The news that the two professional associations representing the bulk of schools leaders are to collaborate on a new set of school information to help parents selecting schools reminded me of my first foray into this market nearly 30 years ago. The Parents’ Guide to Schools in London’s Commuterland wasn’t a commercial success for its publisher, but it did mark probably the first attempt to bring together in one place information about state secondary schools.

Before the famous Section 6 of the 1980 Education Act enshrined parental preference into law, and led to the publication of school prospectuses, and examination results, obtaining information was a bit of a hit and miss business. Even in the early 1980s, not all local authorities conformed to the spirit of the 1980 law. Curiously, it was often tightly controlled Labour authorities that could provide all prospectuses for all schools within the authority from one central point, whereas I well remember the suspicion of schools in Tory controlled Kent where there was no central distribution point, and it was a matter of contacting each school. Some even told me they only sent information to prospective parents after they had visited the school.

When I compiled my book, based upon a similar format for the New York area already being published by the New York Times, I was clear it was a geographical listing and not a set of league tables because that was too simplistic a representation: a point currently being made by the head teachers. So complicated was my guide that the accompanying notes to help parents understand each entry ran to three pages. This may help explain why it was not a commercial success. However, I think it more likely that arranging schools in geographical order allowed parents to brose in bookshops and obtain the key information without paying the £6.95 required to buy the book. With hindsight, I might have made my fortune if the publisher had created a hardback version at a much higher price and sold it exclusively to estate agents. But, it was a case of, live and learn, as this was my first venture into commercial publishing as an author. As it was also the publishers’ first venture into typesetting a book completely from computer output on disk; a fact that allowed it to be produced within six weeks from disk to bookshelf.

One sign of the times was that in 1986 I included the different types of IT systems schools operated, as well as all the Examination Boards they used. This was because the guide was originally conceived as an aid to parents moving into a new area that knew nothing about the local schools. Such parents, and their offspring, are still largely ignored in the debates about the presentation of school information but remain an important group across the country. Many parents faced with a job move confront the agonising choice of weekly commuting or a house and school move. Often the house move is still the easy part, but the school move needs considerable research. In that respect the head teachers can help this group with how they present the information. After all, those living in the area are still as likely to focus on gossip and school gate recollections as on hard facts, whereas incomers have a real need for quality and easily interpretable information: something the DfE data has never been.

Below, I have reproduced an entry from my 1986 guide.

High School

Address and phone number

County Comprehensive Mixed- a mixed comprehensive schools

Formed in 1984 from the merger of two existing schools

Intake 150 Staying on rate NA  HE rate NA

Microcomputers 10 RML 480Z (network); 10 BBC B

Exam Boards RSA, P, C+G

English 30%; Maths 11% of whole year group passing

1985 ‘O’ level exam results % of entries with A-C grades

Features: 1^st year taught in mixed ability groups. Yrs 2/3 same curriculum with Ger for those able. Ability bands in 4/5^th yrs with English, maths, RE, PE and games, health ed and a possible 6 other subj. Remedial ed available on individual or small group basis. Careers guidance in timetable in yrs 4/5. Extended library, completely refurbished gymnasium and bldg programme well on its way. Swimming pool. The school has a uniform. Many activities incl animal care, chess, computing, karting and models. Brass band, orchestra, music theory, recorder group and music/drama productions. Most sports incl keep fit and squash. Skiing journeys with lesson dry slopes. European journeys vary each yr. Annual visit to Hamburg. Youth Club activities 2 evenings a week.

1985 ‘A’ level Examination Results numbers passing (numbers entered)

Eng 9[10]; Maths 6[9]; Fr2[3]; Phy 8[11]]; Chem 2[6]; Biol 1[3]; Geog 5[10]; Hist 1[1]; Econ 7[12]; Ger 1[1]; Art 5[6]; RE 2[3]; Tech 2[2]

Shakespeare wasn’t the only one to have views on music. For many it has been the jewel in the crown of local education services, as successive Secretaries of State have discovered down the years. Michael Gove was just the latest holder of the office to discover that you tamper with the provision of music at your peril.

