Displaying items by tag: Education

Rev Dr Bernard Randall lost his job for disagreeing with LGBT ideology. As Trent College’s chaplain, his job was to ‘be the particular voice and embodiment of Christian values which are at the heart of Trent’s ethos’. Educate and Celebrate, a pro-LGBT 'inclusion' charity, was invited to train school staff. Bernard researched the group and feared the worst but kept an open mind and went to the training. It was as bad as he feared. In line with his school role as 'the voice of Christian values', Bernard raised concerns to management. He was ignored. When a pupil asked him to address the issue in chapel he agreed to preach and encouraged students to respect others' views while ‘not being obliged to accept someone else's ideology’. And the ‘Christian’ school suspended him for gross misconduct. The Christian Legal Centre is supporting Bernard. His tribunal, due in June, was postponed because the school's lawyers didn’t comply with court orders.

Paul Whiteman of the school leaders' union says UK policy on jabs for children should be led by clinicians. Schools should not be responsible for promoting, enforcing, or policing pupil vaccinations. A record 1.13 million children in England were out of school for Covid-19 related reasons towards the end of term. Pupils will return to schools next month, and the Government needs to take every possible step to prevent transmission of the virus amongst people in school communities, no matter what their age. Vaccine decisions for teenagers will be guided by data from other countries. The reason to roll out the vaccine to children is to break the transmission chains in households and in schools for the autumn term, while we know the winter is going to be especially difficult with seasonal respiratory infections. Mr Whiteman recommends everyone over 12 should get the Covid vaccination, which is safe and effective. Israel is vaccinating 12- to 15-year-olds, feeling that protection from vaccination outweighs the risks.

University students will get ‘advance warning’ if they need to have vaccines before moving to halls of residence, Dominic Raab has said. The foreign secretary said decisions will be taken in September - but he was keen to encourage vaccine uptake. Over 70% of adults have had both jabs, and Mr Raab said ‘We need to close that margin’. Currently, the Government plans to require two jabs to go to nightclubs and other crowded venues in England. The full details of the plans are yet to be seen, but the rule is set to come into force at the end of September. An NHS Covid pass - which you can obtain electronically or as a letter - will be used as proof.

Covid-related pupil absence in England has hit a new high since students returned to school in March. Over 640,000 English pupils were not in school due to Covid last week; only 62,000 were confirmed or suspected Covid cases. Gavin Williamson plans to replace the present bubble system with a new increased testing regime so that pupils would only be sent home if they tested positive. Also the mental health impact of the pandemic could have lasting repercussions for young people leaving education to take their first steps on the career ladder, with over one in four 18- to 24-year-olds believing poor mental health will affect their ability to find a job. Research found that while the UK’s public health crisis has eased and the economy is recovering, over 20% of that age group are still reporting poor mental health. Pray for pupils in higher education to receive proactive support to thrive before any further damage is done.

Some schools became hotbeds of anti-Israel sentiment during the conflict between Israel and Hamas. Students staged a number of demonstrations. Angry protesters gathered outside a Leeds school to support anti-semitism when the headteacher called the Palestinian flag a ‘call to arms’. During a protest at Clapton Girls’ Academy students sat down and chanted, ‘Free Palestine’, refusing to return to lessons. They did so after teachers removed posters about the Palestinian struggle from the walls of the schools. A north London school removed images of the Palestinian flag from school noticeboards, and told parents that schools were ‘apolitical organisations’ and ‘not to use political messaging to a captive audience’. Manchester’s Loreto College closed after hearing of planned demonstrations. A Jewish teacher in a non-Jewish school was bullied by students and resigned. Twenty-five teachers from a Jewish school quit their trade union to protest against its call for participation in pro-Palestinian rallies.

The man charged with overseeing plans to help children catch up on missed education in England has resigned just four months into the job. Sir Kevan Collins stepped down over the government’s pledge to spend just under one-and-a-half billion pounds on its recovery plan, calling it a ‘half-hearted approach which didn’t come close to meeting the scale of the challenge’. Boris Johnson said more resources will be ‘coming through’ to support children when catch-up plans were labelled a ‘damp squib’. Head teachers were "hugely disappointed" by a £1.4bn Covid recovery package, which breaks down to £50 extra per pupil per year. A report says £13.5bn is needed for pupils to catch up. Most of the funding will be for tutoring to make up for lost learning.

Connect, Scotland’s largest independent parents’ group, is challenging assessments which replaced Covid-hit exams. Schools are taking ‘different approaches’ across Scotland and they are alarmed that tests and answers are being widely shared on TikTok. The Scottish Qualifications Authority said results will be based on ‘demonstrated attainment’ on a combination of course work and teacher judgement. Instead it mimics the very worst elements of the system it replaces. Wales cancelled GCSE and many schools scheduled assessments to collect evidence for grades while pupils are having to self-isolate. Head teachers and pupils speak of the system’s pressures when grades are decided by schools. Across the UK £13.5bn is needed to reverse the damage to pupils' education caused by the pandemic as they have lost almost two months of learning in reading, and three months in maths. Many are calling for the school day to be extended and increased funding for poor pupils to help recovery.

We recently prayed for a teacher now in hiding after showing images from the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in a lesson about blasphemy. In the wake of the furore Ms Akram, a Muslim Labour councilor, posted a message on Facebook saying she was 'shocked and saddened' that the teacher was forced to go into hiding. She added, 'To the teacher, if you need to leave Batley - which I wouldn't blame you! - come to Slough. We will welcome you and your family.' Her local Muslim community say Ms Akram was disrespecting the Prophet, and now she is receiving death threats. A petition is now online with over 1,300 signatures describing her as 'evil'. Angry protesters have picketed Slough Borough Council for three weeks demanding she resign. Pray for the education authority and schools curriculums to be free to decide what children are taught in school - not parents.

On 16 April university students had a day of action to demand fee refunds because Covid-19 has affected their education. When they signed up for university they were promised sufficient access to facilities, course equipment, and social contact to help them achieve their degrees. But they were limited to internet zoom lectures of variable standard and still expected to pay the full price. The Write Off, Right Now (WORN) group is applying pressure on the government to refund fees because they did not receive value for money. WORN asked students nationwide to ‘take over’ social media to spread the message of the unfair demand for full fees. Education Secretary Gavin Williamson instructed the Office for Students ‘to take swift action where quality and academic standards have dropped’. An online petition, calling for tuition fees to be cut had received over 580,000 signatures in three days.

Cressida Cowell, the children’s laureate, has asked Boris Johnson for £100m to be ring-fenced for building new and restoring neglected libraries every year as millions of children are ‘missing out on opportunities to discover the life-changing magic of reading’. Decades of research has linked childhood reading to future success. The ability to read is a more telling predictor of future life chances than a family’s socio-economic status. Public and school libraries have been subject to swingeing cuts over the last decade. Johnson will reportedly unveil a ‘four-year emergency’ plan for literacy next month. Government figures reveal over 200,000 pupils are set to enter secondary school this autumn without being able to read properly - a rise of 30,000 since last year. The £100m funding is not unreasonable; in comparison, £320m is ring-fenced for physical education in primary schools, with hundreds of millions set aside every year since 2013. Ms Cowell said, ’Surely the opportunity to become a reader for pleasure is just as important as PE?’