This week I report on the delay of the publication of the government’s Schools White Paper, concerns that have been raised over schools having to provide a graded self-evaluation as part of the new inspection system and new qualifications to be introduced to support students to resit English and maths GCSEs.

Delay in publication of the Schools White Paper
On Tuesday the Education Secretary announced that the government’s Schools White Paper has been delayed until early in the new year. The DfE had expected to announce its plans for reforming the special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) system in a White Paper this term.

In a letter to the Commons Education Select Committee Chair, Ms Phillipson said: “To help us deliver the most effective set of reforms we can, I have taken the decision to have a further period of co-creation, testing our proposals with the people who matter most in this reform – the families – alongside teachers and other experts as you highlight in the select committee’s report”.

There has been widespread concern that the government’s SEND reforms could result in EHCPs being cut or reduced. In her letter, Ms Phillipson indicated that the government’s SEND reforms will be underpinned by five principles. These are:

• Early – that children should receive the support they need as soon as possible.
• Local – that children with SEND should be able to learn at a school that is close to their home.
• Fair – ensuring every school should be resourced and able to meet common and predictable needs.
• Effective – that reforms should be grounded in evidence, ensuring that all schools know where to go to find effective practice.
• Shared – ensuring education, health and care services should work in partnership with one another, local government, families, teachers, experts and representative bodies.

Concerns raised over schools having to provide a graded self-evaluation
Headteachers’ leaders have voiced fears about Ofsted’s new inspections asking schools to provide a graded self-evaluation. Under the new inspection system, school leaders must provide inspectors with an evaluation of the school’s strengths and successes and its priorities for improvement in the pre-visit phone call, according to Ofsted’s school inspection operating guide for inspectors.

Headteachers will also have to say where they believe their school “currently sits” on Ofsted’s new five-point grading scale (exceptional, strong standard, expected standard, needs attention or urgent improvement) across each evaluation area (achievement, attendance and behaviour, curriculum and teaching, inclusion, personal development and wellbeing, and leadership and governance) despite the fact that the first leaders to face inspection will have only had two months to familiarise themselves with the incoming inspection report cards. Ofsted has produced an inspection toolkit showing how inspectors will make grading decisions.

Remember schools will no longer get a single overall effectiveness grade after these were scrapped by the Labour government last year.

New qualifications for students who fail English and maths GCSEs
On Monday the Education Secretary announced that new qualifications will be introduced aimed at supporting students with a Grade 2 or below to resit English and maths GCSEs. The plans are contained in a Post-16 Education and Skills White Paper which outlines that students that achieve a Grade 3 will continue to access the GCSE resit directly. The government plans to work with the sector to develop the new qualifications and will consult on them in 2026.

The White Paper also includes plans for new V qualifications to sit alongside A levels and T levels which will help students explore engineering, agriculture, digital or creative careers and students will be able to choose where they wish to specialise. The government has launched a consultation to support the introduction of V levels, which also expands on previously announced plans to introduce an enrichment framework for schools by the end of this year.

This week I highlight the publication of KCSIE 2024 which comes into force in September and guidance documents from the Cabinet Office on the Procurement Act 2023 which includes schools and comes into force in October.

Publication of KCSIE 2024
Although KCSIE 2024 has been published it does not come into force until September. The document may be subject to further changes as sometimes the wording gets revised and paragraph numbers might be altered. Schools should therefore be cautious about making changes to school policies until the final version comes out. In particular, there are two specific areas that are subject to change: preventing radicalisation, where new definitions are coming into force; and the guidance about gender-questioning children. The statutory consultation on RSHE may also have an impact.

Andrew Hall, a Safeguarding Consultant has created a short webinar (17 minutes) explaining the changes and what you could do next which you might find helpful.

Procurement Act 2023 guidance documents published
The Cabinet Office has released guidance on the Procurement Act 2023, which aims to simplify the commercial procurement system for public services, including schools; the Act goes live on 28 October 2024.

This week I report on a series of guidance the DfE has published to support the Government’s desire for a phased re-opening of schools from 1 June and a free webinar for governors on safeguarding during this pandemic.

DfE guidance on preparing to re-open schools to specific year groups
Following the Prime Minister’s announcement that there would be a phased re-opening of schools from 1 June at the earliest, the DfE has published various guidance documents to help schools to plan for this.

Primary schools have been advised to welcome back Nursery, Reception, Year 1 and Year 6 pupils, alongside priority groups. Yesterday the DfE published a planning guide for primary schools to compliment the initial planning framework and guidance on implementing protective measures that was already available.

Secondary schools, sixth forms and further education colleges are to offer some face-to-face support to supplement the remote education of Year 10 and Year 12 students who are due to take key exams next year, alongside the full time provision they are offering to priority groups.

