Posts Tagged ‘Facts and Figures’
Academy ‘spin’ not quite as it seems
So the Tory government’s academy movement has apparently reached a ‘’tipping point’. Well not quite. Unlike many friends and colleagues, I thought last week’s announcement about the apparently extraordinary number of academies opened since the General Election smacked more of mild desperation rather that triumph. Isn’t it only six months since there were going to […]
The truth about celebrity speakers, ‘dregs sifting’ and charter schools
Link to original article in Guardian Education I have been in two minds over whether to write about Katharine Birbalsingh, the South London deputy head whose scathing attacks on state schools was lapped up at the Tory Party Conference. Over my several decades as a journalist I have seen several Katharine Birbalsinghs come and go. […]
Guess what? The state sector is closing the gap.
You may not have realised it from the media coverage but this year’s exam results showed the state sector gaining on private schools at both GCSE and A level. In comprehensives the proportion of GCSE grades being an A or A* rose by 0.9 % and those achieving C or better rose by2.2%. In private […]
The truth about A level pupils and free school meals
Link to original article in Education Guardian A key claim in Conservatives campaigning on education issues, about which we will see more today as their manifesto is launched, is that fewer than 200 pupils eligible for free school meals get three A grades at A level. Actually the figures are vague. Sometimes it is 189, […]
Are our schools really failing?
The received wisdom in parts of the media is as follows: state schools are getting worse the £37 billion spent on them ( a 74% increase in real terms) since 1997 has been wasted there was once a ‘golden age’ when grammar schools reigned supreme, giving poor children ladders out of poverty and into the […]
