22. Memorandum submitted by the National
Union of Teachers (DP 24)
1. The National Union of Teachers welcomes
the opportunity to make a contribution to the Education and Skills
Committee's inquiry into the diversity of provision in secondary
education.
2. The NUT would emphasise that the vision
of public education should respond to the talents and aspirations
of all students in a diverse society. It is a vision that teachers
in the comprehensive maintained system have realised time and
time again. Teachers have proved that they would welcome and facilitate
change where the purpose and motivation is to enhance their ability
to meet the needs of their pupils.
3. The NUT recognises and, indeed, has been
in the forefront of arguing for the transformation of education.
A recently published DEMOS/National Union of Teachers' Report,
"Classroom Assistants Why Teachers must Transform Teaching",
makes it clear that "Most teachers argue consistently that
centrally-driven education reforms meant that they experienced
changes and a never-ending barrage of externally imposed, randomly
timed, and badly managed initiatives that they have little constructive
role in helping to shape".
4. There needs to be an understanding of
the need for genuine partnership between teachers, their organisations,
and Government. At the beginning of its 1997-2001 administration,
the Labour Government said that it would concentrate on standards,
not structures. Yet, the Government now focuses on the future
of secondary schools as being able to deliver "autonomy"
and "diversity". Such concepts bear no relation to the
experience of teachers and the changes needed to enhance the quality
of education in schools. Instead, they have a remarkable similarity
to the previous Conservative Government's provision of "diversity
and choice". The Government's concepts still hold to the
failed ideas of fragmentation and competition, rather than integration
and incorporation.
5. So arid was the previous Conservative
Government's vision that, in 1996, the Audit Commission, in its
report "Trading Places", observed that the structural
consequences of the concept of "diversity and choice"
were leading to "planning gridlock" instead of equality
of access to secondary schools.
6. Instead of reflecting on the failed principles
of the previous Conservative Government's approach to secondary
education, the Government should have promoted principles similar
to those adopted by the National Assembly of Wales. In its White
Paper, "The Learning Country", the Assembly focused
on high standards and expectations; the removal of barriers to
learning; the celebration of the professional judgment of teachers,
lecturers and trainers; evidence-based policies; and the development
of policies and programmes based on partnership. These principles
are far more visionary than notions of "autonomy" and
"diversity" and far more relevant.
7. The NUT would urge the Government to
ensure that a full debate continues with all key organisations,
including trade unions, on the future of 14-19 education with
any proposals arising from that debate being properly resourced
and having lead-in times for implementation with which schools
and students can cope.
8. A 14-19 system of education does not
imply that the needs or aptitudes of students are the same throughout
their teenage years. Neither does it mean that the strengths within
vocational and occupational routes should be ignored. The organisation
of the curriculum in secondary schools should, however, guarantee
an entitlement to a balanced and broadly-based curriculum.
9. There are many ways of achieving this
approach, including credit accumulation and approaches based on
the Baccalaureate. A Welsh Baccalaureate is about to be piloted
and the NUT suggests that the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority
conducts developmental work on the lines of a similar Baccalaureate
for England. In short, the NUT believes that new forms of entitlement
can be explored which secure professional consensus.
DIVERSITY OF
PROVISION
10. It is clear that many secondary schools
are being forced down the specialist school route simply because
of the additional resources being made available. An average increased
funding of 3.5% for specialist schools, compared with non-specialist
schools, both illustrates the funding inequities involved and
the very real financial, rather than educational, incentives to
bid.
11. The Government appears to envisage a
three-tier rather than a two-tier system of education. The introduction
of moving towards specialist status, combined with specialist
and advanced specialist status, compounds the detrimental effects
of a tiered system.
12. The advantages available to specialist
schools will be such that they can attract large numbers of parental
preferences, simply because of their status, irrespective of the
quality of education offered by other secondary schools.
13. Evidence is now becoming available that
specialist status has limited benefits. The report, "Specialist
Schools An Evaluation of Progress", from Ofsted (October
2001), is revealing. Despite additional funding and the innovation
and acceleration in school improvement, triggered by the designation
of specialist status, Ofsted notes that, "the trend of improvement
in GCSE average points score in specialist schools has been slightly
greater than the national rate." On the other hand, one in
five specialist schools were, "disappointing", in their
use of opportunities and resources. In addition, "the community
dimension was the weakest element of specialist schools' work".
