Covid-19: Educational Settings

Lord Lucas Excerpts

Thursday 7th January 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, I have outlined that we recognise the hard work that teachers, teaching staff and all the ancillary staff have been doing, but there will be a few situations in which the best interests of the pupils who need this education mean that there should be some form of accountability. As I said, that is monitoring visits in our schools. Unfortunately, there are some reports of education still not being delivered. However, the guidance is very clear that schools should have an online platform to deliver education. We have moved to that presumption for remote education, but they can use video lessons. Oak academy has made available, with the department’s funding, nearly 10,000 lessons, including special educational needs lessons. I know of schools that have been using that resource. That is entirely appropriate delivery of remote education. One of the things we have seen is the sharing of much more expertise across our best schools through platforms such as this, which we hope will carry on post pandemic.

[Lord Lucas (Con) [V]]

My Lords, has the Department for Education established a working group to look at the opportunities for radical improvements to education and assessment that have been opened up by the disruption caused by the pandemic, and the response of the education system to it?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, there have been significant changes. As I just outlined, we hope we will carry forward certain changes if they are in the best interests of children. There will be a moment to reflect at some point on all the changes that have happened, on the use of online and where it is and is not appropriate. Our focus is on supporting staff and schools to deliver education and to focus on reopening our schools as soon as public health data allows us to.