Displaying items by tag: Education

A headteacher attempted to invoke a UN convention to ban singing Christian hymns at a religiously diverse infant school. A third of students at Poulner Infant School have Christian parents, but humanist head Jo Conner believes singing hymns infringes on the 'human rights' of non-Christian students. All schools must provide an opportunity for wholly- or broadly-inclusive Christian worship to promote spiritual development: however, they may apply for an exemption in particular circumstances. Ms Conner sought an exemption, saying Christian hymns were inappropriate as only a third of students were Christian. The advisory council for Religious Education said any parent had a right to withdraw their child from collective worship, but no withdrawals had been recorded and no parents had complained about worship music. They rejected her application.

Forty schools will use a new virtual messaging tool for pupils to get online help from vetted subject experts in the autumn term to avoid hiring new staff amid a budget crisis. The tool, askOLA, was designed to help pupils study after school but will now be made available during lessons. Over 200 schools are expected to use askOLA by the end of the autumn term, giving 20,000 pupils access during lessons. Pupils connect to an online teaching assistant in less than three minutes, and are coached using a chat box and a virtual whiteboard until they understand. The online teachers start each session by asking the pupil how they are, to assess their mental health and whether they are able to deal with the learning problem.

Parents are facing buying expensive school uniforms in time for the new academicl year. In 2020 the average cost of a uniform was £337 for secondary schools, £315 for primary schools. This year a quarter of parents will try to reuse old school items rather than buying new, according to Barclaycard research. One in five are donating old uniforms to others who cannot afford new ones. Demand for free school uniforms has rocketed recently. Although a new law protecting parents from unnecessary spending on branded items for school uniform costs will come into effect in September 2022, schools have until September 2023 to introduce change. Pray for schools quickly and thoroughly to review their uniform policies to make them more cost-effective sooner rather than later.

Hundreds of thousands of students received their A Level results on 18 August. This was the first time students had actually sat their exams since 2019: during the coronavirus outbreak, they were assessed by teachers. Getting the grades needed for university or college can be really tough, and for some it impacts their mental health. Amid rising levels of anxiety in the run up to results day, Childline said it had seen large numbers of students receiving counselling for concerns about their grades. Pray that those teenagers who may not have achieved the results they wanted will be able to talk to a teacher or an adult they trust to discuss how they are feeling. Remember those who are now desperately hoping to find a university place, somewhere, through the clearing system.

A second-year history student at Cambridge University died in March 2022, three other students died in May, and another in June. The history student was ‘on course to finish as one of the most accomplished students in his year’. The coroner said there was ‘absolutely no indication that he was struggling’. He had had no contact with college counselling services, and his GP confirmed there were no mental health issues. Prof Graham Virgo said that after the fourth death they approached the NHS and public health agencies to investigate and review what had happened and what lessons could be learned. He said, ‘There was no common cause behind these student deaths, but after reflecting on the review, we have considered various aspects of our practice and implemented training in suicide prevention.’ Across the UK there is an increase in the number of young adults experiencing mental ill health. Pray for the bereaved families.

Research by the Times Education Commission condemned ‘shocking’ regional disparities in schools. One primary school reported children starting school unable to say their names; half of reception and nursery were not toilet-trained. There was also a lack of training on how to identify students with special education needs. The Association of Christian Teachers (ACT) called for the Church to play a bigger part in the education system after the report also found that parents do not believe classrooms prepare pupils for life or work and the system places too much emphasis on exams which could damage pupils' mental health. Exams have become a source of emotional stress for teachers and students: some students refuse to even open an exam paper. Christian teachers can emphasise that exams aren’t everything. They have the opportunity to say how trusting God puts worry in perspective, that God has a plan for our lives - even if we feel it all depends on one certain day and one exam.

Parents are receiving an increasing number of fines by schools trying to encourage children to stop missing school. Almost 1.8 million children regularly missed school in the first term of this academic year. As part of a mission to tackle this, parents have been fined £3.7m so far. For some families there are financial barriers; for example, one pupil messaged that they don't have trousers to wear into school. A uniform bank within the school has now been set up to help remove that barrier, but building trust with families can be tough. Some people are not brave enough to come forward and say they can't afford things. Some parents can't afford the dinner money, and it's cheaper to keep them at home. Parents have also been known to keep older children off school to look after younger siblings. Persuading parents to encourage their children into school can be difficult, as many families face ‘heart-wrenching’ struggles.

Despite a 50% increase in students taking a Religious Studies GCSE, no central government funding has been spent on the subject in the last five years. During the same period, £387 million was allocated to music projects, £154 million to maths, £56 million to science, £28.5 million to English, and £16 million to languages. Also many academies fail to offer the high-quality RE provision that according to Ofsted ‘affords students the opportunity to make sense of their own place in the world’. Almost 500 secondary schools are still reporting zero hours of RE provision in year 11; 34% of academies have no timetabled RE. Teaching RE is a legal requirement for all schools. Maintained schools have a statutory duty to teach it, while academies and free schools are contractually required through the terms of their funding agreement to make provision for teaching it.

Over eighty complaints of assaults, neglect, and sexual abuse have been made about after-school clubs in the past five years. In one incident, an eight-year-old boy had to clean his younger sister who had special educational needs, after she soiled herself: see The Department for Education says every child should feel safe in such clubs. Parents rely on them, and breakfast clubs, to provide childcare outside school hours. Many are not regulated, as providers do not need to register with Ofsted unless they offer childcare for more than two hours. They can register voluntarily with Ofsted in England, but only 10% are inspected a year, meaning they might not be inspected for nearly a decade. The mother of the two siblings said it was difficult for parents to know about the quality of safeguarding, saying, ‘After-school clubs are blind spots that need to be addressed.’

Scotland’s school curriculum should be scrapped and replaced with a ‘traditional’ system, the Scottish Tories have said, amid warnings that classroom discipline has almost completely broken down. Teachers are now routinely being attacked, spat on, and sworn at by children as young as four. Mike Corbett, of the NASUWT teaching union, said serious issues had been reported even at the best state schools. He accused the Government of turning a blind eye to the problem by refusing to commission research into poor behaviour; it was as if it didn't really want to know the scale of the problem. Scottish Tories have now called for a ‘national conversation’ about replacing the country’s Curriculum for Excellence, which was supposed to help develop ‘well-rounded’ and confident children. This ‘un-Scottish’ approach has failed and its introduction over a decade ago has coincided with the country plummeting down international education league tables.