NFER has published a report, Tutoring sustainability: Understanding the views of school leaders, after gathering the views of a nationally representative sample of senior leaders from primary and secondary schools in England. This included those who are currently participating in the NTP, have previously participated in the NTP, and have never participated in the NTP. The survey took place between 10 and 15 March 2023.

The results found nearly two thirds (65 per cent) of the 52 per cent of senior leaders currently using the programme are planning to continue using it in the 2023/24 academic year. Three quarters (76 per cent) currently using the NTP believe it is improving the attainment of their disadvantaged pupils, while 73 per cent believe the programme selection guidance allows them to prioritise pupils most in need of academic support.

However, views on the cost-effectiveness of the programme are split (42 per cent believe it is cost-effective and 45 per cent do not) while 58 per cent of surveyed leaders do not think tutoring is a long-term solution to closing the attainment gap for disadvantaged pupils.

The top five reasons given by senior leaders for dropping out of the NTP were:

1. Reduced subsidy (55 per cent)
2. Annual funding arrangements for the NTP made it difficult to forward plan (35 per cent)
3. Difficulties sourcing suitable tutors (28 per cent)
4. Administrative burden required to access the funding was too high (27 per cent)
5. Reporting requirements for the funding were too burdensome (23 per cent)

Dr Ben Styles, NFER’s Head of Classroom Practice and Workforce, said: “School leaders mostly believe the NTP is helping disadvantaged pupils, but many feel this support comes at too high a cost in terms of finances and administration.

“Tutoring is not yet embedded in schools. Long-term financial support is needed alongside reductions to the administrative burden on staff.

“Leaders would also benefit from much more notice on changes to funding arrangements, so they can forward plan and budget properly.

“Overcoming these barriers is vital if tutoring is to win the hearts and minds of schools and be seen as a sustainable way of helping to close the attainment disadvantage gap.”

The study also found:

• Almost all (91 per cent) senior leaders currently using the NTP feel it has allowed them to offer support to more disadvantaged pupils and more than two thirds (68 per cent) have been able to hire or use additional staff. But nearly half (47 per cent) reported that their school only offers tutoring during normal lesson times.
• Issues with NTP funding arrangements are the main reason schools are stopping delivery of the programme, but only 46 per cent of senior leaders agree that providing tutoring would be their top priority if more funding was available for supporting disadvantaged pupils.
• The ability to source suitable tutors, administrative burden and time required to implement the NTP are barriers to sustainability as they are reducing take-up and/or causing drop-out from the programme.
• More than half of all senior leaders surveyed (61 per cent) believe that other types of support are more effective than tutoring for improving attainment amongst disadvantaged pupils, including 42 per cent of senior leaders planning to continue using the NTP next year.
Among numerous recommendations, the report calls on the Government to:
• Explore how additional financial support can be made available to schools over a longer period, to allow tutoring to become embedded in schools.
• Provide schools with more notice about funding arrangements for new programmes to allow them to forward plan.
• Review and reduce the administrative requirements to access, implement and report upon NTP funding and that of other future programmes.
• Work with schools and tutoring organisations to understand their requirements for tutors and consider how best to recruit and retain tutors as part of a wider school workforce strategy.
• Undertake further research to investigate which aspects of tutoring and its implementation can be optimised to improve attainment outcomes for disadvantaged pupils, so that best practice can be shared among schools.

Sarah Martin-Denham (left), University Associate Professor of Care and Education at the University of Sunderland, appeared before the APPG inquiry on School Exclusions and Alternative Provision (AP), drawing on experts’ knowledge across the UK, to improve outcomes for vulnerable children, reduce preventable exclusions and improve the quality of education for children excluded from school.

Sarah’s recommendations to the panel included the scrapping of isolation booths in schools as a punitive approach, better training for the education workforce, from newly qualified teachers to those heading towards the end of their careers, ensuring the voices of children and their parents are heard, a national roll-out of assessment hubs which involve teachers, educational psychologists, mental health workers, to assess why the child is struggling in the school environment, the reason behind the behaviour, tailoring a package of support that works best for the individual.

