Tag: 2010

The speech made by Jonathan Hill, the then Education Minister, on 16 November 2010.

I am delighted to be here this morning and particularly pleased to have the chance to thank you all – and the National Society generally – for the wonderful contribution you make to education in this country.

Now I am sure that ministers of all parties come along and start their speeches like that, but for what it is worth, I say it as someone who likes choice and variety; is drawn to a patchwork quilt of provision rather than some neat and tidy – and soulless – uniformity, and; is instinctively mistrustful of the state.

All of which makes me a natural fan of Church of England schools, even before citing any evidence that Church of England schools get excellent results and are extremely popular with parents.

And yet – somewhat to my surprise – I find myself having to stick up for faith schools. It is something I am very happy to do, but it is perhaps indicative of how secularist parts of society have become.

It is also all the more extraordinary when one reflects on what the National Society has done for children in this country since its foundation in 1811.

It is astonishing to think that, in the forty years to 1851, the Church of England established 17,000 schools in parishes up and down the land. Free Schools, eat your heart out.

Decades before the state stepped in, in 1870, it was the Church that taught the poor and needy to read and write – spreading knowledge and enlightenment where before there had been ignorance.

I know it is the same moral purpose which drives you today.

Like us, you worry about the gap in achievement between rich and poor, and are anxious to extend opportunity to those in poorest areas.

And I am sure that it was because of that great moral purpose – and in keeping with your historic mission – that the Church of England was among the first to recognise the importance, and potential, of the Academies programme and, of course, became one of the first sponsors.

Academies

Now, academies are a subject close to my heart. On my second day in the House of Lords, I had to introduce the Academies Bill and, for two rather crazy months, I did little else but think and, I’m sad to say, dream about the Bill.

Some people accused us of rushing it through, of reaching for the legislative lever too quickly – but my view was, and is, that it was vital to give schools the chance to have these freedoms on behalf of their children as soon as possible.

Children only get one crack at education and we have to give them the best possible chance to succeed. So, yes, the Secretary of State and I were impatient to get on with doing so.

But that brings me to an extremely important point about our overall approach. It is permissive, not coercive. Some schools might not want, ever, to go down the academy route. They might feel that their relationship with their local authority is so good that they don’t want to lose it. Or that greater freedom and control over their budgets, staffing and the curriculum aren’t going to help them give children the best possible chance to succeed.

If that is the case, we fully respect that. We are not seeking to impose a one-size-fits-all solution on every school. If you believe in freedom, I think you should allow people to exercise it – or not – as they think fit.

So we are also introducing greater freedom for all schools. That is why we’ve abolished the self-evaluation form, reduced the data collection burden and told Ofsted to slim down its inspection criteria. We will also be slimming down the National Curriculum, making governance simpler and financial management less onerous. All of these steps will give schools more freedom to concentrate on their core responsibilities – teaching and learning.

Our schools white paper, to be published later this month, will set out a comprehensive reform programme for this Parliament to raise the bar for every school, close the gap between rich and poor, and ensure our education system can match the best in the world.

When you look at the statistics you can see how urgent the need for reform is.

Still a long way to go

In the last ten years we have fallen behind other countries in the international league tables of school performance – falling from fourth in the world for science to fourteenth, seventh in the world for literacy to seventeenth and eighth in the world for maths to twenty-fourth.

And at the same time, studies such as those undertaken by UNICEF and the OECD underline that we have one of the most unequal educational systems in the world, coming near bottom out of 57 for educational equity with one of the biggest gulfs between independent and state schools of any developed nation.

The huge numbers of talented young people who still do not achieve as they should means we need to change.

And so too does the fact that other nations have been forging ahead much faster and further when it comes to improving their education systems.

Global race for knowledge

Across the globe, other nations – including those with the best-performing and fastest-reforming education systems – are granting more autonomy for individual schools.

In America, President Obama is encouraging the creation of more charter schools – the equivalent of our Free Schools and academies.

In Canada, specifically in Alberta, schools have been given more control over budgets and power to shape their own ethos and environment. Alberta now has the best-performing state schools of any English-speaking region.