The government’s review of the vexed question of how to fund schools, or at least that part of it that dealt with the Education Services Gant for 2015-16 drew what the DfE called ‘large volumes of responses to the consultation on ESG relating to the provision of music services’. Many who responded to the DfE were apparently concerned that reduced local authority support for music services would impact on the overall quality of music provision, and in particular on the opportunities for disadvantaged children. Indeed, as the DfE noted, few concerns were expressed about any other centrally provided services by Education Departments. Whether the point about disadvantaged children was because authorities know such children represent a government priority group or whether it was because they felt that Pupil Premium cash wouldn’t find its way into music lessons despite the evidence about music and learning, and in particular mathematics learning, isn’t of course clear. But, perhaps I am being a tad too cynical in my old age.

The government is funding £75 million for music hubs in 2015-16, but perhaps the concern is that these don’t always follow local authority boundaries.  

Perhaps music is a service that could be granted extra funds through a top-slice by schools forums on revenue balances more than 3% above the expected levels of 5% for secondary schools and 8% for primary schools. This might encourage some schools to think about why they are keeping this cash in the bank. This negative use of revenue funding is an unfortunate by-product of school autonomy that the DfE should allocate some time to fix.

It seems likely that the battle of music in schools is not yet over. For, although, as the DfE points out, local authorities can spend ESG money on supporting music services, and presumably any other spare cash they have lying around, most local authorities don’t have the money, and many councillors don’t see the point of funding anything to do with schools now they are no longer a local service. Thus, it seems likely that future secretaries of state are going to have to continue to dip their hand in the Westminster pocket if music is to continue to thrive in our schools much beyond the next election.

Personally, I think that it would be a great shame if one of the key antidotes to an exam factory style of curriculum were allowed to wither on the vine. Music is not just important in our schools, it is important in our daily lives, and whether classic, jazz or pop, a major export industry, much of which starts from the roots put down in our schools. So, whether or not it is the ‘food of love’ it has certainly been the bane of many secretaries of state.

At the end of July the Chief Secretary to the Treasury wrote to the members of the School Teachers’ Review Body – currently without an appointed chairperson – about their work in the forthcoming year. Unlike the letter to the Health Review Body, the letter to the School Teachers’ Review Body does at least accept that there may well be a case for a pay rise for teachers next year if there are staffing problems; albeit probably another year within a one per cent envelope.

Clearly, the government will need to be persuaded that recruitment and retention issues are affecting teaching as a profession since this factor is the main justification that the government will accept for pay increases. At least, with rising pupil numbers, and the Pupil Premium cash available to schools, there should be little reason for the government to argue that pay should be held down because schools cannot afford to pay any increase. To do so would be to fly in the face of the mantra of the past four years that funding for schools has been protected just at the time when the Chief Secretary acknowledges in the letter that the fiscal forecast shows the public finances returning to a more sustainable position.

At this blog has steadfastly maintained, there is a developing recruitment crisis in terms of attracting sufficient numbers of graduates of the required quality into teaching. A short-term solution would create a competitive starting point for new a teacher that is equivalent to salaries for graduates already having spent a year in the labour market in order to compensate for the extra year of training. An alternative would be to pay everyone a training wage at least equivalent to the £24,000+ paid to graduates training at Sandhurst pro rata for the different lengths of the training courses.  The Treasury, and presumably the Chief Secretary, wouldn’t like this as they would have to pay for many that would opt to train as a teacher anyway. But, no such test is applied to whether or not the British Army, and indeed the other services, has the same recruitment difficulties attracting graduates and could ask for both the training fees as well as payment for board and lodging most trainee teachers are expected to fund.

The professional associations will already be preparing their submissions to the Review Body, and I am sure that recruitment, and possibly retention, issues will feature strongly. The evidence of earlier posts on this blog suggests a situation certainly no better than last year, and possibly worse in some subjects. However, it will be November and the ITT census before the real position is known.

As a result of this delay in gathering information, and the lack of real-time information on trainees movement into employment that still exists, I am working to find a way to gather this information quickly, easily and cheaply. Thirty years ago I started tracking the leadership labour market in real-time; and as seemingly nobody else is doing it for the wider profession, unlike in other countries, I suppose I must show how it can be done here.

