Birds of a feather

Posted on June 17, 2013 by John Howson

Nothing I have read so far about the Social Mobility Commission Report into access to Russell Group universities that was published earlier today has mentioned the need for state schools to be able to access the best teachers. https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/206994/FINAL_Higher_Education_-_The_Fair_Access_Challenge.pdf

The present gap between state and private school pupils’ access to this group of universities is certainly dire in many cases, but unless we can adequately staff our state schools it won’t improve. On top of that problem there is the unspoken issue of revision classes and private tutoring often used when some parents are concerned that their child’s school may not be delivering the grades required for entry to a particular university.

Much has been made by some commentators of the fact that state school pupils study the wrong subjects for entry to Russell Group universities, but this doesn’t seem to be an issue in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland where, Edinburgh University apart, the Russell Group institutions generally meet or exceed their state school targets. Leaving aside for a moment the Oxbridge issue, there seem to be a group of Russell Group universities that stand out as being the farthest from their benchmarks; Bristol and Durham in particular, followed by Exeter, Newcastle and a group of London institutions that includes Imperial, UCL and LSE. Although Leeds isn’t in this list, the size of the university means if it did more to attract state school pupils it could also make an impact on the shortfall.

It is to be hoped that these state school pupils that don’t make it Russell Group universities do still attend a university, and that they are rewarded with teaching that stretches their able minds. Then there is the issue, touched on in the Commission’s report, of what happens after university. If employers only attend Russell Group universities looking for new talent, then unequal access to these universities is certainly acting as a filter. But, as the Report identifies, requiring upfront fees for postgraduate study can also be a powerful barrier where private sector employers require a post-graduate qualification. Of course, the egalitarian Mr Gove has solved that problem in education by allowing some schools to take into teaching those with no training at all. But, in reality, that is a different argument. There is also the question of how instrumental candidates from state schools are in selecting both ‘A’ level subjects and degree courses. It is no doubt better to be employed with a degree from a local university than both a NEET and a Russell Group graduate. However, the evidence of the need for state school pupils to achieve higher grades to obtain entry clearly suggests that something unfortunate is going on in England. The Commission might like to republish its findings with just students domiciled in England included: the position then might be even starker than at present.

As I hinted earlier, the need to continue to ensure a supply of sufficient teachers for all schools is a necessary condition if even the present situation is to be maintained, let alone improved. Regular readers will know of my fear in that respect. If they come true, who attends what university still be a matter of even more concern in 2020, and probably well into the next decade.

Ethnic minority teachers: some progress, but where are we heading?

Posted on June 16, 2013 by John Howson

In the autumn of 1997 the new Labour government held three conferences designed to raise awareness about the need to recruit more teachers from ethnic minority groups. Over the following 15 years the TTA, and its successor the TDA, continually tried to encourage more recruits into teaching from among students with an ethnic minority background. Their success was mixed. As the following table shows, students from a White background were more likely to be accepted into teaching than were those students from minority backgrounds, at least as far as courses for graduates to train as a teacher were concerned.

Applications and acceptances by ethnic grouping – UK domicile UK degree 2007-2010
Ethnic Group	Applications	Accepted	% accepted	% of the total accepted
Asian	14,787	3,176	21.40%	6%
Black	6,008	905	15.00%	2%
Other/Unknown	9,441	2,475	26.00%	5%
White	147,833	48,359	32.70%	88%
Total	178,069	54,915

Source: The Author

As a result, it has been estimated that if there were thee hundred graduate would-be teachers; 100 each from the Asian, Black and White groupings: 24 of the white group, 14 of the Asian group, and just nine of the Black group would be likely to fulfil their aspiration of teaching in a state funded school classroom. Even in the sciences, where shortages have been the greatest, out of three hundred would-be science teachers there would be 34 White teachers, 17 Asian teachers and 11 Black teachers.

This suggests that is a need to understand why this discrepancy between the groups arises, especially so since with School Direct decisions now being made at the level of the individual schools. There is evidence that even when students from an ethnic minority have gained QTS they find it more of a challenge to secure a teaching post.

