Tag: Department for Education

The press release issued by the Department for Education on 2 September 2022.

Funding will increase access to English and maths schemes in schools, and the Education Endowment Foundation is backed to continue to improve attainment.

Education trials and interventions to improve attainment will be carried out across schools, colleges and early years settings, backed by a new multi-million government grant.

The Department for Education is to continue funding the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) with a new grant of £137 million, cementing the independent charity’s role as a central part of the education landscape for at least the next decade.

The EEF will continue to support the Government’s teacher training reforms, whilst expanding activity in the early years. This will include working as the evidence partner for the Early Years Stronger Practice Hubs, which are due to launch in November 2022, to share effective evidence-based practices with local settings to help boost young children’s development.

The Government is also announcing a further £66 million for the next phase of the Accelerator Fund to increase access to high-quality literacy and numeracy programmes in schools over the next three academic years. This forms part of the Government’s commitment to ensuring that any child who falls behind in maths or English will get the support they need to get back on track.

As part of this, the EEF will be given up to £41.5 million to continue to increase its evidence around effective programmes, scale-up existing programmes, and support schools with implementation. Up to £21 million of the funding will also support Maths and English Hubs to roll out high quality programmes to schools.

Schools Minister, Will Quince, said:

The re-endowment of the EEF, in addition to funding to continue the Accelerator Fund, will provide the evidence base that allows schools and teachers to give children the best start to their education.

This work, in addition to our ambitious education recovery plan, will help to improve the attainment of millions of pupils and level up opportunities across the country.

Over the past decade, the EEF has carried out over 200 evaluations to understand which interventions and approaches are most effective in closing the attainment gap, engaging 23,000 nurseries, schools, and colleges in trials and reaching over 1.8 million children, including 500,000 pupils eligible for free school meals.

Today’s funding for the Accelerator Fund also follows a successful first year of the initiative, in which the EEF supported 20 programmes across more than 1,500 settings, including those in regions that experienced significant learning loss during the pandemic. Some of these programmes included ‘Reciprocal Reading’, an intensive 12-16 small-group programme to improve reading comprehension and ’1stClass@Number’, which supported 6–7-year-olds with low attainment in maths to improve their skills.

English Hubs and Maths Hubs programmes also helped to deliver programmes to over 5,000 schools, giving them access to phonics and numeracy programmes. These programmes have experienced strong demand and will continue to be rolled out to additional schools as part of ongoing funding announced today. Schools can contact their local hub for more information.

Areas with high proportions of children from disadvantaged backgrounds will continue to be prioritised for the schemes to help level up attainment.

Sir Peter Lampl, chair of the EEF since its inception, said:

Over the past decade, the EEF has built a reputation as a trusted and independent source of evidence. The new endowment will allow us to continue to evaluate and spread best practice across the country, as well as expand our work in the early years sector.

High-quality evidence plays an important role in supporting education practitioners’ own professional judgement, as they work to make sure that every child and young person has access to a great education.

These initiatives form part of the Government’s wider ambitious education recovery plan worth nearly £5 billion. This includes £1.5 billion for a national tutoring revolution, through which over two million high-quality tutoring courses have already started. A £1 billion Recovery Premium is also supporting some of the most disadvantaged pupils across the country to catch up on lost learning.

The £137 million re-endowment of the EEF is in addition to around £40 million of remaining funding from the EEF’s original endowment. The £66 million in funding for the next phase of the Accelerator Fund includes up to £41.5 million for the EEF, up to £21 million to Maths and English Hubs, up to £3 million for a procured supplier to provide capability building support to programmes to help them scale-up, and up to £500,000 for an evaluation of the EEF element of the Accelerator Fund programme.

The press release issued by the Department for Education on 18 November 2010.

Tim Oates, Group Director of Assessment Research and Development at Cambridge Assessment, has today published ‘Could do better: using international comparisons to refine the national curriculum in England’, an analysis of international curriculums and the lessons we can learn as we reform our own national curriculum.

