Schools White Paper
Tristram Hunt Excerpts(14 years ago)
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Michael Gove
I believe in diversity and pluralism—different strokes for different folks. Middle schools do very well in some parts of the country. I know that the lead member for education in Leicestershire, Ivan Oulds, is one of the most impressive councillors in the country, and I look forward to talking to him, my hon. Friend and other colleagues to see what can be done to ensure that everyone is better off.
Tristram Hunt (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab)
May I urge Ministers to focus on the question of resits, which often work to the disadvantage of lower socio-economic groups and are at the root of grade inflation? I am also concerned about the thinking on modules. Modules at A-level work very well indeed, so I would be hesitant about rolling those back. Finally, I join my hon. Friends on the question of the importance of grammar and spelling. On that note, I must point to a grievous error on page 7, line 7 of the statement we were provided. The Secretary of State, of all people, should know how to spell “bureaucracy”!
Michael Gove
First, I thank the hon. Gentleman for his point about bureaucracy. Whenever I see that word, a red mist descends over my eyes, so occasionally the finger slips on the keyboard. I also thank him for his points about GCSEs and A-levels. We are stripping away modules from GCSEs. With A-levels, although I favour in many cases a linear approach that encourages synoptic understanding of the subject, it remains for universities, learned bodies and schools to decide the best way forward. For some subjects, it is appropriate to have a modular approach at A-level.
Oral Answers to Questions
Tristram Hunt Excerpts(14 years, 1 month ago)
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Michael Gove
Top historians such as Niall Ferguson, Simon Schama and even the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Tristram Hunt) have all pressed on the Government the need to ensure that history is taught as a connected narrative. I agree with them.
Tristram Hunt (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab)
May I congratulate the Secretary of State on attracting the likes of Simon Schama and Niall Ferguson to advise the Government, although quite when they last saw the inside of a British classroom is open to debate? However, is the real issue not the syllabus, but the fact that the average 13-year-old has only one hour of history a week for 32 weeks a year, thanks to the growth of citizenship and other well-meaning additions to the syllabus that surely need to be pulled back?
Michael Gove
I enjoyed the hon. Gentleman’s searing attack on curriculum changes introduced under the last Labour Government, appreciate his commitment to the better teaching of history and note, also, the mildly envious tone in his remarks about Simon Schama and Niall Ferguson. However, I can assure him that a copy of “The Frock-Coated Communist” is on my shelves as well, so his sales will certainly be improving—although, whether they can match Niall’s and Simon’s remains to be seen.
Oral Answers to Questions
Tristram Hunt Excerpts(14 years, 2 months ago)
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Mr Hayes
I think that my hon. Friend understated my popularity somewhat, but nevertheless he will know that we are entirely committed to ensuring that people get the right kind of advice about vocational options. Too often, people have lacked that advice and it is important that those with the aptitudes, tastes, talents and choices to take them down that road get proper advice and advice on progression, too.
Tristram Hunt (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab)
Does the Minister accept that young people from poorer communities are often put into vocational GCSEs as an easy option, as a result of which academic subjects such as history are becoming the preserve of the elite? What steps is the Minister taking to ensure that “academic equivalence” GCSEs are not becoming the default option for poorer communities?
Mr Hayes
As a qualified history teacher, I share the hon. Gentleman’s passion for the teaching of history, but I think he underestimates and undervalues—as do so many from the bourgeois class that he personifies—the significance of technical skills, craft skills and practical skills. They matter too, and the Government know it.
Academies Bill [Lords]
Tristram Hunt Excerpts(14 years, 5 months ago)
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Tristram Hunt (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab)
It is a great pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bradford East (Mr Ward). No doubt we shall be seeing him later.
I want to make a rather basic intervention. Amidst all the language of funding models, burdens of bureaucracy, accountability and pupil premiums, I thought that it would be germane to raise the question of what children might learn under these new school reforms. We are being invited to extend the academy model in one form or another on the specific rationale that those schools raise educational attainment, in particular through a rapidly improving results framework, with almost double the number of A* to C grades at GCSE. At the beginning of the Secretary of State’s speech, we heard the litany of schools that are doing so well, and in The Daily Telegraph on Friday, the Department for Education repeated the mantra that academies were outstanding. But what are they outstanding at? How have the results improved so markedly?
Although much of the success can be attributed to strong leadership, inspiring teaching, improved facilities and the new ethos of learning that my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg) outlined so well, in some cases improved results are the product of directing students into less demanding examination options that in the end improve no one’s life chances. We are being asked to implement an educational model whose validity is open to question. Indeed, there should have been an element of scepticism about the academies when they were not subject to freedom of information legislation. With a degree of ease, some academies were able to disguise some of the data behind their results surge.
Andrew Percy
It was not necessarily only academies that went down that route: all kinds of schools throughout the country forced children on to GNVQs and equivalent qualifications to force up their results. It was not unique to academies.
Oral Answers to Questions
Tristram Hunt Excerpts(14 years, 5 months ago)
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Mr Gibb
May I welcome my hon. Friend to the House and congratulate him on his election? I understand his point. Trust status was a useful form of independence, which is why it surprises me that Labour Members are so critical of our moves to boost the academies programme and to give more schools the independence and the trust in professionals that is inherent in the trust school system. Our concern about the trust school basis is that it did not give sufficient freedoms to schools; we want to ensure that schools have those extra freedoms.
Michael Gove
My hon. Friend was good enough to lobby me several weeks ago about the fate of the school that he mentioned, and schools in Warrington overall. He was, as ever, articulate and powerful on behalf of his constituents. I recognise that his constituents have been let down by the fact that Building Schools for the Future spent so much money on bureaucracy, and not enough on bricks and mortar. The purpose of our capital review is to ensure that money reaches the front line more quickly, and that the dysfunctional system that was established under the last Government—which they took no steps to reform or abolish—is transformed. I believe that there will be an interim report in a few months’ time and a final report by the end of the calendar year, both of which will transform school buildings for the future.
Tristram Hunt (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab)
Is the Secretary of State aware that figures from his department show that academy schools are, on average, teaching one third less GCSEs in history and geography than schools in the maintained sector, and are often inflating their grades through the use of GCSE equivalents? If that is to be the model for the future, what steps is the Secretary of State taking to ensure that academic subjects are protected in academies?
Michael Gove
Like the hon. Gentleman, I am committed to academic excellence, so I should point out that he should have said “fewer”, not “less”. However, he has made a good point. I am worried about the use of so-called equivalent qualifications instead of academic GCSEs. When I raised the issue from the Opposition Benches, the then Secretary of State said that I was talking achievements down, but I am glad to note that we can now form a coalition for excellence across the Dispatch Box.