Schools: Curriculum
Lord Lexden Excerpts(11 years, 2 months ago)
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Lord Nash
The noble Lord implies that casual equals laissez-faire; we do not accept that. As I said, we accept that most schools should do what all good schools do, which is to have an active programme of promoting their children’s interest, including drugs education, which they must be taught about in science classes anyway. Often, the best way to engage those pupils with those difficult issues, such as forced marriages or gangs, is not for teachers to do that—they often will not open up to their teachers—but for outside agencies and charities with skilled people in those difficult areas to talk to them about that.
Lord Lexden (Con)
My Lords, will my noble friend confirm that the overwhelming majority of free schools have been rated good or outstanding in Ofsted inspections? How does that compare with the performance of schools as a whole?
Schools: Bullying
Lord Lexden Excerpts(11 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Lexden
My Lords, it is both a pleasure and a privilege to make a short contribution to this debate, initiated with great skill and in the most moving fashion by my noble friend Lady Brinton, who speaks with such tremendous authority on this grave social and educational issue—authority drawn from her patient, dedicated and successful work in combating it in practice on the ground.
School bullies are sad individuals, cowards every one of them, who gain satisfaction and pleasure from showing unkindness to others—a reversal of the right and proper order of things. Unkindness leading to persecution can be such that, in some cases, it leads—as we have heard—to suicide. My noble friend spoke particularly movingly on that point. For far too long, indeed over generations, there were in our country too many weak and callous teachers in uncompassionate schools who did little or nothing to tackle the disfiguring phenomenon of bullying in their midst. Today, however, they can no longer evade their basic responsibilities, which have been clearly defined in law, endorsed by all political parties and by successive governments.
This Government have shown themselves to be particularly sensitive to widespread concern—reflected in my noble friend’s important Motion today—about the extent of bullying prevalent in our schools. That is underlined by the deeply disturbing facts and statistics that my noble friend referred to. The Government have consistently shown their responsiveness to well founded anxiety. In 2011, they brought up to date the anti-bullying advice drawn up to enable all schools to tackle bullying effectively. Teachers have been given new powers to tackle the hideous new phenomenon of cyberbullying, for instance by searching for and, if necessary, deleting inappropriate images on mobile telephones. Very importantly, the Government have laid a requirement on Ofsted to take account of behaviour and well-being, including the incidence of bullying in schools. Most recently, funds have been made available to enable four specialist organisations to work with schools in exploring new, innovative ways of tackling the scourge of bullying. These points, I hope, bring some measure of comfort to my noble friend, while also underlining the need for her continuing commitment to securing further progress.
The Government deserve great credit for extending and enhancing the national framework through which bullying can be confronted and reduced. However, particularly after hearing my noble friend’s speech, we all now yearn for results—for tumbling rather than rising statistics. That can be the only truly satisfactory measure of success.
I will illustrate the point by turning to an aspect of the issue that has always been a particular concern and anxiety to me personally: homophobic bullying. Last year, Stonewall published results of research carried out on its behalf by Cambridge University, involving a survey of some 1,600 lesbian, gay and bisexual young people in our schools. Some 55% had experienced homophobic bullying in schools and 99% had heard homophobic language. It is not surprising, and confirms the other evidence that my noble friend has given us, that this bullying had a marked adverse effect on young people’s attainment, health and well-being. Three in five bullied pupils said that it had a negative impact on their schoolwork. One in three bullied gay young people had considered changing their future educational plans because of the bullying. Nearly a quarter of gay young people had thought of attempting suicide. More than one half had harmed themselves. Polling of more than 2,000 primary and secondary school teachers by YouGov, published in 2009, showed a similar picture. Nine in 10 secondary school teachers said that they had witnessed homophobic bullying. Worryingly, half of secondary school teachers who were aware of homophobic bullying said that the vast majority of incidents go unreported. There is a further important point to be made in this connection. Stonewall’s research into homophobic hate crime in 2008 found that three in five hate incidents are committed by people under the age of 25, highlighting the transition from homophobic bullying in schools to homophobic hate crimes in local communities.