In Sweden, the system has opened up to allow new schools to be set up by a range of providers. Results have improved, with the biggest gains of all where schools have the greatest freedoms and parents the widest choice.

And in Singapore, often cited as an exemplar of centralism, dramatic leaps in attainment have been secured by schools where principals are exercising a progressively greater degree of operational autonomy.

These governments have deliberately encouraged greater diversity in the schools system and, as the scope for innovation has grown, so too has their competitive advantage over other nations.

The good news in England is that there are already some great success stories here to draw on. In the five or so years after 1988, the last Conservative Government created 15 city technology colleges. They are all-ability comprehensives, overwhelmingly located in poorer areas, but they enjoy much greater independence than other schools.

They have also been a huge success. The proportion of pupils eligible for free school meals in CTCs who achieve five or more good GCSEs A* to C is more than twice as high as for all maintained mainstream schools.

These results were replicated by the group of schools that were turned into academies under the last Government.

I am delighted that so many parents and school leaders have seen how academies can improve performance, with academies securing improvements at GCSE level twice as fast as other schools and the best academy chains doing much, much better than that.

Back in 2005, the white paper promised that all schools would, in time, be able to enjoy academy freedoms – but sadly these freedoms were curtailed. A ceiling of 400 academies was placed on the programme and primaries were refused entry.

The Academies Act removed both of these barriers to the rapid expansion of the programme by giving all schools, including special schools, the chance to take on academy status – starting with those rated outstanding by Ofsted.

Since the start of this school year, 144 academies have opened – more than one for every working day of the term. A further 70 are due to open in the coming months.

Just under half of these replaced failing schools, and we will continue to challenge schools that are struggling; either they improve fast or they will have their management replaced by an academy sponsor, or an outstanding school, with a proven track record.

That is why the Secretary of State wrote to local authorities earlier this month confirming that we want to work with them to consider whether there are schools in their areas where attainment and pupil progression are both low and where they lack the capacity to improve themselves. And we have also actively encouraged sponsors to work directly with local authorities to do so too.

All of the schools that have converted now have the freedom to shape their own curriculum; they are at liberty to insist on tougher discipline, pay staff more, extend school hours, and develop a personal approach to every pupil.

Crucially, all of the outstanding schools that have already converted have also said that they will use their new-found powers and freedom to support weaker schools. For instance, Seaton Academy in Cumbria is looking to employ more specialist staff to support students with additional needs. St Buryan Primary Academy in Cornwall is reducing class sizes by taking on an extra teacher. Urmston Grammar School in Manchester is looking forward to bringing back after-school services now that it has control over its own budget.

We also have schools coming to us talking about forming clusters – clusters of primaries, or primaries and secondaries, working together to raise standards and share costs. That is why I believe the result of the Academies Act will be autonomy within a culture of collaboration, where the bonds between schools are strengthened and there is a further step-change in system-led leadership.

It seems to me that this combination of autonomy and partnership is a very strong one, and one that is likely to appeal to the Church of England. I know that one of your concerns early on was that the Government was somehow turning its back on the moral purpose of the Academies programme and that the converting academies might become islands within the broader educational framework.

In fact, what is happening is rather different.

In the coming days, in the next stage of the expansion of the Academies programme, we will also explain how the next wave of schools – those that are good with outstanding features – will be able to apply for academy freedoms.

I particularly look forward to welcoming more Church of England schools into academy status. And I’d like to say how grateful I am for the Church’s support in encouraging more of their schools to follow suit.

At the moment, some 320 Church of England schools have registered an interest in becoming an academy, and 24 of these have so far submitted a formal application to convert.

As we’ve worked through the conversion process with the first wave of converters, a number of practical issues have come to light – for instance, around pension or land ownership. For church schools in particular, land ownership is often complicated and there have been questions about what role the diocese will have once schools have converted to academy status.

I completely understand these concerns and I think that the National Society has been absolutely right to want clarity. Politicians and governments come and go. The Church has been around a lot longer than any government and you are right to be sceptical about government promises. I am sceptical about government promises too. But I hope I have been clear from the outset that my intention is simply to maintain the status quo in terms of the relationship between the Church of England and the state. And I do sympathise with the National Society’s desire to get that understanding down in black and white and close any loopholes.

