Asked by: Kate Osborne (Labour - Jarrow)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps he is taking with headteachers to gather information on covid-19 in their local area and take steps to create a safer environment for children in schools.
Answered by Nick Gibb
Schools supply daily attendance updates relating to COVID-19 to the Department through the schools’ online portal.
The Department also has well established Regional Education and Children’s Teams (REACTs) in place. Their purpose is to help coordinate how information and intelligence about local needs and circumstances is captured during the COVID-19 outbreak.
REACTs are in regular contact with local authorities (Directors of Children’s Services or their representatives) in England to discuss local plans and to offer support. Similarly, the same teams are in regular contact with a range of academy trusts. Through these conversations, REACTs discuss providing practical support to those local authority areas that require it. This includes a range of actions, from answering questions to action planning, and offering and negotiating resources to support local authorities.
On 7 January, the Department published further guidance which sets out what all schools will need to do during the COVID-19 outbreak from January 2021: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/950510/School_national_restrictions_guidance.pdf.
Schools will be familiar with much of this guidance, including the system of controls, which they have been implementing since the start of the autumn term.
The Department will continue to keep its plans under review and ensure our position is informed by the latest evidence.
Asked by: Kate Osborne (Labour - Jarrow)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if he will cancel the publication of school performance tables in the 2020-21 academic year.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Government announced on 3 December 2020 that the Department would not publish the normal school and college performance tables in autumn 2021, based on summer 2021 grades. This remains the case. The announcement is available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-school-and-college-performance-measures.
Asked by: Kate Osborne (Labour - Jarrow)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what additional teaching support is available to university students during the January 2021 lockdown period while they do not have full access to their tutors; and what financial support students can access to compensate for lost income from part-time work.
Answered by Michelle Donelan - Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology
Due to the national lockdown measures now in place, we must take further steps to reduce transmission, including by significantly reducing the number of students returning to university from their winter break accommodation, and limiting the number of people travelling to and from university facilities. We are now prioritising the return to face-to-face teaching for courses which are most important to be delivered in-person to support the pipeline of future key workers. All other courses should be delivered online until at least mid-February. Our aim is to minimise the number of students who return to university to access university facilities.
The government’s clear and stated expectation is that universities should maintain the quality and quantity of tuition and seek to ensure that all students regardless of their background have the resources to study remotely. This is more important than ever at the moment with the vast majority of students studying solely online. The Office for Students (OfS), as regulator for higher education (HE) providers in England, has made it clear that HE providers must continue to comply with registration conditions relating to quality and academic standards, which set out requirements to ensure that courses are high-quality, that students are supported and achieve good outcomes and that standards are protected, regardless of whether a provider is delivering its courses through face-to-face teaching, remote online learning, or a combination of both.
The OfS has published guidance on how best to ensure students continue to receive a high-quality academic experience in the light of the COVID-19 outbreak. This sets out that providers should make all reasonable efforts to provide alternative teaching and support for students that is at least broadly equivalent to the provider’s usual arrangements. The OfS will keep this guidance under review to ensure it remains relevant to the developing circumstances of the outbreak.
The OfS is actively monitoring providers to ensure that they maintain the quality of their provision, that it is accessible for all and that they have been clear in their communications with students about how arrangements for teaching and learning may change throughout the year. The OfS is also following up directly with providers where they receive notifications from students, parents or others raising concerns about the quality of teaching on offer and require providers to report to them when they are not able to deliver a course or award a qualification. If the OfS has concerns, it will investigate further.
OfS capital grants can be used to address the needs of individual students for remote access to learning, teaching, assessment and the related services of a provider, for example through the provision of equipment or connectivity services, where students would not otherwise be able to secure these.
The government has also worked closely with the OfS to help clarify that providers can draw upon existing funding to increase hardship funds. Providers are able to use OfS Student Premium funding worth approximately £256 million for this academic year towards student hardship funds. We are also currently making available up to £20 million of additional hardship funding on a one-off basis to support those that need it most, particularly disadvantaged students.
Students with a part-time employment contract should also speak to their employer about the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, which has been set up to help pay staff wages and keep people in employment.