A second concern is that when ethnic minorities do secure teaching posts they tend to do so in areas where there are large numbers of pupils from ethnic minorities in the schools. A study of the 2012 School Workforce Survey revealed 115 schools where two thirds or more of their teaching staff were from ethnic minority groups. Overwhelmingly, these schools were in London. Of the 31 local authority areas with at least one school that had two thirds or greater ethnic minority staff, 23 were London Boroughs, and only Birmingham among the other eight authorities outside of London had more than two schools where the staffroom was comprised of more than two thirds ethnic minority teachers. The London Borough of Brent had by far the largest number of schools; 28 in all that met the two-thirds criteria. Many of these schools, along with those in other authorities, were primary schools, including the school I attended for six years as a primary age pupil, but there were some secondary school in the list. The other London Boroughs with more than five schools with high concentrations of staff from ethnic minorities included; Ealing; Hackney; Lambeth; Newham; Tower Hamlets and Haringey.

This concentration of teachers from ethnic minorities in a small number of schools raises the issue of whether this might increasingly create schools that are monocultural in nature, and whether this is desirable in a multi-cultural society? Outside of the big cities, teachers from ethnic minorities are probably far rarer sights for white pupils than the Asian corner-shop and the Chinese, Thai or Bangladeshi Restaurant. Can this developing divide be healthy for society?

Teaching a feminised profession?

Posted on June 13, 2013 by John Howson

In the real world you probably don’t come across a normal distribution curve as often as you do in the textbooks. As a result, it is interesting when one pops up during the analysis of a dataset. In this case the dataset is of the number of male teachers in each secondary school in England as recorded in the DfE’s 2012 School Workforce Census. Sadly, it is not really possible to do the same analysis for the primary sector because a very large number of schools either have the data shown as not available or it has been suppressed. Quite why it is necessary to suppress data in this category is a bit of a mystery, but that is government statistics for you

The modal class for schools is between 40-41% of teachers being male, with most secondary schools falling somewhere in the range of 20-70% of their teaching staff being men.

It would be interesting to compare this graph with that of ten or twenty years ago if the data was available; sadly, it probably isn’t or at least not in an easily obtainable format. However we can say that male teachers in the secondary sector accounted for around 75,000 of the 181,000 full-time teachers in the secondary sector in 2012 compared with 119,000 out of 220,000 in 1985. This is reduction from 54% of the teaching force to 41% in just under thirty years.

In a few years time it is likely that six out of ten secondary teachers will be women; and the percentage teaching lower secondary pupils is likely to become even higher as the remaining men take a disproportionate number of the senior posts in schools. Whether secondary education will eventually end up like primary schools, with an essentially feminised workforce is too early to predict, but in London and the Home Counties, where demand for graduates across the labour market is at its greatest, it seems likely that unless wage rates remain competitive men will vanish from many secondary schools.

Whether this is an important issue or just a matter of note probably depends upon your position. I first identified the trend towards more women in secondary schools in 1995, nearly twenty years ago (The Guardian 13^th January 1995), and also at that point raised the question of where would be male role models for the increasing number of boys in single parent families? That debate hasn’t gone away, although it is much more recognised as a fact of life than it was then, and professionals from all walks of life are probably more aware of the possible issues it can raise.

That’s after all one of the reasons for monitoring data. The fact that earlier today Ofsted reported that many secondary schools didn’t seem to be aware of the evidence that some pupils who leave primary school with top grades weren’t making the expected progress at secondary school just highlights how important using management information can be in schools, even if you don’t come across a normal distribution curve as often as you might expect.

Troops into teachers or children into soldiers

Posted on June 10, 2013 by John Howson

Last week the government announced it was going to create a route to allow ex-military personnel to become teachers. Essentially, for graduates in the military, the route will be the same as for other graduates, but with more cash, and possibly some ring-fenced places on either one or all of the routes into the classroom.

The main interest in the media was in the training to be offered to non-graduates. As the non-graduate scheme envisages the bulk of the trainee’s time during training will be spent in school, presumably it is assumed that sufficient subject knowledge will have been acquired during a military career to make the time spending acquiring a degree unnecessary. Now I might be persuaded that a physical education instructor; a chaplain – if any enter the forces these days without degrees; or even a musician, might have acquired enough specialist subject knowledge to teach their subject in a secondary school. But, outside of areas where the work in the forces is at least congruent in some ways with what is taught in schools I cannot see how military life would prepare someone for subject teaching in schools. Many former military staff members have for a long while made worthwhile contributions to the further education sector where their specialist vocational skills can be in high demand. Perhaps the government is thinking that many on the ‘troops to teachers’ programme will work in the burgeoning 14-18 sector of UTCs and studio schools.