Education Secretary Michael Gove said:

This fascinating and insightful paper offers a concise analysis of some of the problems with our current national curriculum and helps explain why so many other nations are outpacing us in educational performance. The debate about our cational curriculum now has to be seen in an international context. The best-performing education nations deliberately set out to compare themselves against international benchmarks – learning from each other and constantly asking what is required to help all children do better.

Shortly, my department will launch its own review of the national curriculum and the remit will explicitly, for the first time, require benchmarking against the most successful school systems. This – as Tim Oates makes clear – has to be done with great care to avoid learning the wrong lessons from countries with very different cultures. But it is essential if we are to keep pace with the world’s best.

Tim Oates said:

We should appraise carefully both international and national research in order to drive an evidence-based review of the national curriculum and make changes only where justified, in order to avoid unnecessary disruption to the education system.

However, simply importing another country’s classroom practices would be a gross error. A country’s national curriculum – both its form and content – cannot be considered in isolation from the state of development of these vital ‘control factors’. They interact. Adjust one without considering development of the others, and the system may be in line for trouble.

The press release issued by the Department for Education on 17 November 2010.

Education Secretary Michael Gove will today announce the opening up of the route to academy status so that every school can become an academy by allowing existing schools that are strong performers to work in partnership with weaker schools.

Michael Gove will today make the announcement alongside the Prime Minister at an event at Downing Street, with more than 150 outstanding school headteachers who have already applied to open academies.

Alongside outstanding schools, all schools that are ranked good with outstanding features by Ofsted will automatically be eligible for academy status. All other schools – primary or secondary – that wish to enjoy academy freedoms will also be eligible, providing they work in partnership with a high-performing school that will help drive improvement.

In addition, for the first time, special schools will also have the opportunity to become academies, providing them the opportunity to operate with greater freedom and autonomy in order to better respond to the needs of children with special educational needs or disabilities. Special schools will be able to apply to convert in January.

Speaking ahead of an event with academy headteachers, Prime Minster David Cameron said:

Improving education is central to our reform agenda and we are committed to giving governors, headteachers and teachers more control over how they run their schools. We know they are best placed to decide how to give their pupils the best possible education and that is why we are encouraging more schools to become academies.

Many more schools will now be able to become academies and I am pleased they will be able to enjoy the additional freedoms, responsibility and empowerment that comes with academy status.

Secretary of State for Education, Michael Gove, said:

Inspirational school leaders like Mike Wilkins at Outwood Grange, David Triggs at Greensward, David Hampson at Tollbar, and Barry Day at Nottingham Academy have all secured exceptional results for children at their own schools and are now extending their reach even further. They have used academy powers to take weaker schools under their wing and help raise standards in local underperforming schools.

We know that the best way of improving schools is by getting the professionals, who have already done a brilliant job, to spread their wings. That is why we are now allowing more schools to benefit by enabling all schools to apply for academy status, if they are teamed with a high-performing school.

The press release issued by the Department for Education on 16 November 2010.

The Education Secretary Michael Gove has today set out radical new measures to help tackle entrenched underperformance in England’s schools.

Speaking today at the National College New Heads conference, Mr Gove announced plans to more than double the number of National Leaders of Education (NLEs) – outstanding headteachers committed to supporting struggling schools.

The number of NLEs will rise from 393 to 1000 by 2014. Superb heads joining the programme will be expected to use their skills and experience to advise struggling schools and help them improve. The role of NLEs will also be strengthened and extended in the white paper, with new incentives for the most dramatic improvements in performance.

NLEs need to have demonstrated sustained high performance in their own school before being awarded this new status, and they will only maintain NLE status if they succeed in turning around underperforming schools. The NLE model has a proven track record. Primary schools that received NLE support in 2007-08 saw a ten percentage point increase in pupils reaching the expected level by age 11 and in secondary schools pupils’ success at GCSE improved twice as fast as the national average.