To commemorate the anniversary of the start of world War 1 

History Tour  (The Somme)

On the signalled route, crawls

A bus; jammed in convoy.

Far from usual destinations.

Taking a load of boys

Along the roads of France

Towards the cemetery.

Their voices full, in songs of

youth as, at the front, the

Leaders listen for the spirit,

But worry, as leaders do,

About the future.

In blazing sun, all align

To assault the first objective.

It marks our examination point.

The Cross of Remembrance;

For those who had no second chance.

Now, I would be dead.

I gaze upon the headstone’s

Name, rank and regiment, an

Infantryman who died today.

We share a birthday.

Tomorrow I have outlived him

No July bullet, to stop me in my tracks.

Is History feelings, not just facts.

Was this his first encounter?

Volunteer from service, exchanging

One country billet for another.

This first sight of battle his last.

Ten minutes fear, to end like this.

A thin line of boys plodding upwards

To meet the scything guns. Man against

Machine, mass production death.

The  factory of war producing the

Colourful, silent black of death.

The good news is that exclusions across England are continuing to reduce in number: the bad news is that is still remains the same groups being excluded.https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/permanent-and-fixed-period-exclusions-in-england-2012-to-2013

A Year 9 boy of Caribbean background is much more likely to be at risk of exclusion, probably for either persistent disruptive behaviour or an assault on an adult or another pupil, than any other group. If he lived in Reading, his chances seem to have been even higher than if he lived in many other areas. Sadly, his younger brother being educated at one of the town’s primary schools might have faced an even greater chance of a fixed term exclusion than almost anywhere else in England. Mixed heritage primary pupils in the town, especially those of White and Caribbean parentage, seem to face even greater risk of being given a fixed term exclusions than might be expected, especially when compared with their classmates.

As there is an almost straight-line relationship between deprivation and the likelihood of being excluded, there must be a question mark about what is happening to the Pupil Premium money in those primary schools most affected? This seems like a legitimate question for scrutiny committees of Councils to ask, even where there is a high proportion of nationally funded schools in their area. This is because pupils with high rates of exclusion are often at greater risk of ending up in the criminal justice system, and many have special needs. All these young people remain the responsibility of a local authority regardless of either who pays for their education or who controls the school that they attend.

Still, the good news is that permanent exclusions have reduced in primary schools from 1,540 in 1997/98 to 670 on 2012/13; and from 10,190 to 3,900 in secondary schools during the same period. In special schools, the reduction is from 570 to just 60 pupils in 2012/13. Sadly, fixed term exclusions have not seen such large reduction falling from 41,300 to 37,870 in primary schools between 2003/04 when the figures first appeared and 2012/13. In secondary schools, the reduction during the same period was from 288,040 to 215,560; and in special schools from 15,170 to 14,100. These figures suggest that there is still a way to go in schools being able to contain challenging pupils within their premises except in the most severe cases.

Although most reasons for exclusion have been marked by reductions in recent years, it is worth noting that physical assaults against adults have risen in the primary sector between 2008/09 and 2012/13; only slightly in the case of permanent exclusion – from 200 to 210, but from 7,000 to 9,080 in the case of fixed term exclusions. Now this may be a case of better categorisation from the ‘other’ category, but it raises the question of whether young teachers entering the primary sector are receiving enough training in this area of their work? In the secondary sector, racist abuse is the category where the reduction is smaller than might have been hoped; and schools will need to be aware of this fact.

Nevertheless, on the basis of these figures, schools seem better able to undertake their primary task of educating all young people than they were in the recent past. Hopefully, the trend will continue with a target of fewer than 5,000 permanent and 250,000 fixed term exclusions being a not unrealistic goal for the future.

Almost exactly a year ago I wrote a post on this blog entitled ‘STEM subjects lead retreat from teaching’. Both the personal and public effects over the summer and into the autumn of last year were dramatic, with amongst other outcomes the first ever Statistical Bulletin to be issued during August on the topic of teacher supply. The longer-term outcomes should hopefully include the opening up of the Teacher Supply Model to public view later this autumn.