Much has been made of the attitude to discipline those with a military background might bring into schools, but discipline in a uniformed service, where a refusal to obey a lawful order might result in a charge, is not the same as either helping a frustrated teenager act out their angst against society during a bad day at school or even just any class or youngsters that feels like playing up a new teacher to test the boundaries of their authority. This is not to deny the great strides the forces have taken in recent years in moving away from a ‘do as I say’ mentality. However, war does require obedience to orders, in a way that society more generally has moved away from. And in the end, the armed forces training is designed to prepare personnel for armed conflict.

Nevertheless, the BBC quoted David Laws as saying that military values such as leadership, discipline, motivation, and teamwork would benefit children.

“We want to capture the ethos and talents of those leaving the armed forces and bring this experience into teaching. We know that our highly-skilled servicemen and women can inspire young people and help raise educational attainment.”

But, perhaps more worrying was the section of the DfE press notice that said:

“We are already working to bring military ethos into our education system to help raise standards and tackle issues such as behaviour. In June the Prime Minister announced a £10.85m expansion of the school-based cadets to create around 100 more units by 2015. Extending the scheme in state schools will allow even more young people to benefit from the life-changing opportunities that cadet forces offer.”

At a time when the armed forces are being severely pruned, perhaps it would have been better for any uniformed units created in schools to have been based upon a civilian service model, and not on a military model dreamed up after the South African war over a century ago. As a means of instilling values such as, discipline, motivation, and teamwork it would bring the same benefits to children without the militaristic overtones. Next year we will be remembering the foundation of army formations such as the Glasgow Boys’ Brigade (16th Battalion, Highland Light Infantry) Battalion as one of the many ‘Pals’ battalions formed at the start of World War One. How far the cadet forces aided recruitment in 1914 is an interesting discussion point.

By all means let’s ensure discipline in schools is as good as it can be, but not at the price of creating a militaristic culture in our schools. So, I welcome ex-service personnel who want to become teachers, just as I welcome those from other walks of life, but schools must no longer be expected to become the training grounds for our next generation of the armed forces. Let it be an adult decision to take the Queen’s shilling.

Funding per pupil, spending by schools: does it give value for money

Posted on June 4, 2013 by John Howson

‘Many of the important operational financial decisions of schools are largely idiosyncratic.’ This was the finding of a DfE sponsored research project that reported in 2012. Earlier today David Laws as Minister of State issued a written ministerial statement on future funding for schools in 2014-15. In the end, whatever decisions are made about how to fund schools, the spending decisions are now taken at the school level. How idiosyncratic schools’ individual decisions are can be determined, at least in historical terms, by an analysis of the raw data the DfE now publishes on its web site

Recent data for academies allows comparisons between such schools expenditure patterns. The latest data is for the school-year 2010-11 since it seemingly takes longer for the private sector to produce accounts than for state owned schools, where data up to March 2012 has been in the public domain for some time now. It would be invidious to look at academies starting in 2010, since they would not have a full complement of pupils, and there are always extra start-up costs. However, taking four academies outside London with starting dates between 2003 and 2008 provides an interesting picture of expenditure over four different categories.

Teaching

All academies with Key Stage 4: National median expenditure £3,544

The 4 academies £2,047 £3,512 £3,700 £4594

Cleaning

All academies with Key Stage 4: National median expenditure £29

The 4 academies £65 £72 £99 £123

Staff Development

All academies with Key Stage 4: National median expenditure £71

The 4 academies £24 £53 £81 £92

Educational Supplies

All academies with Key Stage 4: National median expenditure £603

The 4 academies £602 £779 £880 £885

On every element there is a wide range of expenditure between the four academies. It is important that boards of directors of academies do these sorts of comparisons just as much as governing bodies of community schools so that they can justify the use of what is still in the final analysis public money.

The new funding arrangements for 2014-15 may be the last before a major reform that will grapple with the vexed question of regional funding levels, as well as those at the individual school level. The greater flexibility for the funding of small schools in rural areas highlighted in the ministerial statement will no doubt be welcomed by many in the shire counties and unitary authorities in rural areas, but the approach could mean the end of some small urban primary schools unless they have relatively low overheads and staffing costs towards the lower end of the range. There won’t be many TLRs in those schools, and the new pay arrangements might mean these were the first schools to face the staff with the choice of an increment or the closure of the school.

