SCHOOLS NorthEast hosts first Evidence Champions event

More than 70 Heads, teaching and learning leads and school professionals from across the region joined SCHOOLS NorthEast last Friday to shape an Evidence Champions network for the region. The event, which took place at the Evolve Centre at Rainton Bridge, was an opportunity for school leaders to meet and discuss how they can collectively make …

Sunderland dad’s anger over school ice cream treat for good attendance

A Sunderland dad has hit out at a school reward scheme which he claims is ‘cruel’. Graham Robson said the new treat at Hasting Hill Academy of an ice cream from a visiting van for the children who have 96% attendance or above is unfair on the other youngsters in the hot summer weather. Do …

Data shows North East exclusions hotspots

New statistics released by the DfE show exclusion rates in some areas of the North East remain significantly higher than the national average. The region’s fixed period exclusion rate across all schools was 5.92 in 2016/17, compared to 4.76 for England as a whole. The North East saw far bigger rises in both fixed period …

National funding formula delayed by another year

The Department for Education has delayed the full roll-out of the “hard” national funding formula for schools for another year. A document published yesterday afternoon revealed that local authorities would continue to allocate school budgets until at least 2021. Previously, the “soft” formula that gave flexibility to local authorities was set to continue only to …

Record year of achievements for SCHOOLS NorthEast

It has been a record year here at SCHOOLS NorthEast, and in some respects a year of firsts. We expanded the team last summer, and since  then our engagement, our output and our activity has grown and grown. The end of  term, and the end of the academic year, is a good place to reflect …

Sir David Carter ‘worried’ about non-teachers leading MATs

It is worrying that academy trusts will increasingly be led by people from business with no experience of teaching, the National Schools Commissioner has said. Sir David Carter said that currently about 90% of multi-academy trust CEOs had previously been Head Teachers, but he expected this proportion to drop in the future. The National Schools …

Private tutors ‘should face DBS criminal record checks’

The UK's biggest teaching union has called for all private home tutors to face criminal record checks before being allowed to work with children. The National Education Union (NEU) said teachers barred from classrooms may try to work as private tutors. Research by the Sutton Trust charity suggests the number of children in England and …

Compulsory Mental Health education to be added to curriculum by 2020

All schools will teach children about good physical and mental health, how to stay safe on and offline, and the importance of healthy relationships under new plans published this week by Education Secretary Damian Hinds. Under the proposals, all pupils will study compulsory health education as well as new reformed relationships education in primary school …

Ofsted refuses to name 300 schools with “particularly high levels of off-rolling”

Ofsted has refused to give details of the 300 schools it identified as having “particularly high levels of off-rolling” in a 26 June blogpost. The inspectorate responded to a Freedom of Information Request submitted by education author Sue Cowley yesterday, stating that they consider the requested information to be exempt under section 33 of the …

Bronze Rusty Bullets in the Battlegrounds of our North East Schools

Jon Tait, Director of Acklam Grange Teaching School Twitter: @TeamTait You’d be forgiven for thinking this article was about gun crime in school. Thankfully, even with a recent Donald Trump visit to the UK and his efforts to try and persuade everyone to believe the American dream, it’s not. What it is though, is a …