Queen's Speech - Education
Stakeholder Response: Secondary Heads Association
SHA told epolitix.com that they believe the new Education Bill is unnecessary.
Following the Queen’s speech, the Secondary Heads Association has reproached the government for announcing yet another education bill when it should be building on existing policies.
SHA general secretary, Dr John Dunford said: “We have had a new education bill every year for the past 20 years. Schools do not need yet more new initiatives and policies. They need the government to consolidate and implement the vast number of policies that have been announced in recent years.”
Commenting on plans to give more powers to Ofsted to close failing schools, John Dunford said: “There is no need for this. What is required is a good support system, not new structures. We are strongly opposed to giving powers to Ofsted to close schools. This should only be done by local authorities which have the long-term strategic responsibility for school places and understand the needs of their local communities.
"Ofsted is already viewed too much as a punitive organisation and we hope that its new inspection system, starting in September, will strike a better balance between pressure and support.”
Stakeholder Response: NUT
Commenting on the education proposals outlined in the Queen’s Speech, Steve Sinnott, NUT general secretary, said: “The government is going ahead with its plans to increase the number of academies across the country. Yet no evaluation of the existing academies’ performance has been published and exposed to public scrutiny.
“What we do know is that two have been inspected. One has been told it is ‘improving’ whilst the other, according to the press, is a failing school. Yet the government trumpets academy status as the answer to the problems of our inner cities.
“I want the government to move speedily into its new listening mode: it should heed the select committee’s call for the programme to be halted until the existing academies have been evaluated and their impact on surrounding schools examined.
“Teachers welcome parents involvement in their children’s education but the suggestion of giving them more effective ways of bringing about change sounds ominous. Teachers will fear that unrepresentative groups kicking up a fuss at the school gates could have too much influence over a school to the detriment of all the children.
“Parents have a vital role but for government they either rule the roost or are reduced to simply being consulted on whether their school should become a foundation school. Parents will be unable to prevent a small group of governors altering radically the position of the school for all time without present or future parents having a right to decide.
“The extension of foundation status to primary schools is neither wanted nor necessary. Foundation status undermines productive co-operation between schools and local authorities.”
Commenting on today’s Queen’s speech, Dr Mary Bousted, general secretary of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL), said: “Parents and teachers will welcome greater support for pupils’ learning.
“However, the government’s emphasis on consumer choice is misguided and will not address the problems of social exclusion for our poorest pupils. They need a good local school, with excellent facilities, supported by teachers with a good knowledge of the local community, if they are to overcome, through their education, lifelong disadvantage.
“ATL does not accept that Ofsted should be given the power to close schools. Ofsted judgements are not infallible. The state provides education and the decision to close a school is so grave and affects so many pupils that it should be taken at the highest level.”
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