Asked by: Christian Wakeford (Labour - Bury South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment his Department has made of the potential merits of increasing the provision of pastoral and behaviour support available to (a) pupils, (b) education staff and (c) parents.
Answered by Robin Walker
Attending school or college in person plays a central role in promoting well-being for pupils. The department is pursuing an ambitious programme of work to improve behaviour in schools and to improve the mental health and well-being of pupils and teachers.
The department’s £10 million behaviour hubs programme, launched in April, is projected to support more than 500 schools over 3 years. It will support schools to learn from the best in developing excellent behaviour cultures. In June 2021, the department also launched a call for evidence on managing good behaviour and how schools’ behaviour policies have changed in response to the COVID-19 outbreak. This evidence will be considered alongside a public consultation later this year on the Behaviour and Discipline in Schools guidance. The guidance will provide practical advice to schools about how to encourage good behaviour and respond effectively to incidents of poor behaviour in and out of the classroom and support staff in tackling behavioural issues that have arisen from COVID-19.
The department’s mental health and behaviour guidance for schools includes specific information about supporting pupils’ mental health and wellbeing: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/mental-health-and-behaviour-in-schools--2. This is in addition to the £79 million to boost children and young people’s mental health support announced in March 2021, which will include increasing the number of Mental Health Support Teams in schools and colleges to around 400, covering an estimated 3 million children and young people by 2023.
To provide further support for staff dealing with children and young people experiencing additional pressures from the last year, including trauma, anxiety, or grief, the government announced the £7 million additional funding for local authorities to deliver Wellbeing for Education Recovery programme in May 2021. Alongside this, we are providing £9.5 million to train a Senior Mental Health lead in up to 7,800 schools and colleges in England in this academic year; and funding an adapted ‘Link’ programme which is designed to improve partnerships between health and education leaders in local areas.
Asked by: Christian Wakeford (Labour - Bury South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the findings of the survey by Team Teach on the Hidden Education Challenges during the Pandemic, what recent assessment he has made of the impact of new behaviours and the emergence of new behaviour trends on (a) pupils' and teachers' mental health and (b) teaching.
Answered by Robin Walker
Attending school or college in person plays a central role in promoting well-being for pupils. The department is pursuing an ambitious programme of work to improve behaviour in schools and to improve the mental health and well-being of pupils and teachers.
The department’s £10 million behaviour hubs programme, launched in April, is projected to support more than 500 schools over 3 years. It will support schools to learn from the best in developing excellent behaviour cultures. In June 2021, the department also launched a call for evidence on managing good behaviour and how schools’ behaviour policies have changed in response to the COVID-19 outbreak. This evidence will be considered alongside a public consultation later this year on the Behaviour and Discipline in Schools guidance. The guidance will provide practical advice to schools about how to encourage good behaviour and respond effectively to incidents of poor behaviour in and out of the classroom and support staff in tackling behavioural issues that have arisen from COVID-19.
The department’s mental health and behaviour guidance for schools includes specific information about supporting pupils’ mental health and wellbeing: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/mental-health-and-behaviour-in-schools--2. This is in addition to the £79 million to boost children and young people’s mental health support announced in March 2021, which will include increasing the number of Mental Health Support Teams in schools and colleges to around 400, covering an estimated 3 million children and young people by 2023.
To provide further support for staff dealing with children and young people experiencing additional pressures from the last year, including trauma, anxiety, or grief, the government announced the £7 million additional funding for local authorities to deliver Wellbeing for Education Recovery programme in May 2021. Alongside this, we are providing £9.5 million to train a Senior Mental Health lead in up to 7,800 schools and colleges in England in this academic year; and funding an adapted ‘Link’ programme which is designed to improve partnerships between health and education leaders in local areas.
Asked by: Christian Wakeford (Labour - Bury South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment his Department has made of the impact of the covid-19 outbreak on pupil behaviour (a) in schools and (b) at home.