Michael Gove said:

“Great schools are the product of great leadership. There are many superb heads in our state system doing a wonderful job. But there are also many schools which are still not giving children the start in life they deserve. We still have one of the most unequal education systems in the world and half of young people leave school without the basic qualifications you need to succeed.

That’s why we will invest in recruiting more great heads to turn round our weaker schools and extend the academy model so more strong schools can help weaker schools. The coalition government is relentlessly focused on making our school system one of the best in the world and making opportunity more equal.”

The press release issued by the Department for Education on 2 September 2022.

Schools are being advised to work in partnership with councils and consider targeted family support or home visits where there are barriers to attending school.

This is part of a package of new and innovative measures to ensure that more children are in school every day, including targeted support for individuals who need it and improved data tools that will better identify and solve consistent issues.

The Department for Education is also launching a three-year 1-2-1 attendance mentoring pilot from this term, aimed at tackling the factors behind non-attendance such as bullying or mental health issues. It is being launched in Middlesbrough this year, before expanding to other areas of the country next year. The pilot will provide tailored support to over 1,600 persistently and severely absent pupils over the three-year period.

Schools, academy trusts, local authorities and the government will also have access to a powerful new attendance data visualisation tool is also being launched to help to spot and respond to issues. This data is supporting the launch of the new, interactive national attendance dashboard alongside the publication of the first full fortnightly attendance data of the term. This is expected later in September and will provide ongoing transparency and vastly improved potential for insight and analysis of daily, weekly and termly trends.

The majority of schools are now seamlessly sharing daily register data with the department, where it is aggregated and presented back in dashboards to schools, academy trusts and local authorities. This enables teachers to analyse attendance with greater ease, allowing issues with individual pupils, or groups such as children on free school meals, for example, to be spotted more quickly.

With millions of pupils set to return to schools and colleges over the coming days, there will be a renewed focus on maximising pupils’ time in the classroom, as evidence shows that the students with the highest attendance throughout their time in school gain the best GCSE and A Level results.

As outlined in the Schools White Paper, the government is introducing a wide range of tools and programmes to tackle low attendance, including new best practice guidance on improving attendance for schools, trusts and local authorities.

The guidance makes clear that schools should provide individualised support to families that need it, for example through referrals to other organisations and services, including councils, and issue fines and other sanctions where absence is unauthorised.

There are now over 10,000 academy schools open in England as a result of over 100 new academies converting yesterday, Thursday 1 September. This represents well over half of all students and more than four in five secondary schools.

29 local authorities have expressed an interest in setting up local authority-established multi-academy trusts as part of the trial planned for this year, driving momentum towards all schools becoming academies and receiving the support of a strong academy trust to raise standards across curriculum, attendance, and teacher development. The scheme will be carefully tested via a limited number of successful applications this year.

Education Secretary James Cleverly said:

I want to wish all pupils starting the new school year the very best of luck. From making new friends to learning from inspirational teachers, this is a really exciting time for them.

All the evidence shows that being in school is vital for helping pupils achieve their potential. That is why it is so important for them to attend every day they possibly can.

It’s also great that we can mark the new school year with a major milestone – over 10,000 academies are now open in England. The academies programme has been transforming children’s education for over a decade now and I look forward to building even more momentum so all schools can join strong academy trusts in the coming years.

Since 2010, there has been nearly a 20 percentage point rise in the number of good or outstanding schools, reaching 87 per cent of all schools in December 2021. Academy trusts played a crucial part in this, taking on poorly-performing schools and turning them around.

More than seven out of 10 sponsored academies which were found to be underperforming as an LA maintained school in their previous inspection now have a good or outstanding rating.

But there is more to do. New regulations that came into force yesterday allow the government to intervene for the first time in schools that have more than one consecutive rating of requires improvement or inadequate.

This will support the transition of these schools into strong trusts, which consistently drive school improvement.

Sylvie Newman, executive headteacher at Donisthorpe Primary School said:

Donisthorpe Primary School is a good school with many strengths and we have been exploring joining a multi academy trust for a number of years, but choosing the right one has been very important.