For the past seven years, Sarah’s research has focused on childhood adversities, SEND (Special Educational Needs and Disability) and school exclusion. She has worked with over 200 children and young people from alternative provision schools who have been suspended or permanently excluded from school. As a result of her work, she has created a national training resource aimed at those working across the education sector.

Nine films created by young people, aged four to 16, from five North East local authorities, offer a unique insight into the impact of school exclusion on their lives. The resource #pullupachair has been shared with Government, including Ofsted, the Department for Education, Office of the Children’s Commissioner, Local Authorities, universities, charities, headteachers, teachers, parents, academic experts and educational psychologists.

Speaking to the panel, chaired by Andy Carter MP, and hosted in London, Sarah said: “I’ve been working with partnership organisations, predominantly in the north-east, to highlight varying experiences of pupils and their parents about what matters to them, and how we can work with them to prevent the children and young people from being excluded. With exclusion there is no universal consensus on how to be inclusive, it’s not defined in the National Curriculum, Early Years’ Framework or recent SEND and Alternative Provision Improvement Plan for example.

“All the parents and children I have spoken to talk about inclusion and what it means to them – it’s about a sense of belonging, they would like to have their voices heard.”

She added: “We are seeing positive outcomes in Sunderland with the introduction of assessment hubs, this is introduced to prevent exclusion, and has worked well.”

When asked what her recommendations should be across the education system, Sarah says: “We need to rethink isolation in schools. We should not be in a position where children who cannot meet behavioural standards in schools are being placed in a room, where they can’t even turn around and in some cases are not actually taught.

“As part of my research, we had some cases of children in isolation every-day for three years in statutory secondary education, children talked to me about scratching their face, pulling their hair out, rocking and being physically sick. I would encourage Ofsted inspections to increase their focus on the children who are not in the classrooms, asking questions about where these children are, what their attendance and mental health is like?

“We need to understand what the alternatives are, approaches to sanctions before isolation, where the pupils have to prove themselves out of isolation, rather than understanding the reasons behind their behaviours and building on relationships with these children.”

The Building strong trusts guidance sets out the Confederation of School Trust’s position on seven areas, or domains, on which trusts should focus to provide maximum benefit for pupils, staff, and wider society.

The work is based on discussion and feedback from across the academy sector, and develops a CST discussion paper published in February 2022. It suggests that trusts should develop a strong organisational culture across seven areas:

Strategic governance: The trust anchors its strategy in the needs of its schools, the communities they serve and the wider educational system in line with its charitable objects.
Expert, ethical leadership: The accounting officer and executive team create a culture of expert, ethical leadership based on the Seven Principles of Public Life. They create a culture of one organisation, built around the trust’s purpose and values.
High quality, inclusive education: The trust creates a culture that is motivating and ambitious for all, especially disadvantaged children, and children with SEND, so that all pupils can achieve their potential.
School improvement at scale: A strong conception of quality and culture of continuous improvement is pervasive across all the schools in the group.
Workforce resilience and wellbeing: The trust creates a positive working culture for all staff that promotes collaboration, aspiration, and support.
Finance and operations: Everyone in the organisation recognises the importance of effective and efficient use of resources for the wider benefit of all pupils.
Public benefit and civic duty: Part of the culture of the trust is to work beyond its own organisation with other trust leaders and civic actors the wider common good.

The guidance is designed to provide a counterpoint to the Department for Education’s draft trust quality descriptions, which were published earlier this week.

Confederation of School Trusts Chief Executive Leora Cruddas CBE said: “The fundamental purposes of the two documents are different. The DfE’s intention is to set out (in draft form) definitions of quality to inform the regional directors’ commissioning work. Our work is about supporting the sector to build organisational strength and resilience.

“To best do that, we need to think hard about how we create school environments where all children flourish, ensuring both the optimal continuing development of their intellectual potential and their ability to live well as rounded human beings. But we also need environments where the adults flourish, so we need to care deeply about our workforce.

“We need to think about the flourishing of our schools working together in deep and purposeful collaboration as one entity, under a single governance structure, to improve and maintain high educational standards across a trust.