As we enter August again it is worth asking the question once more: how are we faring in trying to recruit enough teachers into training? There is still around a month to go before courses start, but with the need for candidates to take and pass the Skills Tests before entering a teacher preparation course, there is little time for many more recruits, even if schools had the appetite to work through the holiday period.

Data released yesterday by UCAS on the Unified ITT Application System and the number of offers made and applicants placed when measured against the lower of the DfE’s Teacher Supply Model number or the allocations made for 2014/15 suggests that the 2014 November ITT census could well record shortfalls in training numbers:

Biology – unless there are sufficient offers on general science courses

Business studies

Design and Technology

Geography

Mathematics

Music

Physics

Religious Education

With the exception of Computer Science and languages the list is depressingly similar to the subjects with shortfalls recorded in the 2013 ITT census.

If I am proved correct, and I hope that I am not, and the November ITT census reveals shortfalls against numbers required to enter training again this year, not only will it mark a failure in government policy, but also schools will find recruitment in some areas even more challenging in 2015 than this year just as the nation is in the throes of a general election. The number of debates and parliamentary questions during the past session of parliament suggest that the issue has not failed to attract the attention of the opposition at Westminster.

Should there be any worsening of recruitment into training for 2015 in any of these subjects, when compared with the springs of 2013 and 2014; it would be fair to conclude a real crisis in teacher supply will be affecting some schools just as pupil numbers are on the increase. At that point there will need to be a greater reliance on other measures to overcome shortages, such as persuading existing teachers to remain in the profession; seeking out more returners; and once again encouraging the recruitment industry to conduct more sweeps through the international teacher recruitment markets to fill the vacancies. Programmes of CPD to retrain teachers and better monitoring of the qualifications and deployment of existing staff should also be high on the government’s agenda now they cannot expect local authorities to undertake this sort of analysis for them, especially in areas where most secondary schools are now academies.

There is still time to avert the type of teacher supply crisis the Labour government sleep-walked into in 2003, but the warning signs must be not just heeded but also acted upon in such a manner as to produce results.

I have been told in a briefing note from the LGIU that a recent edition of the Financial Times newspaper carried a report from Children England, a coalition of leading charities, warning that “price-driven competition” in children’s services is having a damaging effect on the resources available for vulnerable young people. The umbrella group suggests that the involvement of “major shareholder companies”, and the cut taken by their investors, is shifting the focus away from the public being served. The charities, backed by the TUC, said an independent inquiry should look at “the benefits and shortcomings” of outsourcing.

This set me thinking about the issue of direct services from government, and the alternative of out-sourcing; especially after I read in the city press about two UK companies active in the sector possibly merging. Although one is apparently stronger than the other, it did set me wondering about whether any of the benefits from a merger might be passed on to the public sector through lower contract prices or will there just be a benefit to investors and the staff? Much, I guess, will depend upon whether it will increase or reduce competition.

At a meeting I chaired in London recently the issue came up in another way. The largest cost we face in education is for staff; whether professional, support or contractors. Material and running costs are relatively low compared with staffing costs, as they are in many other government services. When staffing costs are relatively fixed through the use of agreed wage rates there seems little point in not employing staff directly, as why pay the profit element for a fixed cost? However, when variable wage rates are introduced, the possibility of savings being made arises. If that is controversial, as it always will be, passing the burden of making the savings to the private sector, with profit being the reward, absolves government of the burden of pushing down wage rates. This is what I suspect is happening in the care sector at present, as workers employed by private contractors are faced with absorbing more unpaid work, such as travel between clients and payment is being restricted to actual client contact. Much the same thing happened in the education sector with some supply teacher pay rates in the past.

Now where schools are purchasers of services, there is another reason for local government to abandon direct service provision, as there is always the risk that schools will go elsewhere, and a service will have to be supported from other council income for the remaining users. Wise councils have no doubt cushioned the risk by signing long-term contracts with schools that would allow time to wind down a service if too many schools opted to go elsewhere.