In this area, as in others, the Government have shown commendable resolution and determination. They made tackling homophobic bullying a priority in both the coalition agreement and the 2010 schools White Paper. They have strongly encouraged schools to seek advice and support from Stonewall. Ofsted inspectors are advised to ask pupils about the use of homophobic language in their schools and whether or not they learn about gay people in the curriculum.
Perhaps the Government will now consider taking further steps. For example, through the National College for Teaching and Leadership, they could seek to ensure that high-quality training on preventing and tackling homophobic bullying is part of all teachers’ initial training. They could help schools further to share best practice and to learn from each other in this area, in particular encouraging academy chains to provide such opportunities among their schools. The Government could also ensure that free schools and new academies recognise the importance of combating homophobic bullying and supporting gay young people when establishing policy and procedures. As president of the Independent Schools Council, and its former general secretary, I also recognise that action in these matters should not be confined to the maintained sector. It is needed in all our country’s schools.
Bullying in schools causes serious, sometimes terrible, problems, both social and educational, for those who experience it at the hands of the cowards who practise it. The harmful effects can last a lifetime. Our duty is clear: to do all that we can to help extirpate it.
Schools: Bullying
Lord Lexden Excerpts(11 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Lexden
Can my noble friend tell the House what the Government are doing to ensure that children in alternative provision have support and education to a standard that is on a par with that in mainstream schools?
Lord Nash
We are focusing intensely on alternative provision providers. This Government have sent a very clear message that we expect alternative provision education to be equivalent to that in mainstream schools. There is no doubt that alternative provision in this country is extremely erratic. I am delighted to see that we have a number of alternative provision providers coming through in the new free school applications, and I expect that a number of them will be approved. A number of alternative provision providers are converting to academies. We have some excellent alternative provision providers. We have also asked Ofsted to look specifically at alternative provision through a thematic inspection process.
Schools: Academies
Lord Lexden Excerpts(11 years, 11 months ago)
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Lord Nash
We are offering grants—all this is available on our website—to help sponsors to turn round failing and underperforming schools. In its November 2012 report, the National Audit Office rightly acknowledged the extraordinary success of the academy programme. We make no apology for spending money on a programme that is proven to drive up standards and make long-term improvements. We want as many schools as possible to take advantage of the significant benefits of academy status.
Lord Lexden
Can my noble friend tell the House how successful the Government have been in working with independent schools in expanding their marvellous academies programme?
Education: Development of Excellence
Lord Lexden Excerpts(12 years, 2 months ago)
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Lord Lexden
My Lords, my noble friend Lady Perry has rightly received many plaudits and I want of course to be connected with them. In my four minutes, I will make brief reference to the independent sector of education, with which I was closely associated for over six years as general secretary of the Independent Schools Council. My view is somewhat different from that of the noble Lord, Lord Lea of Crondall.
As is well known, much excellence resides in our country’s independent schools. Sadly, the excellent education which so many of our independent schools provide is beyond the reach of most families in our land. Social mobility is a notable casualty of this tragic state of affairs. There are those who say that the state should help to equip families on modest incomes with the means to pay for places at independent schools. Admission, it is argued, should be decided by ability, not income. At the Independent Schools Council, I was involved in promoting an ambitious scheme to achieve open access. The cause has recently been taken up again by a large group of far-sighted independent heads committed to greater social mobility and supported by the excellent Sutton Trust, rightly praised by my noble friend Lord Lucas.
A Minister of Education said that he saw,
“no reason to use public money to subsidise the transfer of boys from one system to the other on a basis of selection in which nobody knows what would be just or why”.—[Official Report, Commons, 16/6/1961; col. 898.).