So I am very pleased that we now have an agreed set of model documentation for single academy trusts, and a model funding agreement.

We have also agreed a supplemental agreement, to be signed by the Secretary of State, which will set out the Department’s underpinning relationship with the Diocese.

I know that some of you have faced delays while the drafting has been going on, for which I apologise, but I believe we now have a solid foundation on which Church of England schools can move forward to academy status.

Although I have been keen to press ahead, it is important to get things right – and that I think is what we have now done.

The Church has always played an important part in providing choice and quality in this country’s education system.

You’ve always worked hard, often behind the scenes, collaborating with other education partners and sponsors to drive improvements.

I very much look forward to continuing and building on our relationship with the Church and taking our collaborative partnership to the next level – because we need your energy, commitment and experience to be at the fore of school improvement if we are to achieve that shared moral purpose.

Thank you very much.

The speech made by Jonathan Hill, the then Education Minister, in the House of Lords on 7 June 2010.

My Lords, I beg to move that the bill be now read a second time.

My Lords, the House will be aware that I am now the Minister in charge of this bill, rather than my noble friend, Lord Wallace of Saltaire in whose name this bill was introduced.

I am happy to assure the House that I too believe that the provisions of this bill are compatible with the Convention Rights and would have been content to sign the necessary statement had I been in a position to do so when the bill was introduced.

My Lords, this bill will:

• grant more freedoms to schools
• give more responsibility to teacher
• help ensure that standards rise for all children

Last week we had an excellent debate on the measures contained in the Gracious Speech.

Re-reading the whole debate over the weekend, I found that there was broad agreement on the need to trust professionals more, to reduce the bureaucracy they face and to give them more opportunity to drive their own improvement and to deploy resources in the most effective way.

It is precisely those freedoms that the measures contained in the Academies Bill will help to deliver.

My Lords, I have had very thoughtful discussions with the right reverend Prelate, the Bishop of Lincoln and others about managing expectations for this bill.

So let me be clear from the outset that this bill does not in our view represent a revolution in our schools system.

Rather, it builds on what has gone before.

We can trace its roots to the reforms introduced by my noble friend, Lord Baker, through the Education Reform Act 1988, which led to the opening of the first City Technology Colleges in the late 1980s and early ‘90s.

But it was under a Labour government that the pace of reform really picked up and I recognise that contribution very clearly. The Learning and Skills Act 2000, saw the beginning of the Academies programme, and the Education White Paper of 2005 built on it.

I hope I won’t embarrass the noble Lord, Lord Adonis by saying what I said in his absence last week, how much I respect his achievement, and what high standards he set for those who came after him.

I am happy to pay tribute to him, and to my other predecessors who should feel pleased at the good they have done through the Academies programme and the thousands of children’s lives they have already changed for the better.

My Lords, I do not for one moment argue that Academies are always going to be the answer. The noble Baroness, Baroness Morris of Yardley reminded us in the debate on the Gracious Speech that many outstanding schools are notAcademies. And that not all Academies are outstanding. She is of course right.

But, overall, academies do represent one of the best and fastest routes to school improvement.

They have transformed some of the worst performing schools in the country into some of the best.

And in doing so, they have transformed the prospects of tens of thousands of young people. In 2008 and 2009, Academies saw GCSE results increase twice as fast as the national average.

My Lords, it is also clear that the extension of the Academies programme we now propose was what the then Labour Government itself intended to do. In a speech given the day before the publication of the 2005 White Paper, this is what the then Prime Minister, the Rt. Hon Tony Blair, had to say “We need to make it easier for every school to acquire the drive and essential freedom of Academies… We want every school to be able quickly and easily to become a self-governing independent state school… All schools will be able to have academy-style freedoms… No one will be able to veto parents starting new schools or new providers coming in, simply on the basis that there are local surplus places. The role of the LEA will change fundamentally.”

It has taken 5 years my Lords, but this bill is giving effect to what the previous government intended.

My Lords, it is worth reminding ourselves why we need reform.

Despite the best efforts of previous governments, it is still the case that 81,000 11-year-olds left primary school last year without achieving the required standard in reading.

Half of young people left secondary school without achieving five good GCSEs including English and maths.

