Displaying items by tag: Education

The Just Finance Foundation published a report on the impact of its LifeSavers programme in 30 primary schools across England. It said, ‘Primary school pupils should receive compulsory lessons on how to manage money in response to growing levels of financial insecurity and problem debt in the UK. Learning where money comes from, when to spend, and how to save is vital to children’s ability to navigate adult life and should be a mandatory part of personal, social, health, and economic education in primary schools.’ Currently 40% of UK adults have less than £100 in savings. Difficulties managing money are becoming a mainstream issue. LifeSavers equips children to manage money wisely now and in the future, providing training, support and resources which aid teachers to deliver financial education to all year-groups. It helps set up and manage school savings clubs, and encourages parental and wider community engagement. It says today’s children face the most challenging and complex financial landscape of a generation.

In February the BBC reported that some schools are persuading parents to home-school troubled children so that their exam results do not count against the school. They are worried about poor Ofsted inspections, league table positions, and even losing their jobs because of academy takeovers. On 4 March the Times reported that religious extremists are exploiting lax home education laws to expose children to hate-filled material at scores of unregistered schools. Extremist texts seized from the schools allege that boys and girls can marry once they reach puberty, and one blames rapes on the way women dress. At least 350 unregistered schools have been set up across Britain, according to Ofsted, and over 50,000 children in the UK are currently being home-schooled.

With a chronic shortage of qualified RE teachers in schools, greater incentives are needed to attract new recruits. Without such teachers, pupils in later life will fail to filter out the stereotypes that contribute to religious discrimination. The Religious Education Council (REC) believes that high-quality specialist teaching about all faiths, beliefs, and worldviews is essential for all school children, and is leading a consortium to relaunch the Beyond the Ordinary campaign, designed to attract career-changers and graduates to train as RE teachers. For entry into initial teacher training in 2017, 405 places were filled, well below the Government target of 643. To reach that figure requires 1 in 20 graduates with a relevant degree to elect to train as RE teachers. Currently 55% of staff teaching RE in schools have no post-A level qualification in the subject. The REC is pressing the Department for Education for higher bursaries for RE teachers.

Following a meeting with the Prime Minister, the former education secretary, Justine Greening, left the Government, to be succeeded by Damian Hinds. The women and equalities portfolio will be held by Amber Rudd. These changes will give the Government the opportunity to review many of Ms Greening’s more extreme proposals before they begin to impact upon families: for example, using compulsory relationships education to teach children as young as five about same-sex marriage, and allowing anybody, whatever age, to choose their gender. It is not too late to halt either of these policies, nor is it too late for the Government to note the views of the 59% of party members who oppose same-sex marriage (according to a new YouGov poll).

Lamentations 2:19 says, ‘Arise, cry out in the night, as the watches of the night begin; pour out your heart like water in the presence of the Lord. Lift up your hands to him for the lives of your children.’ A report into social media use among 8- to 12-year-olds has stated, ‘Schools should play a bigger role in preparing children for social media's emotional demands as they move from primary to secondary school; and parents should prepare children emotionally for the significant risks of social media as they move schools and meet new classmates.’ Meanwhile, an IJM report said, ‘Cybersex trafficking is the live-streamed sexual abuse of children viewed over the internet. It’s brutal, growing at an alarming rate, and fuelled by the behaviour of Westerners, including people from the UK.’ See

In November you prayed for Joshua Sutcliffe, the Christian maths teacher facing discipline for 'misgendering' a school student. See: He is now taking his employer to court after being dismissed for gross misconduct. The child had self-declared as ‘male’, but Sutcliffe had been given no formal instruction on how he was to refer to the pupil. When the pupil became irate Sutcliffe apologised. However, an investigation began. Sutcliffe’s claim of discrimination also stems from his school Bible club being shut down 18 months after it began. Sutcliffe said he was more than willing to answer all the unjustified allegations against him, and detail his grievances about 'equality' policies and practices, but would do so before an independent tribunal not school governors. The Christian Legal Centre said cases like these have become common as children are making decisions against their natural born biological sex.

EU officials supervise and fund the Palestinian Authority (PA) education system. A series of Helsinki talks examined the new PA curriculum and agreed that the new textbooks stir up further radicalisation and hatred. They concluded that radicalisation is persistent throughout the curriculum, grooming children for martyrdom and jihad war, with a fundamentalist worldview. ‘This curriculum is not only a catastrophe for Palestinian youth but also for the reputation of the Finnish education system, as the curriculum was reviewed under the supervision of Finnish experts and officials,’ said the spokesperson for the EU consultations. An elementary mathematics book asks, ‘If the number of martyrs from the first intifada is X and the number of martyrs from the second intifada is Y, what is the total number of martyrs?’ In basic physics, Newton’s law of gravity is explained by a picture of a young Palestinian aiming a slingshot at an Israeli officer. See

Uganda: Over 9,000 drop out after registering for PLE (Primary Leaving Examination)
Pupils who pass their PLE exam can progress to secondary school. Primary school tuition is free but pupils, especially in rural areas, face serious challenges to finishing their education. They lack books and pens, often having to study all day on an empty stomach since no meals are provided at school, and schools often have poor teaching methods.  Information obtained from Uganda National Examinations Board website indicate that out of 333,482 pupils who registered for PLE from 2010 to 2016, a total of 9,320 did not sit. A government official said, ‘Grazing livestock is one of the major reasons for the school dropout.’ The other reasons keeping children out of school, he said, are poverty, underage marriage, trading, tea picking, stone quarrying and mining. However he said they have engaged parish chiefs, sub-county chiefs and chairpersons of school management committees to arrest parents of children who  are removed from school See also https://www.theguardian.com/katine/2010/feb/08/education-system-explainer

Former education secretary Nicky Morgan will lead an inquiry into the rising costs of the student loans system in England and its possible replacement by a graduate tax. The investigation is needed because of the steeply rising levels of debt carried by graduates after leaving university. It will run alongside similar hearings on personal finance by the House of Lords economic affairs committee. A recent report from the Gambling Commission found that some students have £10,000 gambling debts. A 24-year-old who got into gambling at university said, ‘It went from spending a few days after coming home from lectures and going onto my laptop to suddenly saying no to going out with friends, maybe saying no to going to uni. I think you can be very vulnerable. I'd never budgeted before, and money was a whole new concept to me.’ See also:

Rachel's daughter was raped by a boy at her school. He was arrested, bailed, and put back into lessons, alongside his victim, the following day. ‘A rape victim is already in a terrible place, but to be expected to be back in the same space as the rapist is terrible,’ Rachel said. The Government is writing interim guidelines for schools to prevent such things happening, but campaigners say it is taking too long. Rachel said that the school seemed to have no policy in place, and dealt with the situation ‘extremely badly’. She had to instigate a meeting and, despite her efforts, they did not prioritise her daughter's needs but were keen to protect her assailant’s rights to education. Over 5,500 sex crimes in UK schools were reported in the last three years, including nearly 4,000 physical assaults and 600+ rapes. See