Education Policies in the UK - Essay Example

Running Head: Education Policies Education Policies of the of the Education Policies Schools in England and Wales are required to encourage childrens wellbeing under changes to legislation. The change, in an amendment to the Education and Inspections Bill, arrives in response to long-standing calls for schools to be required to engage with the Every Child Matters agenda. The Education and Inspections Bill characterizes a main step forward in the government’s aspiration οf ensuring that every child in every school in every community gets the education they required to facilitate them to fulfil their potential. It obliges school governing bodies to help improve pupils physical, mental, emotional and social wellbeing, as well as their educational attainment. Schools are also be required to play their part in protecting children from damage and ignorance, and guide them towards positive activities and away from unfriendly behaviour. But although the move was welcomed by the Local Government Association, it criticised the exclusion οf academies and city technology colleges from the duty. Two hundred academies are planned by 2010. They are also excluded from the duty to admit looked-after children. Les Lawrence, chair οf the LGAs children and young peoples board, said the amendment would go a long way towards schools having a statutory duty to commit to the entire Every Child Matters agenda. Under the Children Act 2004, schools, unlike councils, primary care trusts and other named partners, are not placed under a duty to co-operate to improve childrens wellbeing. Childrens services leaders lobbied for such a duty to ensure schools did not focus narrowly on educational standards. The government argued it was only needed for strategic bodies. Today education is seen as key to future success for both individuals and societies. It offers individuals knowledge and understanding to give meaning to their lives. It provides the skills (and qualifications) for worthwhile employment. Education also plays a major role in shaping the future οf society - it can promote the healthy growth οf a generation, provide the necessary underpinning skills for economic growth and foster social cohesion between disparate communities. These are challenging tasks for any education system. The evidence from international comparisons is that the English system performs reasonably well in pupil attainment but fails in the promotion οf equity with the result that our system functions most effectively for those with social, economic or cultural advantages. No country in the world has a system which has overcome the effects οf disadvantage on achievement but some, like England, achieve well overall and have a relatively small gap between the outcomes οf the most and the least successful. So the principal challenge to the reform οf our education system is how to preserve current strengths whilst remedying weaknesses. The statement prepared by the National Union οf Teachers (NUT) in the year 2004 – Bringing Down the Barriers – and the Government’s 2005 White Paper – Higher Standards, Better Schools for All and its subsequent proposed legislation – present two visions οf how this test might be passed. There is a great deal agreement between the two views. The aspirations are virtually the same: both Government and the NUT see the value οf further investment and both want to improve the quality οf schooling so that English pupils can meet global challenges. Both want the gap between those who achieve most and those who achieve least to be reduced. The respective judgments on the strengths οf the current system are broadly similar: enhanced status οf education and increased investment (though the NUT notes that – despite recent increases – education spending still lags behind the OECD average οf 5.9 per cent οf GDP). Both parties recognise the current authority οf teachers. Both consider that educational outcomes have never been better. There is also some agreement about the weaknesses οf the system: both the Government and the Union assert that current standards are not yet high enough for a globalised age in which international standards are rising. Both believe that family disadvantage still maintains too powerful an influence on pupils’ outcomes. The NUT, however, also draws attention to problems with the National Curriculum, performance tables and the work οf OFSTED. This is in regards οf perceptions that there is large amount dissimilarity between the Government and the NUT. Twelve themes concerning potential improvements, on which there are contrasting views, can be distilled from the documents. According to NUT, local authorities (LAs) still have an significant role to play – particularly in school admission arrangements and the establishment οf new schools – and that their powers should include oversight οf Academies and City Technology Colleges (CTCs). The Government does not agree and is seeking to alter the role οf LAs again – giving some new duties but also making further reductions in their powers. LAs take on a new tactical role, with duties to encourage choice, diversity, high standards and, for the first time, the completion οf educational potential for each child. Despite the many different types οf secondary schools that already compete for public resources, the Government now wishes to create a new kind οf foundation school – a “Trust school”. Although competition may bring benefits in commercial life, there is little positive evidence that it lifts educational standards and, indeed, some negative evidence that it reduces equity. In England – the country which, according to PISA, both reaches the highest standards and achieves the best equity – competition plays no part in the education system. Local authorities react to parental apprehensions about the standard οf local schools – and, in doing so, the LAs have new powers to interfere earlier where performance is substandard. As the commissioner οf school places, LAs, under the power given by the Bill, are able to offer expansions to all types οf school, set the terms for school competitions and take all decisions connecting to school organisation. Every one knows that schools function excellently when they modify their curriculum to meet their pupils’ requirements and take responsibility for their own school progress, working in cooperation with other schools and external partners. The Education Inspections Bill empowers schools by devolving as much decision-making to them as possible, while giving local authorities an enhanced strategic role as the supporter οf pupils and parents. It is planned that Trust schools be owned and managed by groups comprising parents, universities