And in the last year for which we have data, out of 80,000 young people eligible for free school meals, just 45 made it to Oxbridge.

My Lords, raising standards is not simply about structures – that was a point well made in last week’s debate. It is about the quality of teaching – which is why we will build on the previous government’s excellent Teach First programme.

And at a time of great pressure in public spending we have also prioritised investment in education by protecting frontline spending this financial year for Sure Start Children’s Centres, for 16-19 learning and, of course, for schools.

But we do believe that giving schools and teachers more freedoms will help them do the job they came into teaching to do.

This bill will give all schools – including, for the first time, primary schools and special schools– the opportunity to apply to apply to become an academy.

I want to stress the word ‘opportunity’. This is largely a permissive bill rather than a coercive one.

And it will help schools right across the spectrum, from the very worst to the very best.

Schools already rated as outstanding by Ofsted may have their applications fast-tracked, and open this year if they wish to.

In return, we will expect every outstanding school which acquires academy freedoms to partner with at least one other school to raise performance across the system.

Schools that are really struggling, my Lords, will see government intervention.

There has always been a focus in the academies programme on the weakest schools, and that will continue.

The Bill will allow the Secretary of State, in circumstances where a school is struggling, to remove a school from the control of the local authority and to reopen it as an academy.

This will mean that we can deliver faster and deeper improvements in deprived and disadvantaged areas.

And for the schools in between, my Lords – those that are doing well but could do better – academies will present a real opportunity to achieve excellent results through the core freedoms that all academies enjoy: making their own decisions about the curriculum, teachers’ pay, the length of the school day and how they spend the money currently spent on their behalf by local government.

But, again, it will be for head teachers, governing bodies and school trustees to decide whether or not to apply.

My Lords, I was struck by this sentence in the speech made by the noble Baroness, Baroness Morgan of Drefelin last week: “There is a good argument for successful schools being given more managerial autonomy and flexibility, provided that that is on the basis of fair admissions, fair funding and a recognition of their wider school improvement responsibilities.”

I thought that was a very fair statement and summed up what we are trying to achieve with this bill very well.

This bill will not just help a small proportion of pupils in leafy suburbs – the original focus of the academies programme on underperformance and deprivation will remain a key feature.

This bill will not allow a small number of schools to float free above the rest of the state school system – it will help all schools improve standards by increasing the number of heads inspiring heads and teachers learning fromteachers through greater partnerships between schools.

This bill will not impinge upon a school’s unique ethos or religious character if it becomes an Academy – we want to give schools greater freedoms, and the preservation of a school’s unique ethos will be an important consideration in deciding whether or not to apply for academy status.

That is also why the legislation ensures that for foundation schools and voluntary schools with a foundation, consent must be gained from the trustees of the school’s foundation before the school can apply to become an academy.

This bill does not provide a back-door to selection – while the small number of schools that are currently selective will be able to keep their selective status, if they choose to become an Academy, non-selective schools will not be able suddenly to become selective. A fair and open admissions policy will mean that intakes at academies will be diverse, inclusive and drawn from the local community.

And we will aim to ensure that the position with maintained special schools is mirrored – we want a special school that converts to an academy still only to take children with statements.

The bill will not disadvantage any maintained school financially, nor will there be extra funding going to academies that maintained schools will not get.

Finally my Lords, this bill will not create a two-tier schools system. Indeed, we believe that it will help close the gap in our current system.

And most importantly of all, while it is not catered for in the bill currently before you for consideration, we will also target resources on the poorest through a new pupil premium. That will take money from outside the schools budget to make sure that those teaching the children most in need get extra resources, for example to deliver smaller class sizes, more one-to-one tuition, longer school days and more extra-curricular activities.

In concluding, my Lords, may I update you on the response we have received from schools so far.

In a little over a week, over one thousand one hundred schools have expressed an interest in applying for academy freedoms.

More than 620 outstanding schools – including over 250 outstanding primaries and over half of the outstandi ng secondaries – have expressed their interest, along with more than 50 special schools.

So there seems to be a real demand for the measures in this bill.

