The Department for Education and Skills published its autumn performance report, detailing progress being made towards its public sector agreement targets.
Source: Autumn Performance Report 2006, Cm 6992, Department for for Education and Skills, TSO (0870 600 5522)
Links: Report
Date: 2006-Dec
The government published a progress report on its five-year strategy for children and learners, published in 2004. It said that there had been progress on all fronts: better results in schools; more and better-quality affordable childcare; a 'revolution' in services for children; greatly improved training and vocational education; and more students than ever before entering higher education.
Source: The Five Year Strategy for Children and Learners: Maintaining the Excellent Progress, Department for Education and Skills (0845 602 2260)
Links: Report
Date: 2006-Dec
The Education and Inspections Act 2006 was given Royal assent. The Act was designed to drive up standards in schools, especially in deprived areas. Every school would have the opportunity to acquire 'trust' status. Trust schools would enjoy greater flexibilities and independence from local education authorities. A late amendment placed a statutory duty on schools in England and Wales to promote children s well-being.
Source: Education and Inspections Act 2006, Department for Education and Skills, TSO (0870 600 5522)
Links: Text of Act | Guide to Act | HOC brief | TSN press release | Community Care report
Date: 2006-Nov
The government published a progress report on its five-year strategy for children and learners, published in 2004, which set out its ambitions for education and children s services, and how it planned to use the resources allocated under the 2004 Spending Review. It said that 'rapid and decisive progress' had been made in delivering the commitments in the strategy.
Source: The Five Year Strategy for Children and Learners: Maintaining the Excellent Progress, Department for Education and Skills (0845 602 2260)
Links: Report
Date: 2006-Nov
The Welsh Assembly Government launched a strategic plan for education, lifelong learning, and skills in Wales until 2010.
Source: The Learning Country: Vision into Action, Welsh Assembly Government (029 2082 5111)
Links: Strategy | Strategy (Welsh)
Date: 2006-Oct
A think-tank report made proposals designed to promote parents' 'right to choose' within the school system. Parents would be entitled to remove their children from schools that were failing, and choose any other school (state or private) instead: state funding would follow these choices. There would be a non-refundable tax credit to provide parents with a pound for pound reduction in their income tax liability (up to an agreed limit) for each child they had in non-state education.
Source: James Stanfield with Michael Sandstr m, James Tooley and Pauline Dixon, The Right to Choose? Yes, Prime Minister!, Adam Smith Institute (020 7222 4995)
Links: Report
Date: 2006-Oct
An independent inquiry was launched into primary education in England. It was designed to assess the impact of political initiatives such as the national curriculum and reading and literacy drives. The review was supported by the Esm e Fairbairn Foundation, and based at Cambridge University Faculty of Education.
Source: Press release 13 October 2006, Primary Review (info@margrave.co.uk)
Links: Primary Review press release | NUT press release | Guardian report
Date: 2006-Oct
An article examined the role of public private partnerships in the Scottish education system. PPPs in education and elsewhere in the public sector were part of a broader attempt by New Labour to present itself as the party of business , in Scotland as well as in England - despite the potential for policy divergence opened up by the devolution process.
Source: Lynne Poole and Gerry Mooney, 'Privatizing education in Scotland? New Labour, modernization and "public" services', Critical Social Policy, Volume 26 Issue 3
Links: Abstract
Date: 2006-Aug
A paper reviewed the international evidence on the impact of schools reform on educational attainment and other outcomes. It highlighted the importance, particularly in relation to reforms to extend parental choice, of getting the 'detailed system design conditions' right.
Source: School Reform: A survey of recent international experience, Strategy Unit/Cabinet Office (020 7276 1881) and Department for Education and Skills
Links: Paper
Date: 2006-Jun
The government published a broad legislative framework designed to implement new arrangements for post-primary education in Northern Ireland. It included the abolition of academic selection, subject to a vote in the Northern Ireland Assembly (if the Assembly were restored by 25 November 2006).
Source: The Education (Northern Ireland) Order 2006, Northern Ireland Office, TSO (0870 600 5522)
Links: Draft order | Explanatory memorandum | NIO press release | BBC report
Date: 2006-Jun
A report by a joint committee of MPs and peers said that the status of trust schools, academies, and city technology colleges might result in their pupils having inferior human rights protections, and urged the government to make it clear that these schools were public authorities.
Source: Legislative Scrutiny: Ninth Progress Report, Eighteenth Report (Session 2005-06), HC 177 and HL 1098, Joint Committee on Human Rights (House of Lords and House of Commons) Select Committee, TSO (0870 600 5522)
Links: Report | TES report
Date: 2006-May
The Department for Education and Skills published its annual departmental report for 2005-06.
