The check was […]

Covid: Schools close sites after surge in Indian variant

Schools are being forced to close on-site provision and switch to online learning due to surging Covid rates linked to the Indian variant. While some have shut down their sites to all but keyworker and vulnerable children, others have had to send home whole year groups and have allowed parents to keep their children off […]

Urgent action demanded on home education after deaths of ‘invisible’ children

The government must pay “urgent attention” to safeguarding for pupils educated at home, an expert has warned, amid a probe into the deaths of three children. The Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel revealed it had been notified of 15 incidents of “serious harm” involving home-educated children over the past year in England. Three children died, […]

‘You have to not look like you’re giving up’

Jess Staufenberg talks to the trust boss the government threatened to sue, who values autonomy and wellbeing for her schools and staff above all else There are very few school leaders who have been threatened with legal action by their own education secretary. Focus Trust chief executive Helen Rowland’s crime was that she wanted to […]

£15 billion extra needed for Covid lost learning recovery, EPI says

The government would need to invest an additional £15 billion in order to fulfil Boris Johnson’s pledge to make up pupils’ lost learning during the Covid pandemic, a new report has claimed. Prime minister Johnson previously stated that establishing a long-term catch-up plan is “the biggest priority” and no child would be “left behind”. But […]

DfE still short of 1.3 million laptop target despite Gibb promise

The Department for Education had still not fulfilled its pledge to deliver 1.3 million free laptops to disadvantaged pupils a month after schools fully re-opened, figures show. The latest official data on the provision of devices shows the DfE fell just short of schools minister Nick Gibb’s pledge that all laptops and tablets would be […]