The Minister in question was the Conservative Sir David, later Viscount, Eccles, speaking in 1961. No one so far has succeeded in finding criteria for a wider access scheme to the excellence of independent schools that is capable of commanding widespread public and political support. The most successful attempt, the Conservatives’ assisted places scheme, was always strongly opposed in some quarters. At its height, some 40,000 pupils benefited. It is greatly to the credit of independent schools that roughly the same number of children have free or subsidised places today as a result of the fee assistance that they provide through means-tested bursaries totalling more than £284 million.
Useful progress can be made through small-scale state-supported schemes, such as the provision of places in boarding schools for certain children in care who would be suited to them. There is growing support, as your Lordships’ House noted recently, for arrangements backed by charities and the Government that would increase the availability of such places significantly. However, as things stand today, the reality is that if independent schools are to spread the excellence for which so many of them are so well known, they will need to put themselves into a closer relationship than ever before with maintained schools, as my noble friend Lord Lucas made clear with his customary passion.
The steady growth of the academies programme and the introduction of free schools under this Government provide hugely important new opportunities for independent schools. Progress in exploiting them has not been as rapid as some might have wished. Thirty-three independent schools are now sponsoring or co-sponsoring academies. According to the ISC, another 18 sponsorships are under negotiation and a further 85 are possible in the next few years. Many parents throughout our country will hope that the pace of change can be quickened. The results of change can be impressive. Within a year of Wellington College sponsoring Wellington Academy, the percentage of pupils gaining five A* to C grades at GCSE rose from 43% to 98%. As the Master of Wellington College, my friend Dr Anthony Seldon, said:
“Academies work, and the partnership with an independent school provides extensive opportunities for both schools to learn way beyond the academic”.
There has been much reference recently to the famous Tory phrase “One Nation”, first used not by Disraeli but by Stanley Baldwin, a great social reformer, in 1924. Everyone in our country recognises that we are still far from making a reality of Baldwin’s vision in our education system, but surely there is no other basis for the lasting success of all our schools.
Schools: Children in Care
Lord Lexden Excerpts(12 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Lexden
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they have plans to enable more children in care to secure places at boarding schools in both the maintained and independent sectors.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Schools (Lord Hill of Oareford)
My Lords, we believe that in the right circumstances, boarding school can be a very good option for children in care and vulnerable children. Last month saw the launch of the Assisted Boarding Network by RNCF and Buttle UK, and also the National Foundation for Boarding Bursaries, which involves independent and maintained boarding schools. Both schemes aim to increase access to boarding for vulnerable and disadvantaged children. We very much support both initiatives and would urge local authorities to consider boarding as an option.
Lord Lexden
I am extremely grateful to my noble friend, with whom I have worked on educational issues in the past, for that reply—particularly as regards the new National Foundation for Boarding Bursaries and the Assisted Boarding Network. Will my noble friend confirm that the state spends annually more than £37,000 on each looked-after child, while the average cost of a private boarding school place is now some £24,000, and that assisted boarders achieve significantly better examination results than look-after children? While, as my noble friend said, boarding education will not be suitable for all children in care, is it not extremely heartening that the Assisted Boarding Network, backed by highly successful charitable organisations, is planning a significant increase in numbers over the years ahead? It is sad that some local authorities have in recent decades been firm opponents of assisted boarding. The noble Lord, Lord Adonis, who has been so determined a proponent of it, recently called for an end to what he called outdated thinking.
Lord Lexden
Will the Government give local authorities their full support to assist the progress of what the Princess Royal recently described as a really key partnership?
Lord Hill of Oareford
Yes, my Lords, we would certainly encourage all local authorities to think carefully about boarding as an option. Local authorities such as Norfolk are already doing it, and others are as well. As I said, boarding schools can play a role—I agree with my noble friend. I am grateful for the initiatives taken by RNCF/Buttle and by the independent and maintained schools.