School funding arrangements will never please everyone, but it is clear that value for money benchmarks that governors and directors of schools can benchmark their own schools against might be a useful aid to constructing budgets and helping ministers decide the funding mechanisms for the future.

Good schools for all or just for some?

Posted on June 3, 2013 by John Howson

Should society concentrate on making entry to good schools fairer rather than trying to expand the number of good schools? The Sutton Trust Report published earlier today about eligibility for free school meals at the top state schools seemingly opts for supporting the former approach. That’s not surprising since it paints a dismal picture where in the top 500 comprehensive schools the overall rate of pupils eligible for free school meals is half the national average, and only 40 of the 500 top comprehensive schools have higher free school meals than the national average. Indeed, since the Sutton Trust first looked at the issue of the number of pupils on free school meals in top performing schools little has changed, except that more pupils are entitled to free school meals as a result of the recession.

Top State Schools Local Area of school National Average

2005 Study 3% 12.3% 14.3% Mostly selective schools

2006 Study 5.6% 13.7% 14.3% 200 comprehensive schools

2013 Study 7.6% 15.2% 16.5% 500 comprehensive schools

Schools in the top 500 are, according to the Sutton Trust study, more likely to be faith schools; single sex schools; converter academies; voluntary aided schools. Some schools may fall into more than one of these categories. All of these types of schools control their own admissions policies.

The alternative approach, making all schools good schools, is the driver that underpins the coalition’s Pupil Premium policy of adding extra revenue support to pupils on free school meals. The top 500 comprehensive schools won’t see much of this money. The Pupil Premium policy tackles the issue of where children are now, not where the authors of the Sutton Trust study might like them to be. Interestingly, the study is silent about what would happen to pupils displaced from the top 500 schools by those on free school meals? Is it assumed that their parents would lead the drive to improve the schools their offspring ended up at?

Ever since the attempts in the 1960s and 1970s to create a rational secondary school system to replace a system designed for an age when the majority of pupils left school at 14 to join the workforce, secondary schooling has all too often been about social segregation in the urban areas, rather than a force for greater social cohesion. The philosophy inherent in the Sutton Trust report seems to be that of offering an escape route to better education for the deserving poor rather than accepting the view that being poor should not mean having to accept a lower standard of schooling from the State for your children.

A good school for all has always been the standard I want our education system to strive for. Looking at what has happened in London over the past decade shows what can be done. I believe it starts with good quality primary schools for all. As a nation we aren’t there yet, and indeed we are often too fixated about the secondary sector. I firmly believe that good primary education will mean more good secondary schools, and ease the debate about admissions policy. After all, those children who live in really rural areas generally have no choice in the matter about where they go to school: they deserve to go to a top school as much as any other child.

Missing the target is a known. By how much is still a known unknown.

Posted on June 1, 2013 by John Howson

This week’s Education Journal carried a piece by Chris Waterman, my co-author of the new book on Teacher Training Places in 2013. His article was entitled ‘Teacher supply: how the Rumsfeldian model is coming along’ and it considers the knowns; known unknowns; unknown unknowns; and the ‘don’t want to know questions’ around the current confusing teacher preparation landscape. I won’t rehearse the various discussions under each of the headings, save to say that earlier this week I worked out that less than a quarter of training places in Chemistry on the School Direct route were being shown as filled on the DfE web site compared with about double that figure for the higher education routes in the subject.

Now, as I have maintained before that difference in acceptances could well be because of schools requiring higher standards than universities from their would-be trainees. If so, then there is little more than three months left to find the trainees to fill the remaining places at a time when the market for graduates appears to be reviving. If the schools and universities haven’t selected from those who have already applied, why should those who apply now be any better in calibre? An analysis of application patterns over recent years has shown that once the rush of applications from finalists who haven’t yet thought about life after university is over there are relatively few other applicants as the summer months pass by. Now, this year may be different, but it is difficult to see why it should be if the overall market for graduates is better than in recent years, as those yet to make a decision about their future have more choice than in recent years, unlike their colleagues in many other European countries.

