Northern Education Trust makes five new appointments

The Northern Education Trust (NET), one of the largest multi-academy, not-for-profit trusts in northern England, has recently made five key appointments as it adds further weight to its senior leadership team. In the 11-18 years sector, Jonathan Morris, who has over 30 years of experience in North East secondary schools, joins Thorp Academy in Ryton, …

Gateshead community, the driving force behind school’s new library bus

Parkhead Community Primary School has just finished a project to convert an old Canadian ‘blue bird’ bus into a new library. The school and community fund-raised £10,500 to support the project and obtained a grant to buy the library books and furniture. Mandy Tulip, Business Manager at Parkhead Primary, was in charge of the project …

Online cross-age peer tuition is a feasible transition intervention for schools

Written by Wayne Harrison, PhD Student (ESRC funded) Durham University As part of an ESRC Funded PhD at Durham University a feasibility study has trialled a new type of transition intervention in schools. The feasibility study involved Year 7 pupil’s peer tutoring Year 5 students in mental arithmetic strategies on the Tute Virtual learning platform. …

More persistent school absentees in Middlesbrough than anywhere else in England, DfE stats show

Middlesbrough is the local authority area with the highest number of persistent secondary school absentees in the country - 11.3%, an increase of 1% on last year. The North East is the region with the highest rate of overall absences (4.8%) at both primary and secondary level, topping the national average of 4.5%. There has been a …

Exam boards – Chief Regulator to meet North East heads after SCHOOLS NorthEast lobby

Last month, SCHOOLS NorthEast made a call for evidence to secondary schools, as we investigated Head Teachers' concerns around exam boards. The response was fantastic and your stories were the subject of an evidence document which SCHOOLS NorthEast submitted to the Education Select Committee. On 14 October, the Committee held an Evidence Session with Ofqual's …

Summit 2015: Feedback and survey winners announced

A week has passed since the SCHOOLS NorthEast annual Summit took place and we would like to thank everyone again for making this a very successful event. We've asked our delegates and exhibitors to fill in a survey regarding their experience at the Summit and the feedback has been fantastic. Two delegates were randomly chosen …

Natasha Devon MBE: Advice for a North East Mental Health Commission (Guest Blogger)

I'll admit that, back when I took my first tentative steps into an Essex based secondary school in late 2007, I wasn't aware of the scale of the mental health and self-esteem issues befalling young people in the UK. In some ways I'm grateful for this since, if I had, I might have been too …

Summit 2015: Who won the Prize Pots?

We had some fantastic prizes up for grabs in this year's Summit Bingo Draw - here are the three lucky winners: Prize Pot No.1: Mo Wilkinson (Carmel College) This includes: Overnight stay for 2 at Doxford Hall Hotel – kindly donated by Doxford Hall Hotel Bottle of Bollinger champagne – kindly donated by Calibre Secured …

Summit 2015: Quick Round-up

This year's Summit took place at St James' Park in Newcastle and was the biggest one yet, attracting over 450 delegates from all four corners of the North East and nationally renowned speakers. The  regional event with the benefits of a national conference has become a must-attend education event in the calendar of North East …

Summit 2015: HMCI Sir Michael Wilshaw backs regional Schools Challenge

Ofsted's Chief Inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw mentioned the North East Schools Challenge at this year's Summit, saying he welcomes efforts to get it off the ground. Sir Michael asked the Summit audience: "What can be done to raise ambitions and improve outcomes, particularly in your secondary schools, in order to end the depressing cycle of …