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16 Oct 2006 : Column 928W—continued
City Academies
Lynne Featherstone: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what criteria and guidelines are used when choosing sponsors for city academies. [92496]
Jim Knight: Academies are established with the involvement of sponsors from the voluntary, private or faith sectors. Sponsors must be able to show a commitment to providing the highest standard of education for all pupils and to provide £2 million towards the cost of each academy, or £1.5 million where they have sponsored three previous academies.
Independent consultants carry out a thorough due diligence check on all potential sponsors during the pre-feasibility stage, and Ministers apply a public interest test to sponsors on a case-by-case basis to ensure that the funding is from an appropriate source. We give preference to British or foreign sponsors with business interests in the UK; who are long standing UK residents; or who have businesses interests in jurisdictions with effective and open business governance where it is easier to assess risk against the guidance.
Sponsorship is purely philanthropic. Sponsors cannot make a profit and the schools cannot charge fees. Sponsors, like all academy trustees, are bound by charitable law to act in the best interests of their
academies. Parents are consulted about academy projects and potential sponsors during feasibility.
Community Libraries (Buckinghamshire)
Mr. Paul Goodman: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills when announcements on arrangements for (a) community libraries and (b) family learning will be made in relation to applications from Buckinghamshire. [93712]
Mr. Lammy: I have been asked to reply.
The community libraries programme was launched on 9 October 2006 and the family learning programme was launched on 19 September 2006. Both programmes are available throughout England.
Community Libraries is open to all local authority library services through a competitive application process.
Family learning grants will be awarded through a competitive application process which is open to statutory, voluntary and private sector organisations (statutory and private sector applicants must apply in partnership with a voluntary sector organisation).
The Big Lottery Fund expect to be in a position to make the first grant awards under the family learning programme in the first half of 2007 and under the community libraries programme in the second half of 2007.
Curriculum Online
Mrs. Villiers: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills on what date work on the Curriculum Online website began; and on what date it received its first hit. [91366]
Jim Knight: Work began on the Curriculum Online website in May 2002. The site received its first hit in December 2002 when it was previewed by a controlled group of 50,000 users (teachers and suppliers) and was officially launched by my right hon. Friend the Member for Norwich, South (Mr. Charles Clarke) at the BETT show on January 9 2003.
Mrs. Villiers: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what contracts and sub-contracts were awarded to set up and maintain Curriculum Online; and what the (a) value and (b) duration was in each case. [91367]
Jim Knight: Over 100 individual contracts have been awarded over the last four years to support all the different aspects of Curriculum Online such as website design, infrastructure, portal development, hosting and distribution, eLearning Credits payment system, metadata schema, tagging tool, vocabularies, application support, technical standards, helpdesks, evaluation, user testing, consultancy support, registration and compliance, legal services, marketing and communications, copywriting/pr/web, design/creative, print/production, advertising, sponsorship/promotion, display materials, promotional video, exhibitions/events and so on.
Due to the scope of the request, we are unable to reply on the grounds of costs. We estimate that the cost
of processing the request exceeds the disproportionate cost threshold (DCT) of £700.
Mrs. Villiers: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what the (a) set up costs were and (b) maintenance costs are of Curriculum Online. [91368]
Jim Knight: The following table gives a detailed breakdown of both set up and running costs for Curriculum Online and eLearning Credits (eLCs) from 2002 to the present.
| £ million | |||||
| 2002-03 | 2003-04 | 2004-05 | 2005-06 | 2006-07 | |
| (1) Of which £75 million ring fenced. (2) Includes running costs. (3) Includes £350,000 for independent product evaluations | |||||
Education Costs
Mr. Duncan Smith: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what the (a) mean and (b) median costs were of educating a child who was (i) in local authority care and (ii) in prison in the last year for which figures are available; and if he will make a statement. [89493]
Jim Knight: The Department does not collect this information.
Emotional and Behavioural Disorders
Chris Ruane: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills (1) what guidance is offered to (a) local education authorities and (b) head teachers on dealing with children with emotional and behavioural disorders; [92233]
(2) what measures are in place to ensure children with emotional and behavioural disorders are taught in an environment suitable for their condition. [92234]
Mr. Dhanda: DfES guidance relating to children with behavioural, emotional and social difficulties (BESD) is directed to both local authorities and head teachers. This includes the SEN Code of Practice (2001), and Promoting Children's Mental Health within Early Years and School Settings (2001). With the Department's BESD Working Group, which includes head teachers, leaders of pupil referral units, educational psychologists, representatives from CAMHS and key voluntary and professional organisations, we are currently considering further, targeted guidance for schools.