One thing that might help recruitment is a review of the benefits from the various routes. On some routes you receive a salary, plus pension contributions, plus pay National insurance that unlocks other State benefits, whereas on other routes you are a students and get nothing more than the right to repay the loan as a tax of 9% for the first 30 years you are in teaching. It is indeed unlikely that many students with a degree plus a PGCE will ever repay the full amount of their loans unless the government changes the rules. How long the Treasury will accept this situation is an interesting question as there are already rumblings about the long-term cost to the Exchequer. I think it would be sensible to return to a level playing field where all who wanted to become a teacher were treated in the same way. After all, the Ministry of Defence doesn’t give officer cadets destined for the infantry a different financial package to those entering the armoured regiments or the engineers. I am quite surprised that a clever lawyer hasn’t cited the Human Rights legislation to show it is unfair to fund the education of some intending teachers in one way, and those of others in another less rewarding manner.

As half-term week comes to an end, and second half of the summer term starts is slide towards the summer holidays, I am confident enough to predict that the glory days of recent years, when every subject except computer science was filling all their places for trainee teachers, has come to an end. The question is: how large will be the deficit across the board by the time courses start in September?

One in five trade unionists works in the education sector

Posted on May 29, 2013 by John Howson

One of the advantages of the DfE moving its statistical output to the central government web site is that it allows those looking for data about education to browse much more easily a much wider field than before. Now there is no longer any need to consult a range of web sites in the hope that there might be some data about education buried there.

Thus it was that I discovered in the figures on Trade Union membership issued earlier today that the education sector is now the most unionised of any occupational group covered by the government’s classification system. Those who want to delve into the data can find it at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/trade-union-statistics-2012

Trade Union membership in the education sector includes not only teachers but also all other staff classified as working in the sector. In 2012, the education sector employed 11.7% of those covered by the survey, but accounted for 23.8% of trade union membership.

Across the education sector, although the percentage of employees in trade unions has declined from 55% in 1995 to 52% in 2012, the percentage of women in the sector in trade unions increased from 50.5% to 52.6% during the same period; the only sector to record an increase in female participation in trade unions during the whole period. This was a time in history when overall membership of trade unions declined, from 32.4% to 26% of workers, and more than halved in the financial and insurance activities sector, from 37.3% in 1995 to 15.9% in 2012.

In the education sector there were just over 1,000,000 trade union members in 1995; by 2012, membership numbers had increased to more than 1.5 million, no doubt partly due to the increase in teaching assistants and other support staff employed in the sector during the past decade. Union membership is strongest amongst full-time, and female workers, and those with permanent posts, although the education sector has the second highest degree of union membership among part-time workers.

England has the lowest percentage trade union membership in the education sector, at 50.3%; compared with 58.8% in Wales; 61.1% in Scotland; and 68.1% in Northern Ireland. Sadly, there is no table to show whether the present Secretary of State in England has inspired an increase in membership across England since 2010. However, there are regional differences across England, with Yorkshire and the Humber having the highest level of membership at 62.4% overall, including more than 69% of full-time staff, and the South East the lowest, at 44.7%. Apart from London, where the percentage membership is 50.7%, membership percentages are higher in the northern regions and lower in the midlands and south of England.

In England, at least among teachers, there will be a big test for trade unions this year with the introduction of what amounts to pay bargaining at a local level for the first time in almost a hundred years for many teachers. Whether it is largely ignored by schools who stick to national ‘guidelines’ or becomes a real bone of contention will become apparent over the next twelve months.

What is clear is that the public sector unions, and those representing workers at all levels in the education sector, now account for a significant proportion of trade unionists. At an earlier piece on this blog showed, a survey last year didn’t always find the teacher members as in favour of action as their leaders.

Some Studio Schools encounter student attendance challenge

Posted on May 28, 2013 by John Howson

Are the government’s new studio schools getting off to a difficult start? Recent DfE figures for pupil absence during the autumn term of 2012-13 do at the very least raise questions about what is happening. https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/200820/Main_text_-_SFR17_2013.pdf

Five of the ten schools with the highest absence rates, across both primary and secondary sectors, were either studio schools or in one case a University Technical College. As all five of these schools had relatively small enrolments, the behaviour of just one or two reluctant transferees may have unduly affected the outcomes. Nevertheless, against a national rate of 5.2%, or 5.7% for the secondary sector as a whole, absence rates of more than 14% do seem a little on the high side.

