Warwick Mansell
@warwickmansell
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Founder/writer of the website Education Uncovered. Covering ed policy since 1997. Please support my work via a subscription to
Joined September 2009
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Wife went to parents' evening for both our children last night. Struck again by the care the staff have for those in their charge. Primary schools, when they are working well and I think most of them are, may be England's most under-appreciated public resource.
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Exclusive: "Public interest" means government advice on mask-wearing in schools must be kept secret, says Department for Education in FOI response: Should be shocking that report informing such an important decision kept confidential.What is there to hide?
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Young scientist loses job, home and savings after being served with a notice of "undesirable conduct" by Home Office after correcting error in her tax return. Truly, this isn't the country I thought I lived in:
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New: Michaela head told inspectors the school did not teach music in year nine mainly because pupils “are not really interested in the subject”.
Long read piece on the inspection notes on Michaela Community School,which I FOI’d following its recent report.
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New: No statistically significant impact found for Ruth Miskin phonics programmes on children’s reading tests and writing attainment, after £1 million trial which took 6.5 years to conclude
A look at today’s EEF findings.
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“What is most upsetting is that a local asset, a school that has been in the community for 110 years, is to be transferred to remote private control, to a group of unelected trustees, unaccountable to anyone except the secretary of state for education.”
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Parents are pleased to have got to this outcome. But it is possible to wonder how education in England is finding itself with need to control details of school life to this degree.
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Wondering why Ofsted doesn't seem to home in on teacher turnover as an issue in reports. Couple of recent examples I can think of where parents and teachers arguing that loss of experienced staff has been huge issue, ppls losing teacher mid-year during GCSEs, etc. Yet no mention.
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Exclusive: Ofsted under fire for praising high-profile free school’s curriculum as “broad” – without mentioning absence of computing, single sciences and design and technology
Aspects of Michaela Community School's new inspection report under microscope.
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New: DfE behaviour adviser’s company paid “unlawful dividend” of £211,800, accounts reveal
Company founded and part-owned by Tom Bennett, and running training events, paid the amount in total to owners Mr Bennett and an Anna Bennett in 2022-23.
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It seems a strange case to make which says: "We can only truly tell you the possible rights and wrongs of something, in a report, if we know what we say will never be reported publicly." Counter-view is that public scrutiny of advice improves decision-making.
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New: England’s largest academy chain seeks to quell parental and student upset over “oppressive” disciplinary policies, including now-scrapped requirement for one school’s pupils to wear behaviour cards around their necks.
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Government was also asked by
@SafeEdForAll_UK
which people and groups it consulted on mask-wearing. Answer effectively: "We met a range of people, including teaching unions". That reads like press release, rather than response to a legal request under FOI to disclose info held.
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New: DfE refuses to release the names of people sitting on body advising it on £100m phonics policy – arguing that they would have expected their identities to be kept secret
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Wow: East London Science School, the high-profile free school with Conservative Party and Spiked magazine links, rated "inadequate" by Ofsted:
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New: Ofsted awards controversial academy a “good” – with no mention of teacher turnover and with nearly nine out of 10 responding parents saying they would not recommend it
Astrea’s Longsands academy awarded Ofsted’s second-highest rating.
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Just heard from mother of a child, with SEND, who has been banned from the end-of-year prom this year because his behaviour has been deemed to "require improvement". His GCSEs are weeks away. Do these policies really help?
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Putting qs to a multi-academy trust, which has 7 schools (4 secondary, 3 primary), but also has a CEO, CFO and director of education, for 8,000 pupils. Scale this up for the country, and you would get around 1,000 directors of ed, for eg,+1,000 CEOs. Efficient use of resources?
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New: Academy which locks gates in front of toilets during lessons tells parent that many modern workplaces restrict access to the loo
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Every time I learn of high pay of CEO heading a small academy trust, I now work out how many pupils it has and look up what the rate would be for the HT of non-academy sch with same number of pupils, under School Teachers' Pay and Conditions Doc. Often a staggering difference.
