What Are Schools Missing?
Absence is – as we are all aware – a big deal in education. One need only linger on the topic for a few seconds, and a whole host of issues arise: can perfect attendance be rewarded without encouraging pupils to bring viruses into schools? (Probably not.) Are holidays during term-time a huge disruption or a holistic, enriching experience? (Both. It depends whether you’re the one sitting in the sunshine.)
This week, however, absence seems to dominate the education news agenda. It is a peculiarly telling trait of 2023 that the school system is now defined by what it does not have.
So here is an itemisation of the things that education has been missing this week.
1. Pupils
If you could only keep a limited number of pupils in school, which year groups would you prioritise? Year 9 would presumably be first to go, for reasons that could be argued in terms of educational importance, but probably come down to the fact that no-one likes teaching Year 9.
Year 7, meanwhile, are a pleasure to teach, because they’re still small and a bit scared. Year 11 are also a bit scared, though for very different reasons.
Whether or not this was the official rationale, most secondaries prioritised keeping classes running for Years 7 and 11 last Wednesday, the day of the NEU teacher strikes.
According to data published by FFT Education Datalab, only around one in 10 pupils in Years 8 to 10 was in school on Wednesday.
Poorer pupils were also less likely to be in school than their more advantaged peers. And academies were more likely to remain open than maintained schools.
2. Science teachers
A practical lesson in the science of evaporation: science teachers are reaching boiling point and vanishing into the ether, according to a new survey.
Thirty per cent of science teachers in English secondaries are planning on quitting within the next five years, according to a survey of more than 3,700 science teachers and technicians, conducted by the Royal Society of Chemistry. Most cite high workload, stress and exhaustion as their reasons for leaving.
And 64 per cent of state secondaries report being understaffed in one of the three sciences, with physics teachers in particular lacking the necessary friction required to stop them from slipping away. Still, perhaps one of the remaining chemistry teachers will discover the secret of alchemy, and learn to turn base metals into functioning staff members.
3. Any teachers
Perhaps it’s because we’re all now aware that we’re walking germ dispensaries. Perhaps it’s because it’s probably a rare teacher ailment that doesn’t have exhaustion at its root.
Whatever the reason, more staff are taking time off work for illness now than before the pandemic, according to four out of 10 teachers responding to a Tes survey.
This is placing pressure on schools’ budgets, which already resemble that tissue you’ve used so many times that you’re effectively blowing your nose into your hand. As a result, schools have been forced to resort to pandemic-era coping strategies, such as merging classes, prioritising certain year groups over others (hello, Years 7 and 11) and using cover supervisors in place of supply teachers.
4. Money
Yes, yes: I know. Tell us something we didn’t know. But there are always new and increasingly inventive ways to make the same point.
This week, nearly half (47 per cent) of single-academy trusts in the primary sector reported deficits for the year 2021-22. The average deficit is £40,000.
The annual Kreston Global Academies Benchmark Report, published on Wednesday, revealed that academy trusts have somehow managed to retain sufficient surpluses this year – presumably by drawing on those same alchemising techniques pioneered in the chemistry department.
But most academy leaders expect to raid their reserves in the coming months: 88 per cent of trusts “are expecting future reductions in total income”, the report stated.
5. Academisation plans
Remember – back in the heady days of the last education secretary but several – when there were plans for all schools to belong to multi-academy trusts? Specifically, the government target was that all schools should have joined, or be preparing to join, a MAT by 2030.
The Opportunity For All government white paper was published in March last year, back when Nadhim Zahawi was education secretary, and the one Tory even non-Tories didn’t really mind.
Oh, how times have changed, and not just for Zahawi. Of the white paper’s 42 proposals, only 19 have been implemented or are still on track, according to Schoolsweek. The government has also dropped its pledge for councils to set up their own academy trusts.
6. Part-time timetables
This sounds like a) something teachers are offered in a properly funded education system; or b) a cunning wheeze to save on heating bills and staffing costs. (In the developing world, the poorest children often go to school in shifts, in order to save on costs and space. This feels disturbingly close to a dystopian vision of our future.)
In fact, part-time timetables are a strategic tool used by schools, when dealing with specific pupils’ needs. Often the wrong pupils, according to new attendance guidance published by the Department for Education.
Part-time timetables must not be used to manage pupils’ behaviour, according to the guidance. Instead, they should only be used in “very exceptional” circumstances. For example, if a pupil was prevented from attending school full-time, because of a medical condition, a part-time timetable might be deployed as part of a broader reintegration plan.
In its annual report, published in December, Ofsted had highlighted the fact that schools were increasingly using part-time timetables when they were unable to manage a child’s additional needs or behavioural problems.
7. Mental-health professionals
A report into the state of children’s wellbeing in England, published by the DfE, revealed that there has been “inconsistent recovery” of children’s mental and physical health, following the Covid pandemic.
More children are reporting “low happiness” with school, according to the report. In a finding that will surely come to no surprise to anyone who’s ever met a teenage girl, boys were on average happier than girls.
Julie McCulloch, director of policy at the Association of School and College Leaders, told Tes that the government had “not put anywhere near enough resources” into dealing with these problems.
Instead, McCulloch said, there was an “unfair burden placed on teachers to support children with complex needs”. Though, really, the second part of that statement is somewhat redundant: it might be more accurate simply to place the full stop after “teachers”, and leave it at that.
You can read more articles by Adi Bloom here.