Although the majority of the studio schools in the list were in manufacturing centres, with school systems that have faced considerable challenges over the years, it does seem odd that despite the variety of different specialism in these new studio schools so many have these high levels of pupil absence. It might have been though that a fresh start in a new school with a definite vocational slant to the curriculum, and often backed by well known employers, might have inspired pupils to attend regularly. On that basis, it is important to identify what, if anything is going wrong? Indeed, although two studio schools are ranked better than 4,000 in the list of all schools for overall absence rates, the other three schools with studio in their title are in the 600 worst performing school for absence rates.

By focussing on vocational trades, it may be that the early studio schools that a skewed distribution of ability and it will take time to enthuse the pupils about the value of their education after nearly a decade when school has not been the most welcoming of places for many of them. What really must not happen is that these schools become dumping grounds for the failures of the mainstream school system. The new schools coming on stream in 2013 and 2014, including the space studio school in Banbury, need to learn the lessons, not least about transfer to a new school at age 14, that these schools have had to encounter in their early stages of development. It would certainly not be acceptable to either turn a blind eye to high levels of absence in these new types of school or to accept it as a part of the deal for the future of education in England.

As the responsibility for these schools lies with Ministers in Westminster, so officials in the DfE, as would any competent local authority, must ask these schools for the preliminary figures for term two. If these so no improvement over term one of the academic year, action must be taken now. Not to do so will reveal to the education community that while it is acceptable for central government to castigate local authorities for poor outcomes, government schools are able to produce even worse outcomes with impunity.

Tear down the ring fence?

Posted on May 21, 2013 by John Howson

The Think Tank Reform today published a report about spending on schools. http://www.reform.co.uk/resources/0000/0765/Must_do_better_Spending_on_schools.pdf

As a right of centre think tank it might be accused of having arranged some of the data to make the most of its thesis that spending on schooling has increased without an associated rise in outcomes. Taking the period from 1999-2000 as a base for some of the analysis means the analysis started from the end of a period when government spending had been depressed during the Major government and the first two years of the Blair government, so some recovery in spending on schooling as a proportion of GDP might have been expected.

The overall thesis is that the ring fence on school spending should be removed, and the same degree of efficiency imposed on schools as on other public services. Now the issue of funding of schools has featured in several earlier posts on this blog. Interestingly, I cannot find any reference in the Reform pamphlet to the growth in school reserves. This issue, the subject of the first column in this blog, is one that has disturbed me for some time. In an age of austerity why are schools taking cash from taxpayers and putting it in their bank accounts rather than spending it? Why, indeed are some schools sitting on balances of over £1 million pounds: the number of schools with deficit budgets was at an historic low in 2012.

Reform also seem to neglect to note that during the period 1999-2003, before spending on schooling increased significantly, there was a teacher supply crisis. They don’t model anything about labour costs in detail. A failure to staff schools does lead to poor performance, and one reason I expect the next PISA results to be better is because schools have been better staffed during the past decade than at any time during my adult life. My anxiety is that an end is now in sight to that period of full staffing unless the government is very careful.

One issue the Reform report does note in passing is the difference between spending on primary and secondary schooling. According to the figures used by Reform, secondary schools accounted for 46% of spending in 2011-12, whereas primary accounted for only 27%; or 33% if under-fives spending was included. In my own view targeted spending on primary pupils who fail to achieve where they could do so might produce the best return on investment within the school system. The Pupil Premium has the capability to achieve this end, providing schools fully understand its purpose.

Indeed, adopting the suggestions in the Reform Report, and abandoning the ring fence on school spending while still aiming to improve educational outcomes and pupil attainment, might affect more affluent areas more than the less well off parts of England. Reform’s supporters might well reflect that it was David Blunkett as Secretary of State who imposed a maximum class size of 30 at Key Stage One. The major beneficiaries of his policy were mostly schools in Tory authorities where large class of over 30 were more frequently to be found at that time. Removing the funding cap might cause a return to that situation. It might also sound the death knell for small and expensive post-16 provision in some schools that is already under threat from other government actions such as the introduction of studio schools and UTCs. Reform’s authors should be careful about what they wish for.