Schools: Admissions
Lord Lexden Excerpts(12 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Hill of Oareford
I know that this subject is very dear to the heart of the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, and I am extremely aware of all the work that he has done for many years to pursue that goal. Those schools are making a fantastic contribution. I was looking at their results the other day. Since they have come into the maintained sector, without selective admissions, they continue to perform an extremely good job. A number of schools across the country demonstrate that it is possible to achieve outstanding results if they have high aspiration, high ambition, an orderly environment and work hard for all of their children to do well.
Lord Lexden
My Lords, does my noble friend recall that some years ago, when I was its general secretary, the Independent Schools Council put forward for discussion an ambitious set of proposals to provide open access to schools of all types in the independent sector? Under these proposals, government expenditure per pupil would be no higher than in mainstream, maintained schools. Pupils of a wide range of ability and aptitude would benefit, with families on low incomes being offered free places. Will the Government now give consideration to some such arrangement?
Lord Hill of Oareford
My Lords, I said in my reply to my noble friend Lord Lucas that the focus of what the Government are doing is to attempt to raise the standards in the bulk of the maintained sector, so that more schools are able to achieve for their pupils the results that the most outstanding schools in the maintained sector are already delivering. That is our focus and some of these other ideas, interesting though they are, are not where our priorities lie.
Education Bill
Lord Lexden Excerpts(13 years, 4 months ago)
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Lord Lexden
My Lords, following my noble friend’s powerful speech, I want to make just a few points on inspection arrangements for independent schools. I do so as a former general secretary of the Independent Schools Council. It was during my time that the Independent Schools Inspectorate assumed its early shape, before being put on a firmer basis by the Secretary of State, and being given responsibilities which were clearly delineated, and approved by the Secretary of State, under the Education Act 2002.
One point that I would like to make is that the Independent Schools Council is not quite in the state of flux that my noble friend suggested. The Headmasters’ Conference has had disagreements with the Independent Schools Council, which acts on behalf of a number of independent schools associations. There have been detailed inquiries as to how the Independent Schools Council might operate more effectively in the future. I understand that those negotiations and discussions have reached a satisfactory conclusion, and on that basis the Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference will be remaining one of the constituent elements of the Independent Schools Council.
There is no doubt at all about the independence with which the ISI operates. This was clearly laid down in the terms of reference that the then Secretary of State gave the ISI in 2002. It is becoming stronger and more manifest next year, as my noble friend mentioned, since the ISI is going to be reconstituted as an independent trust. At no time has the ISC sought to influence, directly or indirectly, the work that independent schools inspectors have done. This has been clearly shown by Ofsted’s monitoring of the education inspections, which has been conducted since 2002 under the terms of reference laid down by the Secretary of State. Not one cause of complaint or censure has ever been laid against the ISI by Ofsted during its monitoring of education inspections. Indeed Ofsted’s report last year praised the “excellent dialogue and communication” with schools, the “clear and authoritative” feedback, the “inspectors’ courtesy and professionalism”, and the “rigorous” checking of schools’ “compliance with the regulations”. I know from my own experience the seriousness with which Ofsted undertakes these duties, which are recorded publicly. Also, there is close Ofsted involvement in the everyday work of the ISI, since representatives of Ofsted—very senior figures indeed—come to the meetings of the committees which oversee the ISI’s work.
As things stand at the moment, independent boarding schools are subject to two separate inspections, causing a great deal of duplication, and of course extra expense. The monitoring arrangements, having worked so well as far as educational inspections are concerned, are now going to be put—and this is a wholly new aspect of things—on a firm, statutory basis as, under Clause 42, the power to inspect welfare arrangements will pass to the Independent Schools Inspectorate as well.
