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The new headteacher of a school called the strictest in Britain has unveiled plans to create a chain of similar schools. Peter Hughes, the principal of Mossbourne Academy in Hackney, is setting up another secondary school and wants to open a primary school in the borough. Mr Hughes has taken over from Sir Michael Wilshaw, [...]

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A head teacher boasted about breaking children down after reducing them to tears, a tribunal heard yesterday. Eirios Hall, in her 50s, is alleged to have humiliated and violently manhandled pupils at Ardwyn Nursery and Infant School in Welshpool, Powys. A General Teaching Council for Wales hearing was told that children would break down into [...]

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For those of you actively job seeking at the moment don’t forget that finding and applying for a new role couldn’t be simpler with our help. Firstly take a look at the thousands of jobs on offer at Schools Jobs and then skip to our lovely new careers page here where you will find top [...]

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Michael Gove’s easy ride on academies is coming to an end. Until now, the financial advantages of academy status have encouraged a steady flow of conversions. This perhaps gave the impression of an ideologically popular policy, but the reality is that schools have just been pragmatic. From here on in, it will be much tougher. [...]

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Schools which find the most effective ways to help children from poor backgrounds could win £10,000, Deputy Prime Nick Clegg has announced. The awards will be made to 50 schools which make best use of the “pupil premium”, a £600 payment given for each child who receives free school meals. Mr Clegg said this would [...]

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Morale among state school teachers is at “rock bottom”, according to a former chief inspector of schools, who speaks out as unions warn that a “perfect storm” of government meddling threatens an exodus of talent from the profession. Christine Gilbert, who resigned as head of Ofsted last year, said there was evidence of widespread disillusionment [...]

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When Sir Michael Wilshaw took up his role as the head of Ofsted in January, he made it clear he had no intention of softening the combative style that marked his spell as head of the high-achieving Mossbourne Academy in Haringey. “If anyone says to you that ‘staff morale is at an all-time low’, you [...]

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When they came to power, David Cameron and Nick Clegg said they were determined to raise the status of teaching because “the most successful countries, from the Far East to Scandinavia, are those where teaching has the highest status as a profession”. These are places where only the top graduates enter teaching, and where training [...]

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A cross–party group of MPs said some of the schools, which are free of local authority control and funded directly from Whitehall, were making “very high” payments to head teachers and leaders of academy chains. The Commons public accounts committee raised concerns over a quango’s failure to “pick up warning signs of improper spending or [...]

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Glynis Bates, who teaches at Priory School, Whippingham, Isle of Wight, tampered with two A-level physics papers sat by student Jacob Phillips in January. She made alterations and re-wrote answers on papers submitted by Phillips, the son of a family friend. The former examinations officer, who won an award from the Good Schools Guide in 2009, [...]

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Reading Michael Gove’s mischievous speech on the disproportionate grip that private schools still have on the upper slopes of British life, I was reminded of the day I fired off a breakfast email to a colleague, saying that his latest article had been so unhinged that I had gone straight to Who’s Who to see [...]

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Michael Gove, the Education Secretary, has pledged his support for the expansion of grammar schools, it was claimed yesterday. People who attended a reception at the Commons last month held by Friends of Grammar Schools said Mr Gove had expressed support for the example set in Kent, where a new “satellite” grammar school – an [...]

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Parents were told today to demand more of grammar schools that are “coasting”. Some are not being held to account for failing to stretch bright children, as might a comprehensive, because admission is so competitive that parents are only too pleased that their child has won a place, says the Good Schools Guide. Figures from [...]

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Sir Michael Wilshaw criticised head teachers “whose first recourse is to blame someone else” for chronic underperformance in schools. He said difficult pupils, unsupportive families and the stress of the job was “too often” used an excuse by staff facing the biggest challenges.   The chief inspector – appointed as the head of Ofsted in January [...]

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Teachers don’t understand the real meaning of the word stress, the new Ofsted head, Sir Michael Wilshaw, said today. In a scathing attack which will raise the stakes in his increasingly confrontational relationship with the profession, Sir Michael took aim at teachers who “make excuses for poor performance,” claiming their jobs are “far too stressful”. [...]

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Richard Cairns, the headmaster of Brighton College, said school leaders should be given greater incentive to control the worst teachers to stop them being “palmed off” to other schools. He said society would be shocked if hospitals tuned a “blind eye to incompetent doctors or nurses” but poor teachers were routinely tolerated in the education system. [...]

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Sir Michael Wilshaw, chief inspector of the education watchdog, said disruption during lesson times was often down to the use of mobiles and that the issue had to be stamped out.   In an interview yesterday, the former headmaster revealed a tough new inspection regime would be introduced in schools from next term. Under the [...]