14. New research from Cardiff University
has revealed also that the numbers of pupils receiving free school
meals in specialist schools is less than other schools.
15. The NUT would always wish to celebrate
the achievement of all schools in improving pupils' achievements.
It is no surprise that schools find recognition. and extra funding
a catalyst for school improvement!
16. Internationally also, the evidence is
stacked against the tiered approach to secondary education, urged
by the Government. OECD's Programme for International Student
Assessment (2000) found that "the more differentiated and
selective an education system is, the larger are the typical performance
differences between students from more and less advantaged backgrounds"
(Improving Both Quality and Equality: Insights from PISA 2000-OECD
2002). In other words, applied to England, this finding means
that the intention of a tiered system—that of achieving
equality of access to high quality education—achieves precisely
the opposite of that which is intended. Tiered systems lead to
inequality of access.
17. The Prime Minister, in his Labour Party
Conference speech, recognised the importance of the recent OECD
research, PISA 2000, describing it as an "authoritative voice".
18. The Government has made the grave mistake
of mixing up the designation of specialist status for certain
schools with a need for specialisms and specialist provision within
schools. The NUT has argued consistently that networks of specialist
provision should be established and be open to pupils with particular
levels of aptitude or ability from all schools within the community.
The NUT would suggest that pupils remain registered at their own
schools and spend most of their time there. Specialist provision
could act as a resource for all local schools and teachers, providing
in-service training and specialist equipment and knowledge. Specialist
centres could be based in particular schools, but there would
be no form of selective admission arrangements or preferential
funding for schools themselves.
19. As Jane Davidson, Minister for Education
and Life Long Learning, said in Wales:
"Schools should be encouraged to work in
partnership and collaboration within individual schools, building
on their strengths. A basic reliance on centrally driven, competitively
inspired, and community damaging approaches", are hardly
likely to provide an environment in which specialist schools can
move towards partnerships and collaboration within the wider community
of schools.
20. The NUT believes that there is no case
for allowing "successful" schools "flexibility
over some elements of teachers' pay and conditions". The
introduction of such flexibility for some schools could lead to
current problems in recruitment and retention being exacerbated
and to fundamental and irrational inequities being introduced
into teachers' pay and conditions. The NUT would urge the Government
not to adopt such an approach.
21. The NUT is also deeply concerned about
the Government's intention to enable successful and popular schools
to expand more easily. The expansion envisaged by the Government
is precisely the approach against which the Audit Commission warned
in its 1996 report "Trading Places". If a School Organisation
Committee in a local authority has been given the responsibility
to determine a number of school places in each school, then that
effort to achieve a reasonable geographical spread of provision
should not be undermined by statutory guidance which favours the
expansion of certain types of schools.
22. The NUT sees no good argument for LEAs
having identified the need for a new maintained school in an area,
to invite interested parties to bring forward proposals to establish
such a school. The Government has made much of its claim that
it is investing upwards of £3.5 billion in capital funding
on school buildings. It is clear that such investment does not
apply to new school buildings or the establishment of new schools.
23. Local authorities, according to Government,
are only one among the potential interested parties who might
publish proposals for the establishment of new schools. Clearly,
the Government believes that private/public partnerships are to
be the main, if not the only, way forward. Schools could be tied
into long-term contracts that are both constrictive and damaging
to the capacity of local School Organisation Committees to organise
effectively the best possible form of provision.
24. The NUT urges the Government to commit
itself to providing the funding necessary to establish new schools
where there is a need, without the constriction of having to adapt
to the priorities of either partner.
FAITH SCHOOLS
25. The 1944 settlement, in relation to
Church of England, Roman Catholic and non-conformist schools,
was both pragmatic and fragile. There has been a continuing debate,
at local level, about the relationship between denominational
and maintained schools. While there have sometimes been specific
and contentious local debates about admissions policies, local
authorities and diocesan bodies have sought to resolve them. The
Government's suggestion that the ethos of faith schools give them
intrinsic advantage over non-denominational schools, is unsupported
by evidence. It is enormously damaging to existing relationships.
26. The NUT has called on the Government
to take cognisance of Sir Herman Ouseley's report, "Community
Pride not Prejudice", which highlighted the dangers of segregation
for social harmony at the very least. The Government must allow
time for a fuller debate on the issue of faith schools.