The work done by the ISI is rigorously overseen. High standards have been maintained by the Independent Schools Inspectorate. There is a wide feeling that it is fit to carry out boarding welfare inspections, the quality of its inspectors and the rigour of its work having been clearly supported and underlined by Ofsted. To the extent that there is concern about the ISI’s position, Clause 42 should increase confidence in that it puts into primary legislation a duty on Ofsted to monitor and oversee the ISI’s work. This is something that already works well in practice for the educational aspect of school inspections. The clause will remove any doubt as to Ofsted’s role and the quality assurance and oversight of the ISI’s work, and it should lower costs to schools by substituting two inspectorates with one, with no lowering of regulatory standards. I believe that it is a welcome clause and that it should receive support.
The Earl of Listowel
I hope that the noble Baroness and the noble Lord will forgive my ignorance but are these inspections normally announced or are they unannounced?
Lord Lexden
If the noble Earl is asking whether the inspectors arrive without notice, the answer is no. There are cycles in which the inspections take place. The inspectors do not suddenly arrive at schools unannounced.
Baroness Garden of Frognal
My Lords, I thank my noble friends Lady Brinton and Lord Lexden for what they have said, and I hope that some of the concerns that my noble friend Lady Brinton raised have been addressed in the remarks of my noble friend Lord Lexden.
Education inspections in most independent boarding schools are carried out by independent inspectorates. Boarding schools, unlike day schools, are also subject to welfare inspections, which are carried out by Ofsted, as my noble friend set out. Where possible, Ofsted and independent inspectorates carry out joint inspections to minimise disruption to the schools concerned, but there are two separate inspection reports, published on two different websites, and that information is readily available on those websites.
The Secretary of State already has a power to appoint an independent inspectorate to undertake boarding welfare inspections in England. We intend to use this power to appoint the Independent Schools Inspectorate, which will mean that schools affiliated to the Independent Schools Council will be subject to a single inspection, covering both education and boarding welfare, which will be followed by a single published report. However, I stress that there will be two reports—one for education and one for welfare.
The clause replicates the measures that are already in place on education inspections to ensure that any independent inspectorate appointed operates effectively. It allows Ofsted to monitor inspections by independent inspectorates of the welfare of children in independent boarding schools and requires the chief inspector to prepare an annual report on those inspections. It also gives the Secretary of State a power to direct Ofsted to undertake a boarding inspection of any school at any time, including where the boarding provision would normally be inspected by an independent inspectorate. This is the same power as he has in relation to other types of inspection, but in practice we would expect this power to be used only in exceptional cases.
I hope that my noble friend will agree that these measures, when taken together, provide transparency, accountability and confidence in the arrangements for independent inspectorates to carry out welfare inspections in independent boarding schools. I reassure her that welfare inspections will continue in all schools, whether they are outstanding or not.
I also reassure my noble friend that safeguards for welfare inspections will be as robust as they are for education inspections, and that regulations will set out criteria for the appointment of independent inspectorates and for terminating any such appointment, if need be. The criteria in respect of boarding will mirror the criteria for appointment in respect of education.
My noble friend mentioned the HMC vote to leave the ISC. I hope that she has been reassured by the point made by my noble friend Lord Lexden. I suspect that I will not have covered other points in my reply, in which case I will write to my noble friend, but, meanwhile, I hope that she will feel free to withdraw the amendment.
Education Bill
Lord Lexden Excerpts(13 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Lexden
My Lords, I vigorously support Amendment 107, on which my name appears. It would be even better if subsection (1)(c) in the amendment included the words “independent schools” after the word “academies”.
Speaking on an earlier amendment, I laid stress on the importance of partnerships between independent and maintained schools. Nowhere is co-operation more likely to be valuable on both sides than in the areas covered by the amendment. In subjects like science and maths, independent schools can really help to raise standards and prospects for high-ability pupils overall because of the successful results that they achieve. In modern languages, for example, almost 50 per cent of top grades go to pupils from independent schools. Let that expertise be shared widely in order to break down even more of the barriers between the two sectors. Independent schools see themselves as part of our national education system. Their inclusion in co-operative ventures of the kind envisaged by the amendment would be greeted by them with considerable enthusiasm. For those reasons, I support Amendment 107.
