Schools: Independent Schools Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateBaroness Jones of Whitchurch
Main Page: Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Labour - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Baroness Jones of Whitchurch's debates with the Department for Education
(10 years, 7 months ago)
Lords ChamberMy Lords, I know that my noble friend is passionate about social mobility through education and I look forward to the Independent State Schools Partnerships conference next Monday, at which we are both speaking—a conference designed to promote partnerships between independent and state schools. As he said, the independent sector has a long history of increasing social mobility through bursaryships, scholarships and collaboration. In 2013, it provided more than £300 million worth of assistance, benefiting 40,000 children, and we absolutely applaud this. However, our priority is to invest our resources in making sure that all state schools provide an excellent education for their pupils, which in the end will be the greatest means of achieving much higher levels of social mobility, which I know all noble Lords wish to see. Our reforms are particularly focused on poorer children through, for instance, our pupil premium and Ofsted’s focus on the progress that pupil premium pupils make.
My Lords, does the Minister agree with Sir Michael Wilshaw that private schools should be doing much more to collaborate with, and support, the state school sector, rather than, as he described it, being guilty of just giving the “crumbs off their tables”?