Answered by Robin Walker
Attending school or college in person plays a central role in promoting well-being for pupils. The department is pursuing an ambitious programme of work to improve behaviour in schools and to improve the mental health and well-being of pupils and teachers.
The department’s £10 million behaviour hubs programme, launched in April, is projected to support more than 500 schools over 3 years. It will support schools to learn from the best in developing excellent behaviour cultures. In June 2021, the department also launched a call for evidence on managing good behaviour and how schools’ behaviour policies have changed in response to the COVID-19 outbreak. This evidence will be considered alongside a public consultation later this year on the Behaviour and Discipline in Schools guidance. The guidance will provide practical advice to schools about how to encourage good behaviour and respond effectively to incidents of poor behaviour in and out of the classroom and support staff in tackling behavioural issues that have arisen from COVID-19.
The department’s mental health and behaviour guidance for schools includes specific information about supporting pupils’ mental health and wellbeing: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/mental-health-and-behaviour-in-schools--2. This is in addition to the £79 million to boost children and young people’s mental health support announced in March 2021, which will include increasing the number of Mental Health Support Teams in schools and colleges to around 400, covering an estimated 3 million children and young people by 2023.
To provide further support for staff dealing with children and young people experiencing additional pressures from the last year, including trauma, anxiety, or grief, the government announced the £7 million additional funding for local authorities to deliver Wellbeing for Education Recovery programme in May 2021. Alongside this, we are providing £9.5 million to train a Senior Mental Health lead in up to 7,800 schools and colleges in England in this academic year; and funding an adapted ‘Link’ programme which is designed to improve partnerships between health and education leaders in local areas.
Asked by: Christian Wakeford (Labour - Bury South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what plans his Department has to encourage more young people to study T Levels.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
We want as many young people as possible to benefit from T Levels. The T Level communications campaign launched in October 2019, aimed at potential students and parents of 14-16 year olds. We are working with the Careers and Enterprise Company to ensure that careers staff can articulate their benefits to students and have included T Levels in the Apprenticeships Support and Knowledge programme, which offers free support and resources to schools to upskill their staff.
We continue to support T Level providers with their recruitment, and going forward T Levels will be part of a new ‘Young People’s Futures’ campaign. This will support 14-19 year olds to understand the range of education, training and work options open to them, including T Levels. T Levels also feature in our Employer Support campaign, helping to increase awareness nationally.
Asked by: Christian Wakeford (Labour - Bury South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment his Department has made of the impact of T Levels on social mobility in Bury South constituency.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
The provision of high-quality technical education is key to improving social mobility, and we want as many young people as possible to benefit from T Levels. The introduction of T Levels will help raise the standard of technical education, so that it is seen as equal in esteem to our world class academic route. The industry placement element of T Levels helps to build students’ employability skills, developing their confidence in the workplace and giving young people from all backgrounds a head start in accessing skilled work. T Levels carry UCAS points in line with three A levels so will also allow progression to higher education. We have also developed a T Level Transition Programme, which is aimed at students who have potential to complete a T Level but need extra support.
The first T Level providers are situated across the country and we have ensured they are represented in opportunity areas. From this academic year, Bury College and other providers in the wider Bury area began offering T Levels, boosting access to high quality technical education for young people in the area.
Asked by: Christian Wakeford (Labour - Bury South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what plans his Department has to encourage more colleges and schools to provide T Levels.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
We are introducing T Levels in a phased implementation with the number of providers increasing year on year. Just over 100 providers are now teaching T Levels and from next September this number will rise to around 200. For this initial rollout we selected high performing providers to ensure high-quality from the start. Providers are now registering their interest to deliver T Levels from 2023 at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/how-to-register-to-deliver-t-levels-in-2023-to-2024-academic-year, and we have seen a positive response to this.
We continue to work closely with sector representatives, such as the Association of Colleges and Association of School and College Leaders, as well as academy trusts and local/combined authorities to raise awareness and encourage providers to register for 2023 delivery.