“And we believe that as trusts are a new form of civic structure, anchor institutions in their communities, we need to consider their duty to contribute to the wider common good.”

The guidance is designed to be developmental and indicative, so that trusts have room to give creative and innovative expression to what it means to be a strong trust in their own unique circumstances.

These are just some of the insights highlighted by a new data dashboard, created by the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) and funded by the Nuffield Foundation. The dashboard draws on data from the School Workforce Census as well as other sources of published data such as school-level expenditure and provider-level Initial Teacher Training (ITT) data.

For the first time, users can access data on a number of key workforce indicators to help understand teacher supply challenges in English primary and secondary schools. Broken down by local authority, parliamentary constituency, school type and academic subject, the data offers insights into teacher retention, recruitment and shortages while comparing regional data with national averages.

The dashboard also reveals little difference in teacher retention between schools in Education Investment Areas (EIAs) and other areas. The rate of secondary early-career teachers leaving the state sector in 2020 was 11.5 per cent in EIAs, compared to 12.3 per cent in non-EIAs.

The new interactive tool also shows that children from schools with a high proportion of FSM pupils are more likely to be taught maths and science by teachers who do not have a relevant undergraduate degree.

NFER School Workforce Lead, Jack Worth, said: “The data dashboard is easy-to-use and easy to access. It will support local and national decision-makers to take action to address teacher shortages in areas struggling the most.

“This initiative is part of our continuing commitment to supporting policy makers in developing robust plans which improve teacher recruitment and retention.”

Dr Emily Tanner, Education Programme Head, the Nuffield Foundation, said: “This innovative dashboard provides key insights into the teacher workforce, showing how the quality of education that students receive varies according to where they live and the type of school they attend. Widening access to this data is an important step in achieving positive change.”

Following a public consultation, the Department for Education has confirmed changes to French, German and Spanish GCSEs, supported by a research review by Ofsted, to help students build confidence and excel in learning languages.

In the updated GCSEs, students will be assessed on the most common vocabulary used in conversations and writing, as well as grammar and pronunciation, increasing clarity for teachers and improving the practical benefits for students.

Research shows that a focus on these ‘building blocks’ enables students to more clearly see progress in their ability to understand and use the language, and in turn grow in confidence and motivation.

The changes aim to fulfil the government’s ambition for 90% of Year 10 pupils to study EBacc subjects for GCSE by September 2025. So far, over 95% of students have been entered for GCSE English, maths and science and over 80% in humanities subjects, and the government wants to increase the number of students studying language GCSEs too.

The consultation was based on recommendations from an expert panel chaired by Ian Bauckham and received 1,644 responses, with the majority from language teachers agreeing with the proposals. The plans for the new French, German and Spanish GCSEs reflect sector feedback, giving exam boards an additional year to develop them.

Schools Minister Robin Walker said: “Studying languages opens up a world of new, exciting opportunities for people and is hugely important for a modern global economy.

“That’s why we want more young people to take up modern language GCSEs, and these evidence-based changes aim to do just that – making these qualifications more well-rounded and accessible, and helping more young people to enjoy learning languages.”

The revised GCSEs will start to be taught in September 2024, with first exams being held in 2026. The changes to the language GCSEs include:

• Students will be assessed on the basis of 1,200 ‘word families’ at foundation tier GCSE and 1,700 ‘word families’ in higher tier GCSE
• An example of a word family could be ‘manage’, ‘managed’ and ‘manages’. Exam boards will select topics and themes to inform the selection of key vocabulary, as opposed being prescribed in the subject content
• At least 85 per cent of the ‘word families’ will be selected from the 2,000 most frequently occurring words in a language to make sure students have a good knowledge of the most common words

Ofqual has also confirmed the assessment approach today, following a public consultation, which sets out the revised assessment objectives and confirms that the current use of tiered assessments and non-exam assessment (NEA) will continue. Ofqual will now conduct a public technical consultation on the details of assessment requirements and then exam boards will develop GCSE specifications, ready to be taught from September 2024.