The DfE is also asking nurseries and other early years providers, including childminders, to begin welcoming back all children. Alternative provision settings should mirror the approach being taken for mainstream schools and also offer some face-to-face support for Year 10 and Year 11 students. Special schools, special post-16 institutions and hospital schools will work towards a phased return of more children and young people without a focus on specific year groups.

Teachers’ unions are to meet the Government’s scientific advisers later today to seek assurances that it will be safe to open schools in England. The meeting follows challenges to the DfE to publish the scientific evidence on which the return to school has been based.

Free webinar on Safeguarding during the Coronavirus Pandemic
Governors for Schools in conjunction with Better Governor are hosting a free new webinar on Thursday 21 May from 8-9 a.m. on safeguarding during the current pandemic.

The webinar will explore the potential current threats to children and young people’s safeguarding and well-being and encourage those involved in school governance to reflect on how these should be monitored by governing bodies. Please use this link to register.

This week I report on the publication of the new Ofsted Inspection Framework that comes into force in September this year and changes to assessment in primary schools with the introduction of the new Reception Baseline Assessment from September 2020.

Changes to Ofsted Inspections from September 2019
This week Ofsted published the finalised version of its new inspection framework, which will govern school inspections from this September. The key changes from the draft version are as follows:

• On-site preparation plans have been scrapped – Ofsted had proposed that the lead inspector would arrive the afternoon before an inspection to do their preparation on-site. This has been replaced with a 90-minute phone call between the lead inspector and headteacher the day before an inspection begins.
• ‘Good’ small schools avoid two-day inspections – plans to increase the length of time inspectors spend in previously ‘good’-rated schools will go ahead, however ‘good’ or non-exempt schools with 150 or fewer pupils on roll will continue to receive a one-day inspection.
• Schools will get time to shake up their curriculums – Ofsted’s new “quality of education” judgement will be implemented as planned but it’s proposing to phase in part of the new framework which looks at the “intent” of schools’ curriculums. The transitional phase will be reviewed in the summer of 2020.
• Separate judgements for ‘behaviour and attitudes’ and ‘personal development – clarifying amendments have been made to the ‘behaviour and attitudes’ grade criteria to better reflect the realities of providers working in challenging circumstances. The absence of bullying is no longer focused on instead, emphasis is now placed on whether or not providers tolerate bullying and how swiftly and effectively they take action if issues occur. Changes have been made to the ‘personal development’ grade criteria to allow inspectors to properly recognise the importance of high-quality pastoral support.
• Headteachers use of internal data will not be assessed – inspectors will not look at schools’ internal data during inspections and has made some amendments and clarification to its inspection handbook “to try to ease concerns” raised by those who objected. The clarification recognises that school leaders draw on “a variety of sources when considering pupil performance, including internal assessment information”. It explains that inspectors will consider “the actions taken by schools in response to whatever internal assessment information they have”. Inspectors will review the impact of those actions without reviewing the assessment information itself.
• Up-to-date private school judgements delayed to 2020 – Ofsted will issue up-to-date judgements following emergency “additional inspections” of the private schools it inspects, but this will not commence until September 2020.

Changes to assessment in primary schools
All state-funded primary schools with a reception cohort will need to carry out the Reception Baseline Assessment (RBA) scheduled for introduction in September 2020. This year over 9,600 schools are participating in the RBA pilot in autumn 2019. Schools will no longer have to carry out Key Stage 1 assessments from September 2022, following the scheduled statutory introduction of the RBA.

The RBA is a short assessment carried out by a teacher in the first 6 weeks of reception. Teaching assistants and other qualified school staff, such as early years leads and special educational needs co-ordinators, can also carry out the assessment with individual pupils.

It is similar to the on-entry checks that many schools already conduct when children start school. The RBA takes about 20 minutes per child and is not a timed assessment. It is an assessment of a child’s early language, communication, literacy and mathematics. Children will provide answers by speaking, pointing or moving objects. The teacher inputs yes or no answers onto an online system for each task.

Teachers will receive a series of short, narrative statements that will tell them how the children performed in the assessment. The DfE will collect the data from the assessments to create school-level progress measures for primary schools, showing the progress schools make with their pupils from reception to the end of Year 6. The DfE will use the data at the end of Year 6 to measure pupils’ progress from reception to the end of Key Stage 2. The RBA will not be used to track individual pupils or as a performance measure for early years providers.

This week I report on the publication of the Timpson Review on exclusions, a new scheme to help teachers tackle bad behaviour in schools and a new programme to protect children at risk of exploitation.

Timpson Review on exclusions published this week
The Timpson review was finally published this week and makes 30 recommendations for the Government to consider, and the Education Secretary Damian Hinds has confirmed he accepts them all “in principle”.

