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15 April 2026

Tag: Nicky Morgan

Ex-NSN director’s government appointment ‘blocked’ by Downing Street

Luke Tryl, the ex-director of the New Schools Network and a former adviser at the Department for Education, has had his return to government blocked by Downing Street, Schools Week has learned. It was announced last month that Tryl was leaving the free schools charity after just a few months in the role to become […]

DfE gave academy trust £500k despite serious concerns about finances

Senior Department for Education officials were alerted to a string of concerns at a high-profile academy trust before it was handed more than £500,000 under a flagship government policy for “top performing” sponsors. In November 2015, Nicky Morgan, the then education secretary, announced Wakefield City Academies Trust (WCAT) as one of five “outstanding” sponsors to […]

Access to the best secondary schools ‘hasn’t improved since 2010’

Access to high-performing secondary schools has not improved since 2010, and has become more geographically unequal, according to a report by the Education Policy Institute. The think-tank compared the availability of places in “high-performing secondary schools” – those with good value-added scores over a four-year period. It found that around a fifth of local authority […]

Don’t make schools collect ‘character’ data, insists Morgan

Former education secretary Nicky Morgan has said teachers should not be measured on how they improve their pupils’ character, but experts have warned that regulation is needed if pupil development is to be taken seriously. Speaking to teachers at a wellbeing conference last Friday, Morgan said her department had debated “endlessly” about whether to set […]

DfE funds £1m for Ofsted illegal schools taskforce

The government has committed a further £1 million to fund Ofsted’s team that investigates illegal schools, despite the watchdog still failing to bring a single prosecution against an unregistered school. Initially funded for one year, the illegal schools team was created after former chief inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw last year warned that pupils in hidden […]

Make sex education compulsory to stop spread of STIs, say councils

Councils across England say compulsory sex education should be extended to academies in order to reduce the spread of sexually-transmitted infections in young adults. The Local Government Association claims the introduction of a statutory duty for academies to provide sex and relationships education could reduce the “thousands of STIs diagnosed in young people later on […]

Nationality data was ‘compromise’ on Theresa May’s school immigration check plan

Controversial new government rules ordering schools to collect nationality data of pupils were introduced as a compromise to curb stricter plans for teachers to carry out immigration checks and deprioritise immigrant pupils. Leaked cabinet letters obtained by the BBC, published today, show Theresa May, while home secretary, wrote to the Department for Education last year outlining proposals […]

Ministers told to ‘come clean’ over national teaching service

Ministers must “come clean” over recruitment figures for a landmark scheme to parachute elite teachers into struggling schools, say union leaders, as questions swirl around the scheme two months before its launch. The government is yet to reveal how many applications it has received for the National Teaching Service (NTS) scheme aimed at tackling recruitment […]