Baroness Morris of Yardley
My Lords, I have a great deal of sympathy with the intention behind these amendments, but I have a few issues about the solution to the problem. I want to ask a particular question that the Minister might address in her response. In the past we assumed that very bright children will succeed despite school and that we should not put in a place a system where they could succeed because of their schooling. I am very much in favour of the proposal that all schools should try to meet the needs of all their students. I have often thought that the most able 2 per cent to 3 per cent of young people in this country have special educational needs in the broadest sense, and that they need to be supported. So I am entirely on board with the idea. I welcome the debate, and although I will have to look at the amendments more closely, raising the issue is a good thing and this should be a feature of our education system. We should ask schools to address the particular needs of this group of children just as we ask them to look after the less able.
I welcome what the mover of the amendment said in terms of not wanting to go back to selection, and I can see that the amendment is not about that. However, I think that there must be a more imaginative approach than creating what is essentially a high ability stream within a school. I am no great researcher, but I know that all the evidence shows that separating children in schools is not the best way of raising standards. With reference to the comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Lexden, work has been done about children working with those in the independent sector. I remember an innovative scheme that was set up under the Excellence in Cities programme in Manchester. Sixth-formers from state schools took an undergraduate module with students from Manchester University, or it could have been the Open University, I cannot quite recall. That was not an isolated scheme.
All I would encourage is more general thinking about how to provide for really able children who need to be pushed. What, in the first part of this century, can we do that has not been done before to raise standards? I would be much more interested in using new technology to set up master classes with the best in the world, even if they are located on the other side of the world. We should free this debate up in order to be more creative than we have been in the past, and therefore my question for the Minister is this: why did they abolish the Young, Gifted and Talented Programme? It was the one scheme that made every school in this country identify a number of students who were thought to be gifted and talented. It brought about cultural changes in schools; some schools had said, “We haven’t got any bright kids”, while others had said, “We’ve got too much on our plate with our struggling kids”, so there was a group of children whose needs were not being met. Over the years that the programme was in operation, we began to change the culture of every school in the country. It was not perfect, but it got on to the agenda in every school that the needs of the most able, by ability or aptitude, also have to be met. It was sad that the Government chose to abolish and destroy the programme, which would have been a good hook on which to continue the debate. I would not mind an explanation of why it was done and what will take its place.
Education Bill
Lord Lexden Excerpts(13 years, 6 months ago)
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Baroness Garden of Frognal
My Lords, I wonder whether the noble Lord, Lord Lexden, could speak to his amendment in this group.
Lord Lexden
Thank you very much indeed, my Lords. Spare a kindly thought, if you will, for your comparatively new colleague who is speaking to his first amendment to legislation since he had the honour of joining your Lordships' House. This would have been my second amendment, if the nervous novice had not incompetently passed up the chance to move Amendment 65 at the end of proceedings on Monday, when we were caught up in a fascinating session on the GTC. Perhaps I may just mention that Amendment 65 was designed to tighten further the procedures for reporting serious misconduct and I hope that my noble friend will, in his usual benign fashion, be able to write to me about it.
I will turn, still as the nervous novice, to Amendment 73. The aim here is to explore the possibility of adding to the Bill a reference to partnership between maintained schools and independent schools. As before, I speak as a former general secretary of the Independent Schools Council. For generations, the best independent schools have reached out to maintained schools and their wider communities. The Independent Schools Council conducts detailed audits of these partnership activities. Nine out of every 10 ISC schools are involved in them. Sport, music and drama are the most widespread partnership activities.
Since the Second World War, the state has taken different approaches to the issue of partnership and the wider involvement of the independent sector in our education system. The Fleming scheme and then the assisted places scheme enabled talented children from less well-off families to attend independent schools. These are long gone and will not be repeated, but ambitious new schemes of partnership are in prospect. They include the participation of independent schools in the most important educational reform of our time—the academy movement, which features in a later amendment and in the new system of teaching schools.