The programme has been initiated in response to the DfE identifying significant challenges in attracting and retaining talented leaders in DCS roles. For example, in 2018/2019 alone, over 25% of local authorities experienced a change in DCS. It was also found that the current average length of tenure as a DCS is 47 months.

The “Upon Leaders Programme” co-created by a consortium awarded with the tender comprising of The Staff College, Institute of Public Care, Skills for Care, and GatenbySanderson, aims to increase the pool of talent leaders that flow into DCS roles with up to 20 participants in the first year, providing support that results in DCS’ remaining in the post for a longer period of time.

The programme has been designed with guidance from current DCS’s, and is looking to attract a diverse range of applicants from both the public and private sector, to find and develop those with the core behaviours and skills that are needed in a DCS role.

The programme will develop leadership and management skills, including personal leadership qualities and resilience, systems leadership and building alliances and partnerships; working in political and corporate contexts; leading in complexity; engaging communities; delivering results; innovation and change.

The first programme is open to 20 candidates with at least 3 years effective senior leadership and management experience in local government children’s services or related fields and sectors.

The application process launches today, selection will occur in October, ahead of the first programme commencing in November and running until June 2021.

Jo Davidson, Director of upon, commented: “The role of a DCS is wide-ranging, challenging, yet incredibly rewarding. Due to the nature of the role, current DCS’s very rarely get the time to share what’s involved and just how much of an impact they make. Our aim is to demonstrate what life is like as a DCS and prepare our candidates for the journey they’ll take, stoking a fire in the belly of future leaders that truly want to make a positive change to children’s lives”.

For more information, or to apply to join the programme, visit: www.uponleaders-apply.co.uk

TRANSFORM-iN EDUCATION is designed to support teaching staff and pupils to have time and space within the day to break with convention which the campaign’s founders Dr Perpetua Kirby and Dr Rebecca Webb believe is necessary to ensure a creative and critical society where everyone is better able to respond to life situations where the answer is not always clear.

Dr Kirby and Dr Webb are looking to work with schools and other educational institutions, to support them to look beyond conformity within the school day, which they define as only learning what others already know to pass exams. The academics believe that while it is important to value existing knowledge, it is also vital to explore different ways of thinking and doing things.

Dr Webb, a Lecturer in Early Years and Primary Education at the University of Sussex, said: “In our current education system, children become successful by acquiring lots of curriculum knowledge and behaving in particular ways. Teachers, who, by implication, must never ‘not know’ and deviate from always explaining what things mean – this means constantly and continuously working ever harder to fill more efficiently and effectively the pupil with certain knowledge.

“We feel that this a really optimum time to launch this, it feels like there could be a positive reception for new thinking within the sector. Higher education encourages students to engage in transformative ‘disruptive thinking’, it’s certainly something we have put at the heart of what we do at the University of Sussex, and so it’s imperative that schools follow suit. ”

The campaigners say they want to help influence a change of policy on a national level and broaden the current models of education they have observed during in-depth research in schools which they say assumes certainty about the knowledge presented to students with very little time or opportunity for uncertainty.

They warn that there is currently too much emphasis on pupils conforming to the standards of good behaviour of prolonged sitting in silence and working hard to find the correct answer. Their research highlights that being good can camouflage an avoidance of effort for some pupils, including engaging in new and unexpected challenges where the answer is unclear.

Dr Webb and Dr Kirby stress the importance of having higher expectations for pupils – that go beyond simply learning what is in the curriculum – to create new knowledge. This includes sharing opinions, questioning the ways things have always been done, pursuing new questions and experimenting with different approaches. Their studies identify that pupils are already working with uncertainty, but mostly alone without the support of a teacher.

University of Sussex masters pupil, Mariyam Ahmed Toor, identifies the limits of current schooling for her generation. She said: “We don’t understand that it’s okay to feel uncertain and to not have answers all the time. In fact, somewhere along the way, we were taught in schools that uncertainty is bad which is so ironic because life is anything but certain. And so, instead of feeling liberated in our 20s, we feel overwhelmed and unsure because every move we make needs to be grounded in certainty.”