The primary motivator is keeping our unique identity but to also providing Donisthorpe with group strength and an opportunity for us to feel part of something ‘bigger’ and to draw knowledge and share expertise.

We will be able to provide opportunities for staff to progress their careers within the trust thereby strengthening retention.

Alongside this, schools will shortly be provided their budgets for free period products for this year, which they are strongly encouraged to use to access the wider range of products expected to be available through the scheme, to help ensure that no child feels the need to miss school as a result of their period and help end period poverty.

Finally, from this month teachers will be able to claim the government’s levelling up premium. This is for teachers of high demand STEM subjects in the country’s most disadvantaged schools and worth up to £3,000 tax-free this academic year, as well as the next two years afterwards.

The press release issued by the Department for Education on 2 September 2022.

The press release issued by the Department for Education on 15 November 2010.

Ahead of Anti-Bullying Week, Schools Minister Nick Gibb spoke to the News of the World about the importance of tackling bullying in schools:

Around half of all children say they’ve been bullied at school and had their lives blighted by fear. And it’s not just at school where young people encounter bullying.

It’s simply unacceptable for a child to be victimised – whether it’s in or out of school, or on their mobile phones, or on social networking sites like Facebook.

That’s why the coalition agreement that unites the government gives priority to tackling bullying and raising standards of behaviour in the classroom.

There are 3 clear principles behind the government’s position:

• we can’t allow any young person to go to school dreading the treatment they will get
• when a bullied child is brave enough to speak out, we must support them – not the bully
• when bullies are identified, we can’t just suspend them for a couple of days and then allow them to saunter back into school to torment their victims all over again

Our schools white paper later this month will put heads and teachers back in control, giving them a range of tough new powers to deal with bullies and the most disruptive pupils. Heads will be able to take a zero-tolerance approach and will have the final say – both in and outside of school.

We will also give teachers the right to remove disruptive children from the classroom without fear of legal action. They will be able to search pupils for weapons, and items like iPods and mobile phones, and confiscate them.

Schools will have revised guidance to make sure they know how to tackle bullying effectively.

We trust headteachers and teachers to use these powers. But there will be no-notice inspections for schools where behaviour, including bullying, is out of control.

As Schools Minister, I am determined to do everything I can to tackle bullying and to help schools raise standards of behaviour in the classroom.

The press release issued by the Department for Education on 15 November 2010.

Michael Gove today announced the decision to scrap the complex and burdensome Financial Management Standard in Schools (FMSiS) with immediate effect.

Following discussions with local authorities and schools, there was an overwhelming consensus to scrap FMSiS and develop a simpler standard.

FMSiS was introduced in the early 2000s and made compulsory for all schools in 2007.

Schools were required to meet the standard every 3 years by going through a burdensome self-evaluation tool. Schools, particularly primary schools, found the system required too much documentation and was implemented in an overly bureaucratic manner. For example, it required them to submit documentation to meet more than 100 different assessment criteria ranging from providing evidence that meetings on school budgets were ‘consistent with the deadlines for important financial decisions’ to showing how the school had made staff aware of the local authority whistle-blowing policy.

Last year the Audit Commission said FMSiS focuses on processes rather than achievement of economy and efficiency, and that schools have not drawn an explicit link between its introduction and value for money.

The government recognises the importance of ensuring schools have the right arrangements in place to manage their budgets effectively and so we will now work with interested parties, including local authorities and schools, to develop a new, simpler way of doing this. It is hoped the replacement system will be introduced next year.

Michael Gove said:

We are committed to reducing the administrative burden on teachers and school governing bodies and have already cut the burdensome self-evaluation forms for school inspections. Today we are ending the overly bureaucratic Financial Management Standard in Schools, and we will continue to work with schools and local authorities to reduce the bureaucratic burden further.