Many independent schools have already applied for permission to become teaching schools. If they are successful, an increased percentage of the teaching workforce will get an opportunity to train in the independent sector. If this becomes the case, it is even more important that the sector should be able to take advantage of the opportunities that partnerships can bring and should not be unfairly excluded from the opportunities afforded to teachers in maintained schools. One thinks particularly of continual professional development, to which the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, made reference.
Whatever may happen in these exciting new areas, great effort should continue to be directed at ensuring the success of the independent/state school partnerships scheme, which was introduced by the previous Labour Government shortly after they took office in 1997 and made permanent by my noble friend Lady Morris of Yardley when she was Secretary of State. Relatively small amounts of public money have brought teachers and pupils together in enthusiastic partnership projects throughout the country. Since its creation, the ISSP programme has funded no fewer than 346 projects and allocated just short of £15 million—not a large sum but one that produces considerable benefits. The average value of a grant has been around £43,000. The largest single grant, of just over £500,000, was to a consortium of 18 London schools to enable them to offer gifted and talented provision in mathematics, science and modern languages over a number of years. I will not go into further detail; the Government produce full reports on the outcomes of partnership schemes. The current round includes 24 excellent projects.
It is against this successful background that I bring forward the amendment. Much has been achieved and it may be appropriate, in order to safeguard the partnership in future, to put it on a statutory basis.
Baroness Hughes of Stretford
I will not detain the Committee. I just wanted, in principle, to support the spirit behind these amendments. We have all talked about the quality of teaching being paramount and about ensuring that this goes beyond initial teacher training and involves continued access to good-quality continual professional development.
I particularly wanted to ask the Minister if he could refer in his reply to Amendment 66(1)(b), which makes reference to minimum qualifications in child development and behaviour. I declare an interest because I used to teach such subjects to postgraduate social work and probation students many years ago. More recently my son did a postgraduate certificate in education and is now, I am very pleased to say, a primary school teacher. I was shocked at the very small amount of time spent on child development and behaviour in his training. I know that it is a question of fitting a lot into a relatively small space of time—a year—but the lack of focus on cognitive development and language development in particular was astonishing. Has the Minister any plans to look at initial teacher training and at the focus, or lack of it, on child development? Will each higher education establishment decide that for itself in terms of the national curriculum, or will there be national guidelines to determine that at least a minimum amount of time should be spent on this important subject?
Lord Lexden
Lord Lexden
My Lords, Amendment 68 would extend the possibility of carrying out a statutory induction year to duly accredited schools abroad. The most important matter arising here is the manner in which such an assurance and accreditation would be carried out.
As some noble Lords may know, there is a Council of British International Schools—I have the honour of being its vice-president—which provides recognised accreditation for schools that conform to the statutory standards required of independent schools in England— namely, the independent schools standards regulations. Recently, the Secretary of State approved the Independent Schools Inspectorate, which works on terms agreed and authorised by the Government as an inspection body for British schools overseas. This has the happy result of creating circumstances in which many international schools can now meet the necessary requirements to offer induction to newly qualified teachers working in British schools abroad if the Government agree to such a development.
Extending the opportunity for teachers to complete their induction year overseas would have at least two direct benefits. First, it would encourage more schools abroad to seek accreditation through COBIS or by some other means on the clear basis that they meet the same standards as British schools in the United Kingdom. Secondly, it would allow teachers who choose to work abroad to return to the United Kingdom with full eligibility to teach in our schools. Under current arrangements, a teacher trained in a European Union country such as Romania can come to teach in England without needing to go through a probationary period, while a teacher who trained in England but left to teach abroad would not be able to teach in England when he or she returned, even after many years of service.