27. The Full Service Schools programme in
the United States and the New Community Schools programme in Scotland
provide positive models for any development in England. Effective
health and social services provision can be situated in secondary
schools, particularly in disadvantaged areas, to address a wide
range of needs which impact on pupils' attainment. Initiatives
which promote multi-agency approaches to tackling socio-economics
impediments to learning at school level can assist schools in
facilitating access to essential support services, thus allowing
teachers to focus on improving their pupils' academic achievements.
CITY ACADEMIES
28. The NUT has consistently opposed the
City Academy proposals (renamed Academies in the Education Act
2002). The NUT opposes the transfer of resources, including school
premises, from publicly-funded education to the private sector
and believes that the initiative will have a detrimental effect
on neighbouring schools and the ability of local education authorities
to provide a coherent and comprehensive education system for local
communities which is locally accountable.
29. The NUT has grave concerns about the
transfer arrangements for staff, their pay and conditions and
job security, the governance of academies, the role of sponsors,
the curriculum offered to pupils and the admission arrangements.
30. The NUT has monitored developments on
the Academy's initiative since its inception and has a detailed
overview, including progress reports on individual academies,
based on a variety of sources, including information from the
NUT's local officers, on this topic.
31. Academies are to be funded more favourably
than LEA schools, receiving additional funding of, typically,
£2 million from sponsors and between £8 million and
£20 million from the DfES, plus specialist school funding.
This differential funding inevitably will have an impact on the
funding available for other schools.
32. The DfES timetable for the Academies
has slipped due to difficulties with sponsors, start dates, transfer
of assets and a variety of other problems so that, to date, only
three Academies (Haringey, Middlesbrough and Bexley) have opened
in September 2002. As detailed in the NUT's documentation, all
have opened with residual problems.
33. There are many similarities between
Academies and City Technology Colleges, including some of the
same individual sponsors. Like CTCs and Education Action Zones,
it has proved difficult to raise business sponsorship for this
Government initiative, which has led to reliance on contributions
from individuals.
34. The schools involved are usually facing
very challenging circumstances with deficit budgets, falling roles
and poor school buildings. The Government views the Academy initiative
as a replacement for the high profile failure of "Fresh Start"
as an option where a new school needs to be opened.
35. The Government strategy for education
in London includes proposals for up to 25 Academies. This will
magnify the funding differentials between schools and contribute
to the incoherence of the admissions arrangements for London schools.
MANAGEMENT OF
SCHOOLS BY
PRIVATE COMPANIES
36. As part of the Select Committee's consideration
of diversity of provision, Members will also be aware that Surrey
LEA has taken a lead in contracting out the management of three
of its secondary schools to private companies—two to the
3 Es Company and the third to Nord Anglia. The arrangement has
involved substantial capital investment by the LEA to improve
school premises.
37. Although it is too early to judge whether
this experiment has been successful in terms of sustained pupil
achievement, this example is likely to be given a boost by the
Education Action 2002 for schools identified as having serious
weaknesses or special measures, or where there is a need for a
new school.
THE FORMATION
OF SCHOOL
COMPANIES
38. The Select Committee should also be
aware that the Government's regulations enabling schools to form
school companies will contribute to the emerging hierarchy of
schools. School companies, taken together with the proposals in
the Education Act 2002 to allow for schools to achieve "earned
autonomy" and advanced specialist school status, would be
perceived as an "elite" to the detriment of schools
without a distinctive nomenclature, not least in relation to teacher
recruitment and retention.
39. The NUT has other significant reservations
about the formation of school companies which is diversionary
from the main purpose of schools, including the possibility that
private companies will be able to become involved in the operation
of schools, including the delivery of the curriculum.
EDUCATION IN
SCOTLAND
40. The NUT would ask the Select Committee
to note the Economic and Social Research Council's project (ESRC),
"a Home International Comparison of Education and Training
Systems in the UK", which involved comparing educational
attainment in England and Scotland. Comprehensive education in
Scotland was found to be more comprehensive and more uniform.
Comprehensive education was introduced wholeheartedly in Scotland
for all 12-18 year olds, all schools having a sixth form and all
schools having equal status. There are no single sex schools and
there is no selection. In England, however, differences in status
remains. For example, some form of secondary modern schools have
no sixth forms, all former grammar schools do.
41. This research project revealed there
was a high level of parental support for comprehensive schools
in Scotland. The Government has tried to introduce opting out
but only one school had been persuaded to follow such a route.
The research project examined outcomes for young people. It showed
that Scotland had comparatively high levels of attainment within
a fully comprehensive system. The research studied differences
in attainment by social class. The gap in attainment was smaller
in Scotland and Wales than for England.
