Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson strikes again. Her latest wheeze is to introduce ‘V Levels’, which the government said will: “replace many existing qualifications, simplifying the current system and open up more high-quality routes for young people. “These reforms will make sure that whatever a student’s interests or strengths, whether academic, technical, or vocational, there’s a…
Evidence. It is something that we teachers encourage our students to find and weigh-up before coming to a conclusion. In science, if the evidence does not back the theory, the theory is wrong. Pretty basic stuff, you’d imagine. But not for our Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson. She came into office with left-wing education theory, having…
Danny Finkelstein, writing recently in the Times, correctly reported on the improvement in schools in England. He noted how we had risen up the league tables in reading and maths – so much so that we are ‘attracting admiring visits from foreign policymakers keen to see what England is getting right.’ He praised the efforts…
The Education Secretary, Bridget Phillipson, captured the headlines recently when she spoke about ‘white working-class children’. She warned that four-fifths of children from white working-class backgrounds were falling short in the English and maths skills required to get on in life. However, this headline-grabbing warning is slightly misleading because she is referring only to white…
Summer ‘reading lists’ are an annual conversation piece amongst politicos and thinkers. Self-appointed authorities set these lists to show what direction they think policy should be taking. I don’t have a list to publish – I have just one book to recommend. And I am hoping that our Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson will have it…