TRANSFORM-iN EDUCATION will bring together academic and non-academic stakeholders, especially teachers, parents, head teachers and students at schools and colleges, to promote more and better opportunities for different ways of experiencing knowledge in school. It’s founders hope to offer a forum to draw on the talents and expertise of teaching staff, who they say do not currently have the opportunities to step outside existing demands within schools.

The campaign will organise and attend events for researchers and teaching professionals to explore the balance of conformity and transformation in schooling, including the tensions in pursuing both goals.

Dr Kirby, an Associate in the School of Education and Social Work at the University of Sussex, said: “Our research has highlighted the need for the space to produce knowledge differently, what we call transformation. We need to listen to how teachers and students want to create spaces that are better suited to the rapidly changing context of the twenty-first century. This demands that we respond in ways not known or even imagined before, whilst not forgetting what we already know.”

www.transformineducation.org

The issue of school funding has come up as a theme in a number of recent enquiries and the National Assembly’s Children, Young People and Education Committee feel now is the time to take a wholesale look at this fundamental issue.

The Committee will be looking at the relationship and balance between the various sources of funding to schools, as well as how transparent these relationships are. This will predominantly include schools’ core budgets but will also look at specific funding streams such as the Pupil Development Grant (PDG), which is used to improve outcomes for learners eligible for free school meals (eFSM) and Looked After Children (LAC).

The inquiry will look at the sufficiency of provision for school budgets, in the context of other public service budgets and available resources, and amongst the inquiry’s other areas of focus will be the weighting given to education and school budgets specifically within the local government settlement formula and the process which local authorities then follow to set each school’s budget.

“Responding to concerns we have heard in other inquiries, this Committee will be looking closely at how Welsh schools are funded, where that funding comes from and whether it is enough to meet the needs of our schoolchildren,” said Lynne Neagle AM, Chair of the Children, Young People and Education Committee.

“We will be looking at whether the current level of provision for school budgets either complements or inhibits the delivery of the Welsh Government’s policy objectives.However, we are well aware of the current spending climate and the need to balance the needs of schools against the demands of other public services.

Our inquiry is therefore not just about the sufficiency of school funding but the way in which individual schools’ budgets are determined and allocated.”

A public consultation is open until Friday 14 December. Anyone wishing to contribute should first visit the Children, Young People and Education Committee web pages at www.assembly.wales/SeneddCYPE.

In NAHT’s Leaky Pipeline survey this year, respondents reported a rise in the failure to recruit to deputy and assistant head roles, with 78% of deputy roles being difficult or failed to recruit and 70% of assistant head roles posing a similar problem.

Ms Mulholland continued: “More and more is being expected of schools and their leaders and yet funding and support for schools is being cut. This creates more and more pressure. At the same time, the methods used to hold schools to account have become increasingly punitive. One bad year of test or exam results for your school can lead to losing your job.

“When the system is causing this many leaders to walk away, something needs to change. That’s why the announcement by the Secretary of State that the government will look again at how it holds schools to account is an important and welcome move.”

“Hundreds of millions of pounds have been found in order to pursue a policy on grammar schools that is proven to reduce opportunities for the most disadvantaged. This shreds the government’s credibility on evidence-based policy. These new schools will actively lower education standards in the areas they serve.

“The chosen model for delivery is the free school. Free schools are the least efficient way to create new spaces. A few thousand pupils will benefit. In the meantime, millions of students will face a narrower curriculum, larger classes, crumbling buildings and the erosion of extra-curricular activities as schools cope with over £3 billion in real terms cuts. The most vulnerable children, including those with special needs and those whose parents cannot supplement school activity, will be hardest hit.

“The Chancellor has offered £216 million for the repair of school buildings. This is a drop in the ocean compared to the £6.7 billion the National Audit Office estimate is required to bring the School estate up to an acceptable standard.

“In short the priorities of this budget are fundamentally wrong. School leaders will be left wondering if there is any potential for constructive engagement with this government. In the absence of consultation and proper evidence, in the light of such narrow policies, many will conclude there is not.”