A study found that teaching school children about their human rights and responsibilities could reduce exclusions and bullying, raise attainment, and improve respect between staff and pupils.
Source: Judy Sebba and Carol Robinson, Evaluation of UNICEF UK's Rights Respecting Schools Award, UNICEF UK
Links: Report | Summary | UNICEF press release | Sussex University press release | Children & Young People Now report | Guardian report
Date: 2010-Nov
A report said that excluding young people from school was expensive and did little to improve behaviour. The single biggest reason for exclusions was 'persistent disruptive behaviour': but early intervention or effective alternative provision could help stop behaviour escalating to a crisis point and therefore limit the need to exclude.
Source: Jane Evans, Not Present and Not Correct: Understanding and preventing school exclusions, Barnardo's
Links: Report | Barnardos press release | Guardian report | Children & Young People Now report
Date: 2010-Nov
A think-tank report called for 'deep-seated reform' of pupil referral units (the institutions to which most excluded schoolchildren were sent). New providers of the units were needed, including for-profit organizations. Organizations that offered longer-term or permanent placements for excluded pupils should be particularly encouraged.
Source: Tom Burkard and Daisy Meyland-Smith, Children Behaving Better: Reforming provision for excluded children, Centre for Policy Studies
Links: Report | CPS press release
Date: 2010-Nov
An article said that it made sense to minimize school exclusions – in terms of social justice, educational and child support, and saving money. It examined research into how local authorities, along with their communities, could successfully reduce or eliminate permanent exclusions.
Source: Carl Parsons, 'Achieving zero permanent exclusions from school, social justice and economy', FORUM: for promoting 3-19 comprehensive education, Volume 52 Number 3
Links: Abstract
Date: 2010-Nov
A think-tank report said that 'widely trumpeted' reductions in exclusions from schools were mostly a statistical illusion. Thousands of pupils, many with behavioural difficulties, were shifted out of schools to alternative providers and further education colleges. These 'managed moves' and 'referrals' did not show up in official exclusion statistics, even though they often constituted effective exclusion. The right of a school to remove a pupil from its site should be recognized: but this needed to be balanced by giving rights to those excluded pupils to choose what provision replaced their mainstream schooling.
Source: Tom Ogg with Emily Kaill, A New Secret Garden? Alternative provision, exclusion and children's rights, Civitas
Links: Report | Civitas press release | Telegraph report | Guardian report | Children & Young People Now report
Date: 2010-Nov
A report examined the impact of a programme designed to promote the social and emotional skills that underpinned effective learning, positive behaviour, regular attendance, staff effectiveness, and the emotional health and well-being of all who learned and worked in secondary schools.
Source: Neil Humphrey, Ann Lendrum and Michael Wigelsworth, Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning (SEAL) Programme in Secondary Schools: National Evaluation, Research Report RR049, Department for Education
Date: 2010-Oct
A study examined usage of the four main 'parental responsibility measures', designed to help tackle attendance/exclusion problems in schools in England. Use of the measures had increased significantly in recent years, but had been hampered by limited funding and resources to support them.
Source: Kathryn Crowther and Sally Kendall, Investigating the Use of Parental Responsibility Measures for School Attendance and Behaviour: Final Report, Research Report RR041, Department for Education
Date: 2010-Sep
A new book examined the processes of exclusion and alienation from school and related them to a changing social and economic context. Policy on schooling, including curriculum reform, needed to be reconnected to the broad political pursuit of social justice.
Source: Jean Kane, Social Class, Gender and Exclusion from School, Routledge
Links: Summary
Date: 2010-Sep
The inspectorate for education and children's services highlighted the challenges faced by local authorities in England in identifying and tracking children who were missing from education. None of the 15 local authorities surveyed felt confident that they knew about all the children living in their area in order to fulfil their duties to keep children safe.
Source: Children Missing from Education: The actions taken to prevent children from missing education or becoming 'lost to the system', HMI 100041, Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills
Links: Report | OFSTED press release | NASUWT press release | Guardian report | Community Care report | Children & Young People Now report | BBC report
Date: 2010-Aug
The new coalition government announced plans to strengthen teachers' powers to search pupils; to repeal the legislation that required schools to give parents 24 hours' written notice of detentions outside school hours; to issue guidance explicitly stating that teachers could physically remove disruptive children from class and prevent them from leaving a room in situations where this was necessary to maintain order; and to give anonymity to teachers facing accusations from pupils.
Source: Written Ministerial Statement 7 July 2010, column 12WS, House of Commons Hansard/TSO
Links: Hansard | Voice press release | NASUWT press release | ASCL press release | ATL press release | NUT press release
Date: 2010-Jul
A report said that that government proposals to scrap excluded school students' right of appeal could disproportionately impact on black pupils.
Source: Debbie Weekes Bernard (ed.), Did They Get It Right? A re-examination of school exclusions and race equality, Runnymede Trust
Links: Report | Runnymede Trust press release
Date: 2010-Jul
The rate of overall absence in primary schools in England in 2008-09 was 5.3 per cent (compared with 5.26 per cent in 2007-08). The rate for state-funded secondary schools was 7.25 per cent (7.36 per cent in 2007-08).
Source: Pupil Absence in Schools in England, Including Pupil Characteristics: 2008/09, Statistical First Release 07/2010, Department for Children, Schools and Families
Links: SFR | ASCL press release | Conservative Party press release | Guardian report | Children & Young People Now report
Date: 2010-Mar
