Schools: Online Learning

Lord Watson of Invergowrie Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd February 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, in relation to SEND pupils, we have given additional funding to the national Star Academies to make sure that through the peer-to-peer support for schools they have the best practice to share. Yes, the effects of remote learning are quite disparate, and there are certain pupils who may have been distracted by pupils in the classroom whom teachers report are engaging better, but it is not a standard picture. We recognise that catch-up will have to be individualised for pupils. Schools know those pupils best, which is why £650 million is going out to schools.

[Lord Watson of Invergowrie (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, based on the figures just given by the Minister, of the 1.3 million laptops promised by the Government, one-quarter are yet to be delivered. At the current rollout pace of some 75,000 a week, many schools face having to wait for their laptops to be delivered until the second week of March—ironically, when the Prime Minister has said that he hopes schools will begin to reopen. The chair of the Education Select Committee has echoed the call by the Education Policy Institute for resources to be provided direct to schools to enable them to source IT equipment themselves. What consideration have the Government given to the feasibility of adopting that approach in order to reduce the amount of lost learning time?

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, at a time when supply was massively disrupted, for the department’s commercial team to procure this number of laptops was actually quite a feat, in this climate where everyone wants a laptop. Some 350,000 were delivered in January alone. Yes, schools have been using additional resources to purchase laptops as well, which they can do from their Covid catch-up money.