Our aim is to meet it and to ensure that:

• heads and teachers have the freedoms they want and need
• parents have the choice of a good local school
• a child’s background does not dictate whether they succeed

I know that this is a vision that is shared on all sides of this House.

My Lords, I am pleased to present this bill for your consideration.

And I beg move that the bill be now read for a second time.

The speech made by Jonathan Hill, the then Education Minister, in London on 18 November 2010.

Good morning everyone and thank you Geoff for that warm welcome.

The more observant among you will by now have realised that I’m not Michael Gove, who unfortunately has been called away at the last minute. He has asked me to apologise on his behalf and to say how sorry he is not to be here. I know that he is a big fan of studio schools, a great admirer of the pioneering work done by the Young Foundation, and a keen supporter of the Studio Schools Trust, which he recently described as ‘superb’.

But I am delighted to be here in his place because it gives me the chance – less eloquently than Michael no doubt – to put on the record my own support for the work of the Studio Schools Trust and my appreciation for what you do.

I have been lucky enough to go to Barnfield College in Luton, shortly after it opened one of the first two studio schools in September. And last Friday I was at Futures Community College in Southend-on-Sea – not a studio school but doing something similar around practical training.

I am the new kid on the block, but you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to get the point.

Switched-on, positive children working hard and learning practical skills.

Switched-on, positive employers telling me how brilliant it was for them.

Academic and vocational teaching being offered side by side; learning tailored to pupils’ individual needs; aspirations raised, so that going to university or getting a good job becomes a realistic prospect for children in families where aspiration and expectation has been very low.

So I want to thank them, as well as everyone at the Netherhall Learning Campus in Kirklees, the Studio Schools Trust and the Young Foundation for the enormous amount of work they’ve done to push the boundaries forward and make the argument for why we need to offer young people the chance of acquiring high-quality practical and technical skills, as well as high-quality academic qualifications.

The challenges

I came to this new job not having worked in education. For the last 12 years, I ran my own business. It has meant I have had – and still have – a steep learning curve, but coming to something fresh is not without advantages.

It means you have to approach things from first principles and you have to ask lots of questions.

Questions like: are enough of our children leaving primary school able to read and write properly?

Are we equipping young people with the skills, knowledge and aspirations employers and universities are demanding?

Have we got an exam and qualification system to which we have confidence? Have league tables and equivalents led to gaming of the system?

Are we motivating and enthusing the workforce of tomorrow – so they fulfil their potential and have the confidence to succeed? Or, at the very least, know how to turn up on time, work in a team, or take direction from a manager?

Is vocational and practical training strong enough so we can compete internationally – or even be able to fill jobs at home without having to recruit from overseas?

How do we measure up against best practice internationally?

To which, my answers are: no, up to a point, not really, yes, not well enough, no and it’s a very mixed picture.

The truth is that too many young people still don’t get the right skills and qualifications for work and further study.

Too many young people are turned off learning at an early age, fall behind and then get left behind.

And it’s not good enough for more young people to be staying on in education if the qualifications they’re working towards aren’t valued by future employers.

I also can’t help feeling that out of a well-intended desire to give vocational and academic skills parity of esteem – which is right – we have ended up undervaluing both.

We’ve forced vocational and academic qualifications to have some kind of uneasy equivalence, when actually we should just be making sure that they are all high quality and do what universities and employers need. And above all that they should be tailored to what individual children need.

So, what are we doing about it?

The top line is that we are trying to get out of the hair of professions to allow them to get on with what they do best. To come up with ideas of their own – like studio schools – as to how they can best cater for their children.

We also want to stop directing and prescribing quite so much, I hope leaving more space for professionals to learn from each other, forming partnerships, spreading good practice and raising standards through collaboration and the sharing of experience.

Reform

More specifically, we have a number of clear aims.

First, to strengthen qualifications so they are more robust, rigorous and teach the economically valuable skills that employers demand to keep pace with the rest of the world.

We will also give universities and employers more say over developing A levels. It’s right that those with the strongest interest in making sure young people have the right skills have a louder voice.

Second, we’ve asked Professor Alison Wolf to lead an independent review of vocational qualifications. Alison’s review isn’t about creating yet another set of Whitehall-designed, top-down qualifications – it’s about giving colleges and schools the flexibility to offer qualifications that meet the labour market’s constantly shifting demands and higher expectations.