Asked by: Christian Wakeford (Labour - Bury South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many students studying T Levels in Bury South constituency (a) there were in the 2020-21 academic year and (b) there are in the 2021-22 academic year.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
We are introducing T Levels in a phased implementation - 43 providers started teaching these pioneering qualifications last September to around 1,300 students. In this first wave of rollout, no providers based specifically in Bury offered T Levels.
From this September, provider numbers have grown to just over 100, which includes Bury College. In the wider area providers include Hopwood Hall, Bolton College and Oldham College. Providers are still enrolling students at this point and data on student numbers nationally will be available later in the autumn, with provider level data available next year.
Keeping provider numbers small in these initial stages of rollout has meant we can work closely with them to ensure a high-quality start. Feedback from students and providers involved in the first year of teaching has been positive.
Asked by: Christian Wakeford (Labour - Bury South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what plans his Department has to encourage more businesses to offer T Level placements.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
We have provided an extensive programme of employer and provider support to help with the delivery of high-quality industry placements. We have invested £165 million over the past 3 years to help providers build their capacity and relationships with employers and we have published practical industry placement delivery guidance for both providers and employers. We are engaging directly with employers through the National Apprenticeship Service to provide a strong pipeline of employers ready to offer placements and there is a comprehensive package of support available for employers offering online guidance, webinars and direct hands-on support to help them prepare for industry placements. We have established a T Level employer ambassador network to engage with others in their industries on T Levels and placements, and we are further developing our communications materials to continue to raise the profile of T Levels to an employer audience. We have also recently put in place a short-term incentive fund, offering employers £1,000 per industry placement, to encourage employer engagement in the post COVID-19 outbreak period.
Asked by: Christian Wakeford (Labour - Bury South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether any schools in Bury South will be supported by the new National School Breakfast Programme in the 2021-22 academic year.
Answered by Vicky Ford
The government is committed to continuing support for school breakfast clubs and we are investing up to £24 million to continue our national programme for the next two years. This funding will support around 2,500 schools in disadvantaged areas meaning that thousands of children from low-income families will be offered free nutritious breakfasts to better support their attainment, wellbeing and readiness to learn.
The focus of the programme is to target the most disadvantaged areas of the country, including the Department for Education’s Opportunity Areas. Schools’ eligibility for the programme is based on the Income deprivation affecting children index (IDACI) – a nationally recognised indicator of need – to ensure provision is directed where it is most needed. Schools will be eligible for the programme if they have 50% or more pupils within bands A-F of the IDACI scale.
The enrolment process for schools joining the programme is currently ongoing, and we have seen a strong interest so far from eligible schools since we invited the expressions of interest. Schools are currently still able to apply to join the programme. As we are still registering schools for the programme, it is too early to publish a list of participating schools. However, we will consider the best opportunities to share information on the programme as it progresses.
Asked by: Christian Wakeford (Labour - Bury South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department plans to take in the event that the size of food orders under the new school breakfast tender decrease in the third term of support when schools must cover 25 per cent of the cost of food orders.
Answered by Vicky Ford
The government is committed to continuing support for breakfast clubs and we are funding up to a further £24 million to continue our programme over the next two years. This funding will support around 2,500 schools in disadvantaged areas meaning that thousands of children in low-income families will be offered nutritious breakfasts. The focus of the programme is to target the most disadvantaged areas of the country, including the Department for Education’s Opportunity Areas.
In terms of the schools’ financial contribution, this is an attractive offer to schools, providing free breakfasts for their pupils for two terms followed by a very substantial discount for the following four terms. Asking schools to contribute a small proportion of the costs means that the overall funding of up to £24 million can go further, reaching a higher number of schools, and therefore more disadvantaged children overall. We have seen strong interest from eligible schools so far since we invited expressions of interest, and our programme will make a real difference in terms of children’s health, attainment, wellbeing and readiness to learn.
Our provider, Family Action, is ensuring that schools fully understand and are committed to their financial contribution when they join the programme. The department and Family Action are continually monitoring the programme and will act upon any issues that may arise.