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Exclusive: "Teach Like a Champion" academy trust sets out minute-by-minute expectations on how teachers should conduct lessons
Detailed look at teaching materials sent to staff at St Ivo school in Cambs by Astrea, the 27-school trust which controls it.
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New: Academy trusts wasting millions of pounds on highly-paid managers
Possibly the most extensive trawl of academy accounts ever, plus analysis of LA accounts and FOIs, finds large MATs spending 8x as much per pupil on £130k+ managers as are large LAs.
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What is private equity doing anywhere near children's homes?
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Labour education bill, to feature in the King's Speech, will end one of the two freedoms usually referred to in relation to academies: the ability to opt out of the national curriculum:
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Arguably most significant +concerning figure in PISA coverage is in 2nd-last par here: UK now "has 2nd-lowest average life satisfaction of 15-year-olds across OECD". Ed policymakers haven't prioritised children's mental health. Need to reflect on this.
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BBC Panorama investigation into academies to air next Monday.
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New: Departing teacher delivers scathing criticisms of academy trust’s policies, in school she describes as “totalitarian”
Another teacher leaving an Astrea secondary school in Cambs lifts the lid on classroom-level problems, as she sees them.
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New: Make children with SEND central to all education policy and end “blame” culture, psychologists advise new government
Association of Educational Psychologists among 16 groups signing open letter to Bridget Phillipson on “crisis” facing SEND provision.
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New: Ofsted, worried about "outdated and discredited" research theories in initial teacher education, cannot say which ones it means:
Staggering Ofsted respose to FOI from Janet Downs says "we do not have the information".
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DfE's overall argument, that the pandemic makes it even more necessary that advice is kept confidential, as this ensures the best quality of advice, seems in direct opposition to views recently expressed by Dominic Cummings, among others.
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Find it strange reading headlines re Sue Gray,Starmer's chief of staff, being paid £170k when, among public servants I cover - CEOs of larger academy chains - figures higher than this have become routine. Conservative gov largely gave up on policing this years ago.
@ChrisMasonBBC
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Wow-head resigns with public criticism of the MAT he worked for, over level of its top-slice:
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Had interesting chat w someone who works with headteachers. Was of view that Eng's structural reforms are creating, effectively, in MATs, entities which end up looking like local authorities,but without local accountability. See probs w this when covering parent,teacher concerns.
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Ofsted inspections are not designed to measure national education standards. The system also changed in the early 2010s, with introduction of RI rating instead of satisfactory. Shouldn't an Education Secretary be setting a better example, then, to students in the use of data?
The
@Conservatives
are relentlessly driving up standards in our schools.
As of today, 89% of schools are now rated good or outstanding, up from just 68% under Labour.
Labour would reverse this progress - they can't be trusted with our children's education.
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LGA's study is latest to find LA schools outperforming academies in Ofsted comparison measures. Devil is always in the detail with these data, but one thing is clear: there is no strong statistical case in favour of the DfE's academisation drive.
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"It defies understanding that we have some 2,500 academy trusts, all funded by the state but operating under a vast range of different owners...We need an open debate about ownership in publicly-funded schooling." Ron Glatter on the academies set-up:
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New: Scale of Oak’s likely future reach into schools, via “full curriculum packages,” set out in DfE letter
Letter implies that Oak will be setting out possibly the entire content of teaching for individual subjects, by academic year.
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Found today: chain of four primary academies has a "chief executive" and a "chief operating officer". Chain of two-ish schools has a CEO, a director of finance, a director of education and a deputy director of ed. Extraordinary world we've entered in English education.
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Expansion of acads system went "too far, too fast," says MAT leader Lucy Heller. "Govian regime...felt like the Wild West," while "in lots of cases the main improvement [of academisation] was in principal salaries, rather than in outcomes".
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Another troubling report on teen mental health, with Children's Society finding "UK 15-year-olds at bottom of European satisfaction league." Can't all be blamed on smartphones, as prevalent in all countries. Report raises qs re school experience for yp...