Source: Departmental Report 2006, Cm 6812, Department for Education and Skills, TSO (0870 600 5522)
Links: Report
Date: 2006-May
A series of articles critically examined the Labour government's education policies.
Source: FORUM: for promoting 3-19 comprehensive education, Volume 48 Number 1
Links: Table of contents
Date: 2006-May
The Education and Inspections Bill was given a third reading. The Bill was designed to drive up standards in schools, especially in deprived areas. Every school would have the opportunity to acquire 'trust' status. Trust schools would enjoy greater flexibilities and independence from local education authorities. Around 46 Labour MPs rebelled, many arguing that the Bill undermined the role of local education authorities, and the vote was carried due to the support of the opposition Conservative Party.
Source: Education and Inspections Bill, Department for Education and Skills, TSO (0870 600 5522) | House of Commons Hansard, Debate 24 May 2006, columns 1484-1600, TSO
Links: Text of Bill | Explanatory notes | Hansard | HOC brief | Guardian report
Date: 2006-May
An article said that devolution had created the circumstances in which education policies in Wales had become increasingly distinct from those in England: but the impacts of Wales's new policy system might turn out to be more restricted than needed to be the case.
Source: Gareth Rees, 'Democratic devolution and education policy in Wales: the emergence of a national system?', Contemporary Wales, Volume 17 Number 1
Links: Abstract
Date: 2006-Apr
An article examined the criticisms of education research that had been made by government and related non-departmental public bodies and stakeholders. It said that researchers should beware of allowing their work to be shaped entirely by the government's call for research that was directly useful to policy by always prioritizing applied or practice-based approaches.
Source: Geoff Whitty, 'Education(al) research and education policy making: is conflict inevitable?', Educational Research, Volume 32 Number 2
Links: Abstract
Date: 2006-Apr
A new book said that children who did not pass the 11-plus examination were condemned to lower standards of education than if they went to a comprehensive school in an area where there was no selection.
Source: Mark Hewlett, Richard Pring and Margaret Tulloch (eds.), Comprehensive Education: Evolution, Achievements and New Directions, University of Northampton Press (01604 492337)
Links: Summary | TES report | Guardian report
Date: 2006-Apr
The Education and Inspections Bill was given a second reading. The Bill was designed to drive up standards in schools, especially in deprived areas. Every school would have the opportunity to acquire 'trust' status. Trust schools would enjoy greater flexibilities and independence from local education authorities. Around 50 Labour MPs rebelled, and the vote was carried due to the support of the opposition Conservative Party.
Source: Education and Inspections Bill, Department for Education and Skills, TSO (0870 600 5522) | House of Commons Hansard, Debate 15 March 2006, columns 1462-1567, TSO
Links: Text of Bill | Explanatory notes | Hansard | HOC brief | BBC report | Guardian report
Date: 2006-Mar
An article said that 'tracking' - early selection of students into different schools based by ability - increased educational inequalities, and also tended to reduce average performance.
Source: Ludger Woessmann and Eric Hanushek, 'Does educational tracking affect performance and inequality? Differences-in-differences evidence across countries', Economic Journal, March 2006
Links: Abstract
Date: 2006-Mar
An article examined how the 'capability' approach (drawn from development studies) offered an alternative to the dominant human capital ideas in educational policy.
Source: Melanie Walker, 'Towards a capability-based theory of social justice for education policy-making', Journal of Education Policy, Volume 21 Number 2
Links: Abstract
Date: 2006-Mar
The Prime Minister said that neither he nor any future prime minister would ever abolish grammar schools in England.
Source: Interview with Tony Blair MP (Prime Minister), The Guardian, 14 February 2006
Links: Guardian report
Date: 2006-Feb
The government responded to a report by a committee of MPs on the White Paper on school reform (published in October 2005).
Source: The Government's Response to the House of Commons Education and Skills Committee Report: The Schools White Paper - Higher Standards, Better Schools For All, Cm 6747, Department for Education and Skills, TSO (0870 600 5522)
Links: Response | MPs report
Date: 2006-Feb
The Education and Inspections Bill was published. The government said that the Bill was designed to drive up standards in schools, especially in deprived areas. Every school would have the opportunity to acquire 'trust' status. Trust schools would enjoy greater flexibilities and independence from local education authorities, employing their own staff and managing their own assets. Parents would be able to ask for new schools to be set up to reflect local need and demand. But the Bill also provided a guarantee that primary legislation would ensure no return to selection by ability, together with a series of measures to toughen up school admissions practices, including a bar on interviewing.
Source: Education and Inspections Bill, Department for Education and Skills, TSO (0870 600 5522)
Links: Text of Bill | Explanatory notes | DfES press release | NUT press release | ASCL press release | GTCE press release | LGA press release | BAAF press release | Barnardo's press release | Guardian report
Date: 2006-Feb
A report said that local authorities should be required to produce an annual report detailing proposed school admissions policies in their areas, to ensure all children had fair access to education.
