THE WHITE PAPER ? SHORT DIGEST OF THE EDUCATION AND SKILLS SELECT COMMITTEE REPORT
THE WHITE PAPER ? SHORT DIGEST OF THE EDUCATION AND SKILLS SELECT COMMITTEE REPORT, THE CONSERVATIVE MINORITY REPORT AND THE ?ALTERNATIVE WHITE PAPER?
EDUCATION AND SKILLS SELECT COMMITTEE REPORT
Background
The Education and Skills Select Committee announced an Inquiry into the White Paper in early November. Written evidence was submitted by 30 November and NGC and NASG were invited to give oral evidence on 12 December. The Select Committee?s Reports were published on 25 January 2006. There are in fact two reports: a ?majority? report issued by the Labour and Liberal-Democrat members of the Committee and a ?minority? report issued by the conservative members of the Committee. The two reports take a different view of the White Paper.
Majority Report
The Select Committee has judged the White Paper on the basis of the Secretary of State?s evidence to the Committee in which she said that ?This White Paper is all about driving up standards for the most disadvantaged children?.
The main conclusions of the Select Committee?s Report are:
- That the issues surrounding what happens in classrooms are the most important facet of the White Paper. That fundamentally the attainment levels in schools are the result of the pupil intake and the quality of leadership and teaching. All types of schools can be successful and no one type is a panacea.
Personalisation
- The additional funding requires more clarification especially in terms of how Government can be assured it is used for the purpose it is intended.
- Initial Teacher Training and In-Service Training will need to be carefully developed to ensure that the personalisation agenda is embedded in schools.
Every Child Matters
- That all schools should be subject to a formal duty to cooperate just as local authorities and other agencies are.
Local Authorities
- That Local Authorities should still be able to set up Community Schools.
Behaviour
- Welcome the Steer Report and the Government?s Response to it.
Trust Schools
- That the link between external partners and the success of a school has not been proven. Trust Schools are not new; they are simply a reworking of Foundation schools.
- That if Trust Schools are set up all the parent representatives on the governing bodies must be elected.
- Not convinced of the need for Trust Schools to own their own assets ? believe that local authorities with their strategic responsibilities should continue to have ownership.
- That Trust Schools should not be an overriding policy objective for the Department.
- That the Government should establish a list of bodies it considers appropriate to act as Trust Sponsors.
Admissions
- The Code of Practice must be enforceable with effective oversight and sanctions.
- That the Government should introduce Regulations to prohibit interviewing or other proxies for academic selection.
- Local authorities should be given a statutory duty to monitor admissions practices and make an objection to the Schools Adjudicator where it appears they do not comply with the Code.
- Welcomes the Government?s proposals to make the Adjudicator?s decisions binding for three years.
On a general note the Committee noted that the use of a practitioner?s group to report on learning behaviour was particularly effective and recommends that the Government use practitioner?s groups more widely.
The Minority Report ? Conservative Members
This report states that it does not believe that the Committee allowed sufficient time to receive and evaluate the evidence.
Welcomes
- More personalisation.
- The Steer Group recommendations.
- Expansion of the gifted and talented programme.
- CPD for staff and particularly headteachers.
Trust Schools
- Believe they should have true independence
- Should be a duty to promote Trust Status
- That the Government should leave the way open to compel schools to become Trust Schools, foundation or voluntary-aided schools.
- That at least 50% of the parents on a
Choice Diversity and Fair Access
- Do not believe the Code of Practice on admissions should be made regulatory.
- Believe that the surplus places are a reasonable price to pay to allow more choice.
- Parents should have more power in the process to establish new schools.
Shaping the Education Bill - Reaching for Consensus (The Alternative White Paper) by Estelle Morris, John Denham, Alan Whitehead, Nick Raynsford, David Chaytor, Angela Eagle and Martin Salter
Background
The ?Alternative White Paper? was published by a group of high-profile Labour MPs in reaction to the Government?s White Paper. It contains suggestions of how the proposals in the formal White Paper could be amended.
Central concerns
- proposals for self-governing (Trust Schools) do not come with an effective system of accountability or measures to ensure that the interests of all pupils are protected and advanced; and
- the potential for pupils from poorer areas being disadvantaged as popular schools expand, and wealthier and better informed parents are able to set up their own schools operating their own admissions policies.
Recommendations
- Proposals for the expansion of schools should not be given automatic approval; local authorities should be given power to refuse proposals on the grounds that they would not be in the overall interests of pupils in the authority. Decisions should be subject to ratification/overrule by the adjudicator.
Schools to Co-operate
- Education Bill should place a statutory duty on publicly funded schools to work together to achieve aims of Every Child Matters.
Admissions
- The revised Code of Practice on Admissions should provide a clear definition of fair access and list the criteria that are considered to be acceptable in a fair and non-selective admissions policy.
- The Code should be statutory and all publicly funded schools should be required to comply with its provisions.
- The Bill should set out how local authorities should monitor and ensure compliance.
- Local authorities should be given additional powers to co-ordinate the admissions process for all schools.
- Admissions Forums should become responsible for approving the suitability of local admission policies in the context of the broader interests of all children within the local authority?s jurisdiction.
School Organisation
- There should be no outright ban on new schools being developed as local authority community schools.
- There must be a genuine choice of school governance models with no in-built financial or other bias in favour of trusts and academies and against community schools.