Today’s announcement was welcomed by headteachers. John King, Headteacher of Gable Hall School in Essex, said:

This marks the end of a hugely time consuming, burdensome bureaucratic and, in parts, senseless system of checking financial competency.

Claire Axten, Headteacher of Brookside Community Primary School in Somerset, said:

Our experience is that FMSiS was a very lengthy and burdensome process. The aim of FMSiS was to achieve value for money but the process was so time consuming this defeated the aim at the beginning! I am very pleased the government has decided to end the current system and replace it with a much simpler, national standard.

Pippa Dodgshon, Headteacher at Hall Cross School in Doncaster, said:

The system was unwieldy and the process was expensive – a massive burden to schools.

The press release issued by the Department for Education on 10 November 2010.

Education Secretary Michael Gove today announced a pioneering new partnership with China to train 1000 more Mandarin teachers for secondary schools in England.

During a visit to China to build stronger education partnerships with the Chinese, Mr Gove launched the joint programme between the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust and Hanban (the Confucius Institute Headquarters). It is to run over the next five years.

Mandarin is an increasingly popular subject choice for young people at GCSE but in England there are currently only around 100 qualified Mandarin teachers, and only 16 per cent of secondary schools offered Chinese language teaching in 2009.

This new partnership will increase the quality and quantity of Mandarin teaching in schools and allow more young people than ever before the chance to study this important language. Increasing the number of Mandarin speakers will help equip Britain’s future workforce with the skills we need to compete in a globalised economy.

Speaking from Beijing, Michael Gove said:

I am delighted to be building a stronger education partnership with the Chinese. There is a lot our countries can learn from each other and we want to work together to deliver world-class standards in schools through the greater sharing of knowledge and experience.

This is not just about fostering a better understanding of China among our young people. Offering every young person the chance to learn Mandarin will help to encourage mobility between the two countries, equip the next generation with the skills they need to succeed, and ensure the long-term success of our economy and society.

Elizabeth Reid, Chief Executive at the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust, said:

China is at the centre of the global economy, and the next generation will need to understand its culture and be able to work in its language – which is why we are delighted to be signing a memorandum of understanding with Hanban to train 1000 teachers of Mandarin Chinese over the next five years to meet the growing demand in England.

This new five-year programme will be co-financed by the two organisations and will begin in July 2011. The programme is aimed at dealing with the immediate shortage of Mandarin teachers and enabling schools to meet the rapidly rising demand for Mandarin teaching. In five years, the supply of qualified Mandarin teachers should have increased sufficiently to match demand, but the situation will be kept under review.

 Notes to editors

1. Hanban is the Confucius Institute Headquarters / Office of Chinese Language Council International.
2. Mandarin GCSE entries across the UK increased by more than five per cent between 2009 and 2010 and by nearly 40 per cent since 2002.
3. Currently there are approximately 100 qualified Mandarin teachers in the UK.
4. In a CBI survey in 2010, UK employers mentioned Mandarin and Cantonese as second only to French as language skills they would be looking for in future employees.

The press release issued by the Department for Education on 11 November 2010.

Commenting on statistics showing Key Stage 1 attainment by pupil characteristics, Schools Minister Nick Gibb today stressed the need for a greater focus and emphasis on the teaching of reading and writing in primary schools.

The results are available via the Department’s Research and statistics gateway.

Nick Gibb said:

Though there is a slight increase in the proportion of seven-year-olds reaching the expected level in reading, it is a real concern that almost a third of all Key Stage 1 children receiving free school meals are failing to achieve the standard in reading and writing. Additionally, over a third of boys receiving free school meals fail to make the grade in reading and writing.

Getting the fundamentals right is crucial to a child’s success in secondary education and throughout their adult life, and the Government is committed to getting all children reading and writing to a high standard.

That is why we are promoting the use of systematic synthetic phonics in primary schools and why we are introducing a short reading test for six-year-olds, so we can identify those who need extra help. We will also support the most disadvantaged children by introducing a pupil premium which will provide extra funding for those schools with the most challenging intakes.