In a time of cutbacks on government expenditure, as we have witnessed during the past six years, it is inevitable that staffing costs will come under pressure, and the debate between cutting wages or cutting services will rage. Sometimes there is a third way, and new technology or a different approach, can achieve the same service level for lower costs. Is that what we ought to be striving for in education? The only other alternative to preserve service levels is higher taxes.

Zia Jian (or goodbye)

So, it’s out with the wordsmith and in with a woman who will surely never make the mistake of taking just about heroes, and never mentioning a heroine, as Mr Gove once did to an audience of head teachers.

No doubt we haven’t heard the last of Michael Gove’s views on education as in his new role he will be able to take part in the Conservative election campaign without the need to actually take responsibility for a department of state. At least his successor, as a corporate lawyer with Treasury experience, might be expected to have a better grasp of numbers than her predecessor; always I felt a possible Achilles heel for Mr Gove, who seemed happier with a speech that could be reported by the Daily Mail the following day with a ringing endorsement. Perhaps it was either the Trojan Horse affair in Birmingham that finally did for Mr Gove or possibly intelligence from the constituencies picked up that the teacher vote was more important in marginal seats that was compatible with a Secretary of State with such an upfront manner. Either way, he is now added to the list of past holders of the office on the wall in the reception area at Sanctuary Buildings.

The departure of junior minister in the Department, Elizabeth Truss, to cabinet glory, leaves David Laws as the sole survivor in the Commons on the school side of the department. And one wonders whether he will survive the autumn re-shuffle of Lib Dem Ministers when it comes around at conference time. Perhaps, it may depend upon how the Scottish Referendum plays out and whether there is a vacancy for the post of Chief Secretary to the Treasury in October?

Much of the legacy of Mr Gove may come from his first year in office, and those heady first three months when he piloted the Academies Act through parliament and set schools on a new course towards independence. He also visited China with the Prime Minister that autumn, hence the headline for this column. However, although the teaching of Mandarin is now more common in our schools, it hasn’t yet taken off in the same manner as academies.

Hopefully, near the top of the new Secretary of State’s to do list will be to sort out teacher supply and the issue of how we prepare enough teachers for the boom years to come? Solve that problem and many others pale into insignificance. Some calming down of the curriculum changes might also be worthwhile now that there will be a new junior minister in place to take the burden. Finally, there is less than 300 days to mend fences with the teachers, or at least not to make relations any worse.

My first thought was to head this piece ‘The triumph of hope over reality’, but I thought that a bit unfair. Nevertheless, the fact that the much trailed ‘Troops to Teachers’ scheme has recruited just 102 entrants into teacher training over two years, when the government has said in answer to a Parliamentary Question put on 6^th March 2013 that they were planning to be able to support 1,000 entrants from that route on either School Direct Salaried or Training courses, does raise some questions.

Now those leaving the forces have often ended up in education. For many years Warrant Officers and NCOs leaving with a pension have taken their skills into the further education sector, and some officers similarly leaving with a pension have become bursars, mostly in the independent sector. So, were the government policymakers expecting these leavers to switch to mainstream teaching or had they indentified a group of earlier leavers from the army that might be attracted into teaching? I am sure someone in either the DfE or the NCTL asked the question; how many leavers of a graduate level or with the skills to acquire a degree leave the army each year; and how many might want to teach? I assume you can leave aside most of the specialist trades and professions within the army as they would normally head back into law, medicine, the church, or whatever trade, skill or vocation they had used in the army.

So, did that leave mostly the infantry and the gunners as the main source of potential teachers? I don’t know what the number of graduate level leavers there are each year from these two branches of the army, but I doubt it is anywhere near 1,000 even every two years. As a result, 61 this year might just be a good haul from the possible pool. I have been told that around 1,000 expressed an interest, and 300 were possibly eligible, so a one in six conversion rate for those eligible compares with a conversion rate per place of about 3.3 for higher education secondary courses according to one source in the comments to an earlier post on this blog.  

Now I suppose that there were those that felt former army personnel would have the necessary grasp of discipline to be able to deal with behaviour management: as if hormonal teenagers were no different to young soldiers. Personally, I think it more to do with the personal qualities any occupational group that works mostly with people requires. Those from such groups often make good teachers because they understand the need to relate to others. It is also why teachers make such attractive employees to other employers, a fact we should not overlook as the economy expands and business look for graduates with the inter-personal skills teachers have in abundance.