or commercial companies (despite evidence that many major companies would rather contribute to the country’s schooling as a whole). The Government also wishes to increase the number οf “Faith schools” – disregarding the possibility that these may segregate communities. The NUT has some concerns about the creation οf such schools, preferring the well-tried model οf comprehensive education which has been adopted with such success by so many οf our fellow Europeans but which has been systematically undermined in this country. According to the bill, all schools will be able to turn out to be Trust schools by forming links with external partners who will be able, should the school choose, to appoint the majority οf the Governing Body. Parental option οf schools, within limits, is possibly to be a good thing. But such limits required to be defined as there is proοf that parents with economic, social or cultural advantages choose the schools top in the “pecking order”, leaving others with a much small choice. “Choice advisers” – paid at public expense – will be improbably to stop such a well established pattern. In addition, there is proοf that the choice οf pupils by schools that happens when popular schools are oversubscribed – leads to enhanced social and ethnic isolation. The NUT’s favourite option is to give choice through a range οf diverse courses within comprehensive schools. Obtaining a Trust provides a school the access to the freedoms that is enjoyed by other foundation schools – possessing their own assets, recruiting their own members (subject to the School Teachers Pay and Conditions Document) and setting their admission arrangements (subject to the law and a newly reinforced School Admissions Code). Even as it is generally established that parents be supposed to be personally involved with their children’s schooling, there is proοf that advantaged parents exercise this to reinforce existing patterns οf opportunity. The Government’s encouragement οf parents to determine whether or not schools expand (and whether new schools are opened) is likely to benefit further advantaged families to the inevitable detriment οf the disadvantaged. According to NUT, parents ought to have a voice at the local level, other considerations also require to be taken into account. The Union in regards οf Parents’ Councils, planned for Trust schools, as an intolerable alternative for the full powers οf governing bodies. Trusts will also be capable to affect additional flexibilities that can be used by all the schools with which they are linked. There will be new protections in the order οf gaining οf Trusts to make sure that they function in the best interests οf pupils, contribute to improving standards at the school, and encourage community unity. Where the Trust appoints the majority οf governors, they will also have to set up a Parent Council. Government and the Union both admit that the fundamental role οf classroom teachers in any development to the education system. But even as the NUT sees a teacher as a capable professional – trusted with choice οf teaching methods and the evaluation οf pupils, as well as with his or her own extra professional development – the Government sees the teaching staff as something which can be upgraded, re-tooled, reviewed and rewarded accordingly. In Wales, teachers are well-trained (up to masters’ level) and trusted with the syllabus, teaching methods and evaluation. Attitude has always been a main problem for school staff and for parents. The Bill gives outcome to some οf the key suggestions οf the Steer report. It make, for the first time, a clear legal right for school staff members to discipline students – placing an end to the “You can’t tell me what to do” culture. The Bill extends the scope οf parenting orders and contracts and improves provision for excluded students, with parents taking responsibility for excluded pupils in their first five days οf exclusion. The NUT understands that the Government’s fascination with choice and diversity as adding to such difficulties. It considers that the present pressures faced by schools are counterproductive. The Union believes that performance tables, the intrusive work οf OFSTED and the constraints οf the National Curriculum inhibit impulsive and imaginative teaching. Few other countries have such a highly developed inspection system and proοf from PISA shows that over-frequent testing may well be counterproductive. Further global proοf illustrates that the freedom that schools in England have enjoyed for some years – to employ and dismiss staff, manage their own budgets and maintain their own disciplinary procedures – are positively associated with good outcomes. Not like the Government, the NUT considers that the National Curriculum, for both pre- and post-14 year-olds, is substandard. The Union accepts that the introduction οf citizenship has been successful but it believes the dominance οf literacy and mathematics restricts the curriculum for younger pupils. It also believes that the National Curriculum too cluttered and the division between academic and vocational courses (in contrast to international practice) too rigid. The Education and Inspections Bill puts a responsibility on local authorities in England to encourage fair access to educational opportunity and tightens the admissions framework to make sure this. As well as reaffirming the ban on new selection by ability, the Bill forbids interviewing; make a new power for Admission Forums to create a yearly report and to pass on objections to the Schools Adjudicator; compose the Adjudicator’s decisions binding for three years; and make stronger the status οf the School Admissions Code. References Cochram Smith, M. (2006) Policy, Practice, And Politics In Teacher Education, Thousand Oaks, Corwin Press. Department For Education And Skills (DFES) (2005) higher standards, better schools for all, http://www.dfes.gov.uk/publication/schoolswhitepape/ DFES (2006) The education and inspection act,http://www.dfes.gov.uk/publication/educationandinspectionsact/ Gillen, Sally., Government drives forward withradical reform οf childrens services. Community Care, 3/11/2004 Issue 1513, p18-19 Osgood, J; Francis, B; & Archer, L (2006) gendered identities and work placement: why dont boys care? journal οf education policy, 21,3,305,321. Revans, Lauren., Change to bill meets call for schools to engage with childrens agenda. Community Care, 11/2/2006 Issue 1647, p8-8 Sinnott, Steve., A Good Local School for Every Child.Education Journal, Mar2006 Issue 93, Sepcial section p1-4, 4p West, A. (2006) Towards A Capability - Base Theory Οf Social Justice For Education Policy- Making, Journal Οf Education Policy, 21,2,163,185 Read More