42. Social segregation had an impact on
attainment. Where there was a good social mix, the attainment
of all students was higher on average, with a bigger gap between
the highest and lowest performance in England than in Scotland
and Wales. An examination of entry into higher education in the
UK for 1998- 99 revealed that there was 47% participation in higher
education in Scotland. In 1965, 70% of students in Scotland left
school with no form of qualifications, but this had been reduced
by 17% by 1998. The Research Project seemed to indicate that this
was an indication of increasing inclusiveness of Scottish education.
A NON-SELECTIVE
EDUCATION SYSTEM
43. The relative achievements of secondary
schools between areas with and without grammar schools are significant.
In areas with grammar schools, 29% of comprehensive school students
achieved five GCSE A-C grades, whereas in nonselective areas,
48% of such students achieved a similar level. This comparison
suggests that in areas where grammar schools remain, comprehensive
schools whose intakes are diverse have much less chance of achieving
well in terms of the league table criteria (Chitty and Benn Thirty
Years on" (1996)).
44. The NUT believes that the needs of young
people in the 21st century are best met through secondary schools
offering high quality education, free of charge and open to all
pupils regardless of ability range. It is through such a comprehensive
system that a parity of esteem between "academic" and
"vocational strands", with parity of esteem between
the two would best be achieved. Only within comprehensive education
can these two strands be developed in order that pupils have opportunities
to access both educational approaches.
45. The Government should undertake an audit
of a capacity of institutions, particularly small and medium sized
and/or remote institutions such as those in rural areas to deliver
a new range of courses, qualifications and more individualised
curricula and to develop collaborative arrangements between schools
and colleges.
46. The NUT believes emphatically that targets
for schools which have underpinned Government policy in education
in recent years are a crude and ineffective instrument with which
to drive up educational standards.
47. The NUT would draw the attention of
the Select Committee to the NUT's research, commissioned by the
Union, which focused on the impact of the National Curriculum
tests, national targets and performance tables. ("National
Curriculum Tests A Survey Analysed for the National Union of Teachers",
by Dr S R St J Neill, (Institute of Education and the University
of Warwick, October 2002). This provided overwhelming evidence
of the detrimental effects of the tests on the curriculum, teacher
workload and the morale of pupils and teachers.
48. The NUT also has deep concern about
the targeting by Government of school resources on particular
groups of pupils in order to move pupils across the borderline
of Government targets, thereby reducing the resources and support
available to pupils at other National Curriculum levels.
49. The Government's attempts to use targets
and performance tables as policy levers sits particularly uncomfortably
with proposals outlined elsewhere. Most specifically, proposals
for new qualifications and collaboration between institutions
will either be undermined by performance tables or make them meaningless,
or both.
50. This fact is reinforced by the fact
the Government itself is unable to put forward proposals on how
early achievement of AS qualifications in Year 11, for example,
or late entry for GCSE qualifications, can be shown in performance
tables. The NUT has long argued that targets and performance tables
are crude indicators that restrict schools in their own policy-making
at local level. The fact that they now appear to be hindering
even the formation of Government policy at national level is the
strongest indicator yet that such measures of performance need
not minor adjustment, but removal.
LEARNING AND
SKILLS COUNCILS
AND 14-16 EDUCATION
51. The NUT is opposed to the LSC taking
over funding for 14-16 education. The split between LEAs and the
LSC in funding arrangements will endanger the coherence with curriculum
offer of secondary schools and lead to enormous, additional administrative
burdens for schools.
52. Government needs also to engage with
some more fundamental issues regarding FE professionals teaching
students within a compulsory schooling age range. It is vital
that young people of 14-16 are taught by teachers with QTS. In
addition, there are issues of differences in salary and conditions
of service between the school and FE sector; and differences in
funding formulae, which will become even more pressing issues
to be addressed under future proposals. The NUT is deeply concerned
that these issues have not been considered or yet resolved.
53. The Government should ensure that it
works in professional partnership with teachers to develop an
appropriate 11-16 education system based on the basis of professional
consensus rather than further "top-down" reform. In
the longer term, it is likely that this will involve further consideration
of curriculum, assessment and qualification models, both at GCSE
and Advanced level. Any change, however, might well be a reform
of existing models within the context of an overarching certificate
rather than a fundamental change in the qualification structure.
November 2002
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