The question that needs asking is, who was responsible for talking up the possible delivery target for the ‘Troops to Teachers’ scheme, and did a Minister accepted the figures without asking any questions? If so, what was their special adviser doing?

In the Daily Mail today there is an attack on the free school meals policy for infants to be introduced in September by the Coalition. Oxfordshire is apparently cited as an area not entirely ready for the new policy and the Conservative Cabinet member is quoted. I thought readers of this blog might like to see the exchange in the Oxford Mail comment column between myself and the Cabinet member over the issue that went out at the end of May.
Should all five- to seven-year-olds get free school dinners?
The decision to offer free school lunches for all pupils in reception and Years 1 and 2 of state funded schools was announced by Nick Clegg, the deputy Prime Minister, at the Lib Dem Conference in Glasgow last autumn, and comes into force with the new school year this September, writes John Howson.
The free school meals policy is one I completely agree with.
From September, hard-working families won’t have to spend money on their children’s lunches during term-time.
Parents can save around £500 per child per year of pre-tax income by not having to pay for these meals.
This is money that can now be used for other things. It is being achieved without any bureaucracy or form filling and will especially help parents on zero hour contracts with irregular working weeks.
The new policy also does away with the unfortunate division within schools between free school meal pupils and the rest that accompanied the previous means tested policy in some schools.
Bringing children together at this age at lunchtime can help develop social habits such as eating together as a group. It can also teach the values of sharing, as well as respect for the needs and tastes of others.
Lib Dem policy will now ensure a free meal at midday for most infants. It is a cost-effective policy.
Of course, there are hurdles to overcome.
These include creating the spaces to cook and eat the meals, especially in schools built since the Thatcher era when school meals were regarded by successive governments with disdain.
This is despite the contribution school meals made to the well-being of generations of young children after their introduction by the Liberal government of 1906.
Many schools will receive money to refurbish their buildings, and small rural schools will receive an extra £3,000 each that will help around 80 Oxfordshire schools.
The Pupil Premium money schools receive can still be used for breakfast clubs, where appropriate, and all schools will still need to collect information on eligible pupils that will continue to receive the funding, but, as other authorities have shown, collecting this information presents no real problems.
Nationally, the free school meals policy reverses a mistake of the Thatcher/Blair era, and once again recognises the vital relationship between nutrition, learning, and behaviour in young children.
Melinda Tilley, Conservative Cabinet member for Oxfordshire Children, Education & Families
We all want to see children eating healthily and there’s nothing wrong with promoting school dinners. But while Nick Clegg’s flagship policy may prove popular with parents, I suspect most – or at least a great many – would accept they don’t really need the state to pay for their children’s lunches,
Rather than introducing this universal benefit, the money would be far better spent on ensuring disadvantaged children are getting the help they need to keep up with their classmates. And if it must be spent on providing food, then breakfast clubs would be a better bet, as some children are starting the school day without any breakfast at all, and that has a major impact on their ability to concentrate and learn.
It has been suggested the policy will save parents £400 a year. However, they will also help to fund the scheme along with all other taxpayers – many of whom will rightly ask why, at a time of austerity, the Government is spending their money on a free-lunch scheme for families who can afford to pay and have done so for years.
The policy has also been announced without consultation or apparent consideration of the practicalities involved.
As things stand, many schools don’t have the right kitchen facilities or enough dining space – and some don’t have on-site kitchens at all. That means building work is needed, not to mention extra tables, chairs and cutlery.
The Government has provided around £1.4million in total for non-academy primary schools in Oxfordshire to make the necessary arrangements in time for September. We are working hard to establish the exact requirements of individual schools and what can be achieved in such a short space of time with this very limited funding.
In apparent recognition of these issues, Mr Clegg has now said schools can provide packed lunches instead of hot meals if necessary – which has only served to confuse matters further.
The bottom line is that hot meal or cold, schools have got to make this happen and we are doing what we can to help them.