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Sadly, and staggeringly, my sense is that it's rare for someone in or around post-2010 DfE policymaking to link educational underattainment with the effects of poverty and government austerity. Soon-to-depart Children's Commissioner not holding back here:
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New: Ofsted unable to back up statement on teacher education with any numerical information: Ofsted sector report had said “some” ITE providers had curricula “underpinned by outdated/discredited theories”. I FOI'd: how many? Ofsted: we don’t have the info.
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Another vignette about Astrea academy trust. Parents at one of its 2ndaries in Cambs were sent a message from school yesterday warning daughters not to wear black socks over black tights. Message said that students had been reminded that this was vs the rules, despite the cold...
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Exclusive: Ofsted’s maths “research review” prompted complaints from renowned international academics that their findings had been misinterpreted
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Exclusive: Insider paints picture of chaos at the Department for Education around coronavirus strategy, adding that civil servants “want Gavin to go”.
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New: Academy trust flooded under-pressure school with 25 extra staff during an inspection, FOI response reveals
Astrea details how extra staff, including 12 managers, were brought in to Longsands Academy, Cambs, during inspection.
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Ofsted reports currently list the names of the inspection team. They also should be listing the orgs those members work for or have done recently, I think, given that I'm frequently finding inspectors seemingly associated with academy trusts. Effects of this may be subtle.
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"It will take more than a few visits from inspectors to sort out the unaddressed problems of the academisation experiment." Guardian leader on multi-academy trusts: a rare national paper discussion of this governance model.
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Current Brexit mess seems like the shambolic world of education policy I've been covering for years, writ large. Control of thousands of schools has changed dramatically, with little planning, in process set in train by Gove and Cummings. Consequences will be felt for many years.
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If the UK were a school, its Covid-19 response would have been rated inadequate and the government would be seeking to hand it to an outside organisation. Maybe we should be taking more advice from countries which have done better.
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It is hard to see how a curriculum without computing, IT, seemingly without much PE, with music taught only until year 8 and with a much narrower range of GCSEs than is usual could meet that "breadth" criterion.
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Tom Bennett tweeting today that school exclusions are "only done when necessary". How do you know? Have you looked into the details in every case?
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This first sentence is the stand-out oversimplification of this thread. One one-off test, introduced by a national politician, transforms standards. Ridiculous. And underlines the superficiality of ed policymaking, for all that NG's influence has nevertheless been deep+ profound.
The multiplication test for 9 year olds means more children know their tables than ever before. The new more rigorous maths GCSE means better preparation for A level, now the most popular A level choice. 4/5
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Interesting claim by Kemi Badenoch re girls developing urinary tract infections at an unnamed school, because they did not want to use gender-neutral toilets. Haven't heard this, but do hear cases of girls not going to toilet because of restrictions around access more generally.
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National Education Union calls on government to now introduce a national plan for how education is to recover from impact of covid-19, 'along the lines being developed by Scottish government'
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Reading Council also calling on the government to scrap the forced academy policy, arguing that it feeds into an "impossible high stakes and personal accountabilty culture," and not seen evidence that it raises standards.
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New: Ruth Miskin Literacy makes nearly £10 million post-tax profit in four years – taking cash pile for its sole shareholder to approaching £15 million
Analysis of accounts, and some background, in this piece on the Read Write Inc provider.
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Listening to Tory MP criticising 150k+ sals at BBC. Will party also criticise their occurrence in another area of public sector: academies?
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Press release from
@ASCL_UK
says the Prime Minister's "British Baccalaureate" plan has not been discussed with the education sector, and "without any detail of what is being proposed it is a policy which is largely meaningless".
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Cue much protest from parents, with messages asking why the school was requiring children not to be as warm as they could be, in the freezing weather, and why it was spending time and energy on this and not on teaching and learning.
