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12 April 2026

Tag: grammar schools

Grammar schools are a symptom not a cure

The design of the schools system requires that failure exists somewhere. Ed Cadwallader says the only fix is a broader curriculum that gives every child a chance to succeed and when knowledge itself is seen as more important than grades. It has been heartening to see educators usually at odds with one another unite in […]

How selection could – and probably will – seep back in

“There is no way they will get this grammar school thing through.” That’s what former shadow education secretary Lucy Powell said at a debate on Sunday. It’s a comforting thought, but I’m not buying. Governments tend to do what they want, regardless of the administrative hurdles placed in their way. Michael Gove used the Terrorism […]

Grammar get-out clause confirmed: selection ‘permissible’ within trusts

The government has confirmed it has a grammar school get-out clause that allows academy trusts to filter their brightest pupils to another site, effectively creating selective schools and dodging the need for new laws to be passed. The education green paper introduced by Justine Greening a fortnight ago outlined proposals for multi-academy trusts to move […]

No one is talking about a return to the 11-plus

An element of selection will not necessarily lead to a return of the secondary modern, says Heath Monk. However, making selection work for all will need careful implementation There’s no subject that unites the warring factions of the educational world more than their hatred of grammar schools. Largely abolished in the Sixties and outlawed (twice) in […]

If you can pass the test you’re in. But who benefits?

The grammar schools proposal could be described as a “great right-wing fraud”, says David Blunkett… pretending you are delivering to the many what you know you can only deliver to the few Next month I will take part in a gathering at Ruskin College, Oxford, to commemorate the 40th anniversary of a seminal speech on education […]

Why grammars are a five-sided dice trick

A jumbo five-sided dice is due to land at the Schools Week towers this week. It is smooth, blue, an odd triangular shape, with faces only showing numbers 1 through 5. It’s my “grammar school gamble” dice. The game is easy to play. Imagine you are the parent of a child in the last year […]

There’s more to worry about than grammars

Spending the summer worrying about the return of grammar schools is like worrying the NHS is about to reintroduce frontal lobotomies. Lobotomies, like grammars, were a miracle cure of the 1940s. At their peak more than 1,000 people a year had metal spikes pushed into their skulls, swished around, and withdrawn, in the belief that […]

Theresa May should take a look in the mirror on grammar schools

Theresa May’s policy to expand academic selection by allowing grammar schools to expand and other schools to select some of their pupils is an exercise in Orwellian double think. On the Radio 4 Today programme this morning Justine Greening tied herself up in knots trying to argue that grammar schools represented increased choice, an argument […]

Prioritising poorer pupils could help lift grammar ban

Grammar schools that prioritise free school meal pupils in their admissions policy could be used to prove that lifting the ban on new grammars will not disadvantage students. A leaked memo this week revealed the government plans to open new grammars, although education officials say they believe the policy will be blocked in the House […]