In addition to guidance, specialist training materials and opportunities for accreditation have been made available for some 500 staff across the country who have particular responsibilities for BESD.
Our guidance on exclusion from school also makes it clear that schools must do their best to ensure that the necessary provision is made for pupils with special educational needs and that, other than in the most
exceptional circumstances, schools should avoid permanently excluding pupils with statements. We will be revising our guidance on school behaviour policies to strengthen advice on making reasonable adjustments for pupils with special educational needs and disabilities.
On suitable environments for children with BESD, the SEN Code of Practice requires all local authorities to provide appropriate settings, either through mainstream schools, BESD special schools, or PRUs, with a flexible continuum of provision to meet the particular needs of children with BESD. Where a child has complex needs the statutory framework makes clear the need for children to be assessed individually and for authorities to take into consideration the views of parents.
Further details on the Government's programme for BESD will shortly be announced in our response to the House of Commons Education and Skills Committee SEN Third Report of Session 2005-06.
Chris Ruane: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills (1) how many children in each local education authority area, diagnosed with emotional and behavioural disorders were being taught in a mainstream educational facility in the last period for which figures are available; [92235]
(2) how many places in each local education authority area were available for children with emotional and behaviour disorders in England in the last period for which figures are available. [92237]
Jim Knight: Information on the number of places available for children with behaviour, emotional and social difficulties is not collected centrally.
Information was collected from schools on pupils who are supported at School Action Plus and those pupils with a statement of special educational needs (SEN) about their main or primary need and, if appropriate, their secondary need for the first time in 2004.
There are a number of sensitivities about categorising pupils in this way. It is important that anyone using the data should be aware of the concerns and also understand the limitations of the data’s reliability and validity. There are a range of factors which may affect the data recorded, including:
Local interpretation of definitions
Classification of children with multiple needs
Differences in diagnoses between education and health professionals
Availability of special school provisions in Authorities
A table showing information on the number of pupils being taught in a maintained mainstream school who have statements of special educational needs or are supported at School Action Plus and who have behaviour, emotional and social difficulties as their primary need has been placed in the House Library.
Chris Ruane: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how much funding was made available in each local education authority area, for each child at facilities for those with emotional and behavioural disorders in England in the last period for which figures are available. [92236]
Jim Knight: The Department does not collect this information.
Excluded Children
Philip Davies: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what recent estimate he has made of the number of children (a) excluded from school and (b) in local authority care who (i) become prostitutes and (ii) go into prison. [90088]
Jim Knight: At 30 September 2005 there were 44,700 children who had been looked after continuously for at least 20 months by English local authorities. 34,800 of these children were of school age and of these 310 (or 1 per cent.) received a permanent exclusion.
Information on the number of these children who become prostitutes or go into prison is not collected centrally.
Sarah Teather: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many black (a) male and (b) female pupils were excluded (i) temporarily and (ii) permanently from a maintained secondary school in each of the last five years. [91747]
Jim Knight: The available information is given in the table.
| Maintained secondary schools: Number of exclusions by black ethnic origin and gender( 1 ) 2000-01 to 2004-05, England | ||||||
| Maintained secondary schools, pupils of black ethnic origin ( 2, 3) | ||||||
| Permanent exclusions( 1) | Fixed period exclusions | |||||
| Boys | Girls | Total | Boys | Girls | Total | |
| (1) The number of permanent exclusions are known to have been under-reported by schools in each year since 2000-01. The numbers shown here for permanent exclusions are as reported by schools. The data are unconfirmed and known to be incomplete. (2) Includes pupils aged 5 and over. (3) Includes pupils of Black Caribbean, Black African and Black Other ethnic origin. (4) A new ethnic coding framework was introduced in the 2002 and 2003 Census'. The new ethnic coding frameworks included a new category for pupils of Mixed ethnic origin. In 2001-02 and 2002-03 both the old and the new ethnic codesets were used. This could have caused some disruption to timeseries data. .. Not available, 2003-04 is the first full year for which fixed period exclusions data are available Note: Numbers have been rounded to the nearest 10. There may be discrepancies between the sum of constituent items and totals as shown. Source: Schools’ Census and Termly Exclusions Survey | ||||||
Foreign Languages
Mr. Lancaster: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what percentage of students at age 14 have taken up a foreign language at Putteridge high school in Luton. [91658]
Jim Knight: Data on the number of pupils who have taken up a foreign language at age 14 is not collected by the Department. Therefore the information requested is not available.
Foreign Students
Mr. Hurd: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many foreign students of (a) primary and (b) secondary school age are in maintained schools in (i) Ruislip-Northwood constituency, (ii) each London borough and (iii) England. [92816]
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