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Recent reforms of England's initial teacher education institutions "amount to the biggest act of government overreach in England's educational history," writes
@viv_ellis
in
@timeshighered
. Worth registering or subscribing to read.
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NAHT and ASCL calling for an immediate pause to Ofsted inspections. Press release highlights seven areas of concern mentioned by coroner at Ruth Perry inquest, and says response from HMCI "does not go nearly far enough".
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Behaviourists, favoured under the Conservatives and led by Tom Bennett, do seem to have questions to answer over rising PX and suspension numbers in recent years. If current set-up working well, why are these figures climbing?
@warwickmansell
It just seems we are ignoring two major factors
1. That rigid systems are hindering rather than helping
2. Pastoral interventions are not focused on the proactive teaching of behaviour
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@cyclingkev
What a way to sum up someone's seven years in primary education. Does anyone out there in control of policy think about the impact on children? It's brutal.
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New: Local authority which employed Ruth Perry calls for forced academisation policy to be scrapped
Reading Council’s stance comes in letter to Ofsted’s “Big Listen” consultation exercise.
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Schools are harming low-ability pupils' chances by teaching in sets, academics say via
@tes
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"The system that has evolved over the past decade is messy and often confusing," says white paper. Hmm: well I wonder who set up system of thousands of schools with individual contracts with government, and individualistic/private systems of control.
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Important work by
@SchoolsWeek
, holding the incoming chief inspector to account for what he said to MPs. Telling the truth needs to be at heart of what Ofsted does; it sometimes hasn't been.
Incoming Ofsted chief ‘misled’ MPs over trust exclusion claims
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New: Pupils at Astrea academy face super-sized classes as trust struggles to cope with teacher exodus.
Longsands Academy in Cambs lost 8 per cent of its teachers at Xmas and now faces NEU strike ballot. Trust operates super-centralised management.
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Oh, one further quick point to take away from all of this: Ofsted is not telling it like it is. No wonder the current inspection regime is under such scrutiny.
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I've been fairly agnostic on school uniform: have sympathy with arguments on both sides. But the following article makes some good points, and am interested in arguments re current direction of schools vs wider social trends.
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These see students even up year 11 having to follow along with rulers. A teaching source said that while this might be useful for year sevens, for 16-year-olds it was “patronising and puts the kids’ backs out.” A parent said expecting this of 15-year-olds was “ridiculous”.
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She said she didn’t think Astrea’s strict/sweat-the-small-stuff disciplinary approach worked – “challenging students remain just as challenging…quiet students live in constant fear of someone picking up on something insignificant.”
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Still had no-one come back and point to research evidence in favour of strict/no excuses approaches to managing behaviour in schools. Pretty extroardinary, that, given impact such policies are having on pupil experiences,and fact that DfE's lead behaviour adviser runs ResearchED.
Recent book "Squarepegs" includes statement "No research evidence - ever - has been produced in support of the punitive [strict] approach" to behaviour management in schools. Would be v interested to see any evidential studies,esp given no DfE eval of Behaviour Hubs available
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New: “My dad died last week. And my son went to bed crying because he thought he would get a detention for forgetting his spare pen.” Parents set out concerns about well-connected academy trust’s behaviour regime
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Have had a bigger response to this story than any I've written for a while. And rightly so: serious issues to discuss here about how control of English state-funded schools has changed.
@CLARESAMBROOK
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The school is one of many in England, of course, restricting access to the toilets during lesson time. This one has gates operating as a physical barrier, as pictured here. This policy resulted in distressing incident for this child, and also another at this school.
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This is where education reform appears to have taken us, in England in 2019. Disadvantaged kids being pushed out of schools in the chase for better results. Shameful for the profession, surely. Why are more educators not standing up and calling it out?
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Exclusive: teachers at celebrated academy, led by £250,000 superhead, receiving only statutory sick pay of less than £100 a week
Another follow-up on the case of Yasmin Omar, who was left homeless while off sick while employed by Brampton Manor Academy.