Third, we want to raise the quality of careers guidance.

Fourth, we are expanding the number of Apprenticeships.

It’s sobering that only eight per cent of employers in England offer Apprenticeships – compared with 24 per cent in Germany. And of businesses with at least 500 employees, it’s just 30 per cent here compared with more than 90 per cent across in Germany.

Fifth, we are trying to put the right structures in place through our wider reform programme.

People sometimes say to me: why are you making these structural changes? Surely its teachers who make the difference? Stop messing around and concentrate on the teachers.

I agree totally that it always comes down to people – and we will be saying more about that in our white paper to be published shortly. But the point of the structural changes is to give those people more space and it provides the opportunity for new ideas to bubble up from below.

So we’re expanding the Academies programme and we’re ensuring that new providers including parents, community groups and businesses can come together and open new Free Schools where there’s demand – bringing outside expertise and experience into the state sector.

That’s why we back Lord Baker, who through the Baker-Dearing Trust that he set up with the late Lord Dearing, is doing a fantastic job in pioneering a new generation of University Technical Colleges.

They will offer high-quality technical qualifications – all as autonomous institutions, sponsored by leading local businesses and a local university.

The JCB Academy in Staffordshire is already open – offering hard practical learning alongside academic GCSEs.

The new UTC in Birmingham will specialise in engineering and manufacturing when it opens in 2012 – with students working with Aston University engineering staff and students, as well as local business and colleges.

And Ken has ambitious plans to open many more in cities across the country.

Studio schools – the way forward

And it’s in that same spirit that we are right behind the studio schools movement and keen to see it grow, and we hope that the wider education system sits up and takes note of your distinctive philosophy and ethos.

We think that studio schools have huge potential, and it’s not just us who think so. I gather that there is a great deal of interest from overseas.

Studio schools have a fresh and new culture for young people at risk of dropping out elsewhere. They are all ability, have high aspirations for all pupils and make sure young people get the strong qualifications they need to get into employment or university, whether that’s GCSEs, A levels, Diplomas, BTECs or NVQs.

But they also give them the practical skills employers demand in trades like construction, hospitality, plumbing and engineering, as well as softer skills like team working, communication, initiative and punctuality – exactly the kind of intangibles that businesses want but often can’t find in school leavers.

Studio schools show us how to go beyond so-called ‘traditional’ teaching by using some of the most innovative teaching methods like personal mentoring and coaching, project-based learning which cuts across subjects, and rooting lessons in practical, real-life situations. And they use smaller classes to back up high-quality staff, allowing them to focus more attention on pupils who might have been at risk of falling behind or switching off.

And one vital point: this doesn’t mean dumbing down – it’s about making sure young people are inspired and excited to invest the time and effort in their own futures.

They mustn’t be seen as some kind of halfway house between mainstream provision and PRUs, as some sort of sticking plaster. This is exactly the kind of false label, often attached to vocational education, which we need to squash. It doesn’t do justice to the teachers teaching or the pupils learning in them. And it misses the point about the enormous potential that studio schools have.

By bringing employers into the classroom, it’s a win-win for them and the children.

Young people are doing real work in real business environments – the over-16s are paid a proper wage, but above all they are getting the chance to work alongside professionals on real commercial projects.

I like the fact that employers involved in studio schools recognise that there is not much value in making noises-off about the quality of skills, while not actually working in schools directly. So it is absolutely right they are reaching out to young people directly and taking them under their wing.

By working together, I know we can spread the word about the studio school approach. And I would urge everyone here who thinks they might be interested to talk to the Studio Schools Trust.

Conclusion

Today is a celebration of the launch of the first two studio schools, but I hope it also heralds more to come.

It is extremely important that the pioneers do well, not just for the children you are teaching, but because of the role models you can be.

Showing that it is possible to break down the long-standing divide between academic and vocational qualifications that has existed in our country for too long. Showing that it is possible to re-engage young people and get them to set their targets higher.

And showing that we can give more young people real choice in their lives.

I believe that studio schools can help achieve all of that.

And I hope this is just the start of things to come.

Thank you.