Source: School Admissions A Proposal, Children's Services Network (020 7554 2800)
Links: Report | Community Care report
Date: 2006-Feb
A think-tank report called for a four-pronged approach to school reform, involving greater choice for parents; an end to selection; greater autonomy for schools; and better targeted funding.
Source: Paul Marshall, Jennifer Moses and Edward Seed, Aiming Higher: A better future for England s schools, CentreForum (020 7340 1160)
Links: CentreForum homepage
Date: 2006-Feb
A report by a joint committee of MPs and peers said that there was a serious question as to whether trust schools (proposed in a government White Paper and Bill) would be regarded as public authorities under the Human Rights Act 1998, and therefore whether the fundamental rights of parents and children would be protected within them without further legal clarification.
Source: Schools White Paper, Ninth Report, (Session 2005-06), HC 887 and HL 113, Joint Committee on Human Rights (House of Lords and House of Commons) Select Committee, TSO (0870 600 5522)
Links: Report
Date: 2006-Feb
A think-tank report said that in a truly modernized, well funded, well supported comprehensive system, quality could co-exist with equality.
Source: Melissa Benn and Fiona Millar, A Comprehensive Future: Quality and equality for all our children, Compass (neal@compassonline.org.uk)
Links: Guardian report
Date: 2006-Jan
A report by a committee of MPs said that 'trust' schools (proposed in a government White Paper) were not a new concept: the government had simply re-branded one type of foundation school and sought to promote it as the way forward for schools. Much more detail and clarity were needed on the process involved in becoming a trust school, if the government wanted to allay fears about how they would operate.
Source: The Schools White Paper: Higher Standards, Better Schools For All, First Report, (Session 2005-06), HC 633, House of Commons Education and Skills Select Committee, TSO (0870 600 5522)
Links: Report | NASUWT press release
Date: 2006-Jan
The Audit Commission responded to the White Paper on schools. It expressed reservations about the consequences of schools making autonomous and unchecked decisions about admissions arrangements: such decisions were more likely to work against the interests of the most disadvantaged, least mobile, and worst informed parents and children.
Source: 'Higher Standards, Better Schools for All: More choice for parents and pupils - Consultation response, Audit Commission (0800 502030)
Links: Response | Guardian report
Date: 2006-Jan
A think-tank paper said that plans by the opposition Conservative party for independent state schools should deliver a 'genuinely dynamic and diverse' education system; and that plans for a new funding system should mean that everyone, not just the middle classes, would benefit. But in a number of key areas the party seemed unwilling to follow its own reforms to their logical conclusion.
Source: Julian Astle, A Very Conservative Revolution: Tory education policy examined, CentreForum (020 7340 1160)
Date: 2006-Jan
The Cambridge Primary Review published its final report on the condition and future of English primary education. It said that England's primary schools were under intense pressure, but in general were doing a good job. Since 1997 investment in primary education had risen dramatically, and many policies had had a positive impact. But it recommended that the beginning of formal teaching should be delayed until age 6, and that SATs tests should be replaced by teacher assessment across a broader range of subjects.
Source: Robin Alexander (ed.), Children, Their World, Their Education: Final report and recommendations of the Cambridge Primary Review, Routledge (01264 343071)
Links: Summary | Briefing | Review press release | Cambridge University press release | NASUWT press release | Voice press release | ATL press release | Daycare Trust press release | Telegraph report (1) | Telegraph report (2) | Guardian report | BBC report
Date: 2006-Jan
An article examined the relationship between education policy and the economy, and identified ways in which the existing economic crisis was likely to shape education policy in the short and medium term. Although the consequences for education policy were likely to be deeply damaging, there were new opportunities to reassert the case for education as a public good based on the values of local democracy and economic stability.
Source: Howard Stevenson, 'Feeling the crunch: education policy and economic crisis', FORUM: for promoting 3-19 comprehensive education, Volume 51 Number 3
Links: Abstract
Date: 2006-Jan
The opposition Conservative Party announced plans to replace the worst-performing schools with academies. Where schools 'failed to teach the basics' properly, where discipline was poor, and where the leadership had failed, new leadership teams would be installed with a proven track record of academic success. A Conservative government would immediately begin the process of replacing the leadership of any school that had been in special measures for over a year by the end of the following (2010-11) school year. The schools inspection framework would be 'radically simplified' to focus on core activities: outstanding schools would be exempt from inspection, and failing schools would be given more attention.
Source: Speech by Michael Gove MP (Shadow Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families), 7 October 2009
Links: Text of speech | Conservative Party press release | NASUWT press release | Voice press release | ATL press release | BBC report | FT report | Guardian report
Date: 2006-Jan