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Exclusive: A “closed shop”? Phonics advisory group to Department for Education dominated by individuals linked to products offered by just two companies
DfE finally reveals names of people on its English Hubs Council, following my FOI challenge.
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The parent also questioned the line that many workplaces restricted access to the toilet. Another source conceded to me that this might be true in some places, such as Amazon warehouses,but generally only for “low-paid, non-unionised and precarious jobs”.
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Gosh, one standout line from Christine Gilbert's Ofsted review: "To inject greater distance and more obvious objectivity into the complaints process, regional teams no longer investigate their own complaints."
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New: curriculum-focused Ofsted fails to mention two subjects not being taught at Tory peer’s academy:
I still find it extraordinary that Ofsted, supposedly so concerned about curriculum, lets its reports not say when subjects are not being taught in acads.
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Peers call for urgent overhaul of secondary education in England Comments about effects on pupil mental health come with last week's PISA findings showing"life satisfaction" rating of 15-year-olds sliding, despite self-congratulatory DfE spin here.
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(Tory-controlled) W Sussex County Council to write to D Hinds asking for poss of academies being returned to local authority control following "unanimous" council vote Friday,
@NEUnion
press release states. Follows troubles at TKAT's Thomas Bennett academy. Local Tory MP agrees.
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So what are people's experiences with letters from schools re pupil attendance, which mention possibility of court action and penalty notices, after a few days sick including covid? Is this unusual?
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Should inspectors with a background as secondary headteachers be leading inspections of primary schools? Does the reverse happen? Qs as I look at a report under the former scenario.
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Press release from
@ASCL_UK
, re the King's speech.
@RealGeoffBarton
: “It was particularly disappointing to hear no mention of efforts to reduce the scandalous levels of child poverty in this country. This has a huge impact on the educational attainment of young people..." 1/2
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Right...about to do a v long thread on Michaela...
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New: Teachers at Astrea secondary academy told to remove all items from the front of their classrooms – and to have all year groups reading with a ruler
Latest developments at Astrea’s St Ivo Academy, in St Ives, Cambridgeshire.
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NASUWT is joining with "other unions" in demanding that England's largest academy trust, United Learning, drops its pension plans, states press release. UL is offering teachers the change to get a pay boost in exchange for less generous pensions.
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The trust, whose directives seem driven by its director of secondary education, Richard Tutt, has also issued scripts with by-the-minute instructions to form tutors on how to conduct lessons in which they read to pupils.
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Author Frank Cottrell-Boyce raging over the contents of Astrea's reading lesson directions for teachers, as also set out in this thread, contrasting them against his "joyous" school visit this morning to read to children.
Little thread of unravelling
This morning I went to a community special school which I often go to. I wasn't very prepared so I read them The Skull by
@burstofbeaden
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Is there any greater priority, as children progress through education, than their mental health? Yet too often schools policymaking has seemed not to consider wellbeing. Need to consider impact of system on yp in round.
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Girls on their period have to either get their parents to tell the school about this, or ask their form tutors to issue a toilet pass, which would allow access, email to parent from school states. (This implies permission is needed each month).
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Re-reading DfE's teacher recruitment and retention strategy doc. "We will develop specialist quals to support clearer non-leadership career pathways for teachers..." Why was the advanced skills teacher position done away with post-2010?
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Bizarre questioning of Keir Starmer re schools on
@bbcr4today
, along lines of "Will you show your decisiveness by saying heads should use the law to force parents to send their children in in September?" No qs re safety, logistics. UK's political coverage can seem very shallow.
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Oak National Academy still branding itself as an "independent public body". It's not really, though, is it? It's "strategically aligned with but operationally independent from the DfE". Will Labour, then, keep Oak+align it with its priorities, or scrap it?
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What will happen to schools policy in the post-Nick Gibb era? What will happen to the networks which sprang up around/were enabled by the schools minister? What's the future for developments such as Oak National Academy? Interesting questions, as we head into a new policy era.
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