Proposals to create more good school places through lifting the faith cap were unveiled today on 1 May as new data shows over half of schools are now academies. A consultation on lifting the 50% cap, which applies to new faith free schools, will be launched alongside proposals on opening special faith-based academies. The DfE … Continue reading Government to launch consultation on lifting the 50% cap on faith school places
GCSE results will suffer ‘well into 2030s’ due to Covid
A new study from the University of Exeter, the London School of Economics and the University of Strathclyde conducted the research, funded by the Nuffield Foundation is reported on in Schools Week. The key findings include: Covid fallout to affect GCSEs ‘well into 2030s’‘Unprecedented’ widening of attainment gapEducational damage could cost billionsUniversity-led tutoring could boost … Continue reading GCSE results will suffer ‘well into 2030s’ due to Covid
‘Nearly all’ schools rely on donations for classroom essentials
A new poll of its members by NAHT has found that only 1 per cent of school leaders say they get enough funding to meet all their pupils’ needs. A TES article notes that nearly all school leaders (95 per cent) in England have had to generate additional income through other sources - like charity … Continue reading ‘Nearly all’ schools rely on donations for classroom essentials
How AI is being abused to create child sexual abuse imagery
A sobering new report from the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) focuses on it's 2023 investigation of the first reports of child sexual abuse material (CSAM) generated by artificial intelligence (AI). Initial investigations uncovered a world of text-to-image technology. In short, you type in what you want to see in online generators and the software generates … Continue reading How AI is being abused to create child sexual abuse imagery
Children’s Media Lives
A new report from Ofcom is the latest in a longitudinal study that started in 2014. It provides evidence about the motivations and the context for media use, and how media is a part of children's daily life and domestic circumstances. The project also provides rich details of how children’s media habits and attitudes change … Continue reading Children’s Media Lives
The Features of Effective School Groups
A new report from the Education Policy Institute brings together findings from their interactive benchmarking tool, which compares the performance of individual academy trusts, local authorities, federations and dioceses across four key performance indicators, along with results from their Decisions in Education in England (DEEP) survey of senior leaders working in school groups. Key findings … Continue reading The Features of Effective School Groups
School funding model: Effect of falling school rolls
This sobering new report from the Education Policy Institute finds that: Total pupil numbers in state-funded primary and secondary schools are projected to fall from a peak of 7.57 million in 2022-23, and then decrease at an average rate of 1.0 per cent each year until they reach 7.14 million in 2028-29. This means that … Continue reading School funding model: Effect of falling school rolls
Safeguarding Children in Schools and Colleges
The Department for Education (DfE) have launched a 12-week call for evidence (from 28 March), to take the views of schools, colleges, and other professionals on safeguarding practice development and direction, in advance of Keeping children safe in education 2025 (KCSIE). Your reflections, experience, and suggestions in this call for evidence will help to inform … Continue reading Safeguarding Children in Schools and Colleges
Using AI to analyse 30,000 school policies
The Key's Robin AI tool has “read” just shy of 30,000 policy documents from over 1,000 schools. This blog looks at the data generated to see if anything interesting could be revealed. A huge caveat is that this is not science: no effort was made to ensure the 1,035 schools were representative. In fact, they’re … Continue reading Using AI to analyse 30,000 school policies
Leadership Strategies in School Trusts
Edurio's new resource, "Leadership Strategies in School Trusts", explores what it takes to be a high-achieving leader in a Multi-Academy Trust (MAT). Exploring leadership practices across trusts, they draw insights from those achieving top leadership scores which are above national benchmarks in their data. The report is available on their website, here.
Schools’ Air Quality Monitoring for Health and Education (SAMHE)
The Schools' Air Quality Monitoring for Health and Education (SAMHE) is a project offering schools a free air quality monitor and learning resources. The monitor will provide evidence for national policies and practice to make schools healthier for pupils. Schools can: Get a free monitor View data on air quality in the classroom using a … Continue reading Schools’ Air Quality Monitoring for Health and Education (SAMHE)
Schools offered free cyber defence tools to help keep out attackers
UK education settings can sign up for the NCSC's Web Check and Mail Check services to protect their websites and email servers from cyber attacks. SCHOOLS can now benefit from free cyber defence tools from the nation’s leading experts to help them protect their emails and websites from online attackers. Find out more here,
Free support from Energy Sparks to help Derbyshire schools save energy and fight climate change
Energy Sparks is a registered charity providing an online energy analysis tool and energy education programme specifically designed to help schools reduce their electricity and gas usage through the analysis of smart meter data. Using a school’s electricity, gas and solar data, Energy Sparks shows pupils, staff and volunteers how much energy the school is … Continue reading Free support from Energy Sparks to help Derbyshire schools save energy and fight climate change
Have your say on the future of Derbyshire Services for Schools
As part of budget setting measures outlined by Derbyshire County Council in February, the function of the Derbyshire Services for Schools (S4S) team (also known as the Traded Services team) has been identified as a potential area for savings. To better understand how changes could impact your school or academy, they have developed a brief … Continue reading Have your say on the future of Derbyshire Services for Schools
Government ends Inspiring Governance contract
The DfE have agreed to continue funding the Inspiring Governance service to support schools and academies for a further six months, but DfE funding of the Inspiring Governance school governor recruitment service will come to an end on September 30th, 2024. DfE funding for the service was reduced by 45% from April 2021, and over … Continue reading Government ends Inspiring Governance contract
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