Now that British schools abroad can voluntarily request an inspection by the ISI and demonstrate that they are meeting the same standards as British schools in the United Kingdom, their inability to offer induction is a purely geographical problem. In some other cases, specifically those of Her Majesty’s forces schools in Cyprus and Germany, geography is deemed not to matter, presumably because there is a sufficient level of quality assurance from the United Kingdom. Now that kind of quality assurance can be guaranteed at accredited schools. I know that discussions on this matter between COBIS and the Department for Education are proceeding positively, along with parallel discussions with groups such as British Schools in the Middle East and the Federation of British International Schools in South East Asia. It would be good for Britain, and for British teachers and pupils at British schools abroad, if the recognised induction process could be offered in such schools.
Amendment 69 again draws on the experience of the independent sector, and in particular of the ISC's teacher induction panel, established and recognised by the Government in 2002, which last year acted as the appropriate body for more than 1,250 NQTs serving induction in 800 accredited independent schools. It is the largest appropriate body in the country. The panel believes very strongly that newly qualified teachers should be able to serve only one induction period, not least because such a small number fail—16 last year out of more than 29,000 teachers taking induction. That leads the panel to the clear conclusion that, after the established statutory induction period, the outcome is that only a tiny number are not suitable to teach.
The Government are gaining tremendous credit for increasing the rigour of the selection process for state-funded teacher training places, bringing the system closely into line with the very successful Teach First initiative. A revised and significantly reduced set of teaching standards that will underpin both the training and probationary years is in the pipeline.
Given that the new set of teacher standards will cover both years, teachers will be in the satisfactory position of having twice as much time to become familiar with, and proficient in, fewer standards. Thus, it would seem to make even less sense if new teachers who could not make the grade were allowed to retake induction. One year should be enough for experienced professionals to make a judgment on whether new teachers are able to cope with the demands of day-to-day school life. Just as we would expect new teachers who show insufficient knowledge and understanding to fail their initial teacher training, surely we should similarly expect those who are unable to maintain order in a way that meets the required induction standards to fail the statutory induction process without being able to extend that beyond the statutory period.
Finally, and briefly, Amendment 72 relates to a specific, but not unimportant, issue arising from the establishment of teaching schools, which are a very welcome development that will begin in September. The new networks of teaching schools will undoubtedly be successful in training their own staff, whether at initial teacher training level or over the statutory induction year but—and this is the issue—would it be altogether wise to allow these schools to become their own appropriate bodies responsible for validating the induction year and for the oversight of the quality assurance of the process? That is the issue that has led to my tabling Amendment 72.
Lord Sutherland of Houndwood
My Lords, this amendment intrigues me, and it raises a question that I hope the Minister can answer. I hope that the proposal would not in any way affect the positive cross-border flow of teachers between Wales and England and between Scotland and England. There are benefits to both sides at the moment.
The Earl of Listowel
My Lords, I am sorry to trouble the Committee further, but I am still a little worried by the Minister’s response. I was grateful for what she said but I can see a situation where excellent head teachers working extremely hard in very challenging areas producing outstanding results do not get the credit due to them for doing that. It is far easier to get high academic results in a school in a leafy suburb than in an inner-city school. We risk denying our future teachers an experience of learning from an inspirational head in an inner city if these plans are not carefully balanced to ensure that there is a broad base of experience in these teaching schools and they are not situated predominantly in areas where it is easier to get high educational attainment. However, we need to aim always to get the highest educational attainment for all our children.
Lord Lexden
My Lords, my three amendments have precipitated a discussion on induction that has ranged rather more widely than I anticipated. I thank all those who have contributed to this wide-ranging discussion, including my noble friend Lord Lucas who rebuked me for my mean-mindedness. I will work on it and seek to correct it. I also thank the noble Baroness who spoke on behalf of the Government for the many reassurances that she gave, particularly for her comments about the expanded arrangements now in contemplation so that induction can be undertaken in British schools abroad. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.