Addressing Mr Timpson’s recommendation that changes should be made to strengthen accountability around the use of exclusions, the Government announced that it will launch a consultation later this year. This will include how to make schools accountable in the most effective and fair way, so they can fulfil their responsibilities for permanently excluded children. This may include through reform to commissioning and funding arrangements for alternative provision.

£10 million scheme to help teachers crack down on bad behaviour in the classroom
The Government has announced that more than 500 schools will be part of a new scheme to tackle bad behaviour in schools, backed by £10million investment. The programme will launch in September 2020 and the programme will run for an initial period of 3 years. Behaviour expert and former teacher Tom Bennett, who led a national review to identify the best ways of dealing with disruptive behaviour in schools, will lead the programme, where a network of expert schools will be identified to help teachers and school leaders in need of support.

A team of advisers (education professionals with a track-record and understanding of improving behaviour in schools) will be appointed to work alongside Mr Bennett to help develop and deliver the programme of support. They will help select the lead behaviour schools which will deliver additional support to others; work with supported schools to develop an understanding of the causes of the behaviour issues and how these could be addressed; develop comprehensive, bespoke action plans for the supported schools;
carrying out a series of follow-up visits; and participating in behaviour conferences to share best practice and ideas.

New programme to protect children at risk of exploitation
Yesterday the DfE announced a new ‘Tackling Child Exploitation Support Programme’ which has been designed to improve how different local areas respond to child exploitation such as gang, ‘county lines’ drug dealing, online grooming, sexual exploitation, trafficking or modern slavery and is backed by £2 million. It will help equip professionals involved in the protection of young people to identify those most at risk from dangers in their communities and online.

Councils in England will be able to apply for bespoke support from the scheme to tackle specific threats in their area, bringing social workers, police forces, schools, health services and charities together to improve how they respond to cases of exploitation, and learn from what works. The programme will be led by a team of academics and experts led by Research in Practice, together with The Children’s Society and the University of Bedfordshire.

This week I highlight a series of free Governor training webinars available this term from Governors for Schools and the Education Secretary’s call for evidence on the funding arrangements for pupils with SEND.

Free Governor training webinars this term
Governors for Schools (previously School Governors One Stop Shop) has announced a series of free webinars for Governors this term as follows:

• Thursday 16 May from 8 to 9 am and Monday 20 May from 7 to 8 pm – Latest education hot topics such as new Relationship & Sex Education Guidance, the new Teacher Recruitment Website and Interactive School Financial Value Standard for 2019/20.
• Thursday 27 June from 8 to 9 am – Headteacher recruitment.
• Thursday 18 July from 8 to 9 am – Self-evaluation of governance.

All sessions will be hosted by governance experts Steve Barker and Linda Waghorn. They’ll include a mix of information and advice, opinion polls and the opportunity to ask your own questions. Recordings of the webinars will be available on their website shortly afterwards.

Education Secretary calls for ideas on to improve SEND funding system
In a speech to the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) today, the Education Secretary will launch a Call for Evidence on the funding arrangements for pupils with complex Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) and praise the work of schools, teachers and support workers for enabling those pupils to achieve great outcomes.

Ministers have already identified high-needs funding as one of two areas most in need of a funding uplift in the forthcoming spending review, the other being post-16 funding. The call for evidence launches today and will run until 31st July.

This week I report on the appointment of the National Schools Commissioner, the Upskirting law that came into force on 12 April 2019  and funding to provide sanitary products extended to primary schools from early next year.

National Schools Commissioner appointed
The Government has appointed Dominic Herrington as its permanent National Schools Commissioner. Mr Herrington, also the Regional Schools Commissioner for south London and south east England, was appointed on an interim basis last September to succeed Sir David Carter but will now take on the job permanently.

He will also oversee “operational changes to the work of regional schools commissioners in the coming months to help schools, academy trusts and local authorities work with them by creating an even more joined-up team in each of the eight RSC regions”.

Upskirting now a crime
‘Upskirting’ – the act of taking a picture or video under another person’s clothing without their consent – has been made a criminal offence punishable by up to two years in prison, under the new Voyeurism Act.

Almost 100 cases of upskirting have been reported to the police in the last year, including incidents in schools.

Schools will need to review their Child Protection and Safeguarding Policy in line with the new law and make amendments/additions as appropriate.

Government funding to provide sanitary products in primary schools
The Government committed to fund sanitary products in England’s secondary schools and colleges in last month’s Spring Statement, and the Children and Families Minister Nadhim Zahawi has now confirmed access to sanitary products will also be fully-funded by the DfE in all primary schools across the country from early 2020.

Extending the programme to primary schools follows feedback from teachers, students and parents, and the DfE is now working with key stakeholders in the public and private sector to roll-out the programme in a cost-effective manner.