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Pupils face a ban on mobile phones in school as part of a new Ofsted crackdown on classroom discipline. Schools will be penalised for failing to tackle persistent low-level disruption in lessons under a tough new inspection regime being introduced next term. This could force teachers to forbid mobile phone use by pupils – including [...]

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High School Principal Accused of ‘Spying’ on Facebook, Resigns [VIDEO] via High School Principal Resigns After Allegations of Fake Facebook Account Used to ‘Spy’ on Students. » Inline Ad Purchase:  Intext Link

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Proposals from the examinations watchdog Ofqual to scrap modular A-levels, spelling the end for the AS level, were revealed by the Sunday Telegraph last week. Research by Ofqual suggests universities believe the modular structure of A-levels and numerous resits has led to students struggling with degree level work.   They will be opposed by the National [...]

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In a highly personal attack, school leaders accused Sir Michael Wilshaw of undermining the teaching profession with “negative rhetoric” directed at the state education system. The National Association of Head Teachers threatened to pass a motion of “no confidence” in the chief inspector of schools – effectively calling for his sacking. At the union’s annual [...]

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Headteachers could boycott the Government’s controversial new reading test for six-year-olds if it is used “as a stick to beat schools with”, a union leader warned today. Russell Hobby, general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers, (NAHT) said there were fears that the check will be used to “attack rather than assess”. If [...]

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Social networking sites and celebrities are creating a generation of ‘mean girls’, a leading public school headmistress has warned. In a fierce attack, Dr Helen Wright  said sites such as Facebook encouraged teenagers to believe ‘bitching is good’. She added: ‘They’re far more used to defriending friends online rather than befriending them in reality. If [...]

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Head teachers will also be offered more money to become inspectors to improve the quality of monitoring. Snap inspections, where inspectors turn up at the school gates unannounced, were due to start in September.   Sir Michael Wilshaw, the head of Ofsted, argued that no-notice inspections were necessary to make parents confident that they were getting [...]

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A primary school head has threatened to shop parents to social services if they allow his pupils to use Facebook and other networking sites. Paul Woodward is concerned that youngsters who use the sites risk being exposed to porn and online grooming. He has warned parents that persistently letting children flout Facebook’s 13-plus age rule [...]

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Britain’s biggest headteachers’ organisation is to set up a network of troubleshooters who can help struggling heads turn their schools around. The plan is to build up a bank of heads whose schools have been rated “good” or “outstanding” who can act as mentors to those at schools facing the threat of failing their inspection [...]

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Schools are being required to return around £117,000 each – 10 per cent of many schools’ budgets – after the accountancy blunder, it was revealed. Head teachers’ leaders claim that the move will force some schools to make staff redundant and cut building projects to make up for the shortfall.   It will be seen as [...]

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Parents must take responsibility for what their children watch online, amid concerns that youngsters are accessing inappropriate material such as pornography, headteachers warned today. They said misuse of technology is a “growing problem”, with schools forced to deal with the fall-out. The National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) also raised concerns that children as young [...]

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More than six-in-10 state secondaries in England were found to be not good enough under the new regime established to provide a more accurate picture of school performance. Around one-in-eight schools were given the lowest possible rating – more than four times higher than previous figures. Since January, Ofsted has placed a greater focus on [...]

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Four out of 10 headteachers say they are planning to leave the profession early because of “a culture of intimidation” being created by Ofsted, the education standards watchdog. Headteachers say Ofsted’s rhetoric has caused staff morale to plummet – even in schools rated “good” or “outstanding” by inspectors. The findings, in a report out today, [...]

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More than eight-in-10 head teachers said the pupil premium – worth £1.25bn next year – had either equalled or failed to make up for financial losses elsewhere, it emerged. Just a quarter of schools claimed the money would make any difference to children’s education.   The results will be seen as a blow to Nick Clegg, [...]

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The Education Secretary, Michael Gove, is obsessed with a golden age that never happened, according to the general secretary of the head teachers’ union. Russell Hobby, of the National Association of Head Teachers, says Mr Gove’s belief that education was better in the 1950s and 1960s is misleading as only a small percentage of the [...]

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A superhead has resigned from his £206,000-a-year post after Government auditors uncovered a series of extraordinary purchases including hi-tech gadgets, antiques and sex games. Richard Gilliland quit as the results of the inquiry shinto his salary and expenses were handed to the police. The 61-year-old, who ran four academy schools, presided over the hiring of [...]

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The proportion of female secondary school head teachers in Wales has doubled in eight years to nearly one-third, according to a teaching body. General Teaching Council for Wales statistics show 31.7% of heads are female, compared to 16.5% in 2004. This year has seen the biggest annual increase, with the number rising to 70 in 222 [...]

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The average salary for a headteacher at an academy is £6,000 higher than that of a head at a local authority school, the Department for Education has revealed. On average, academy heads earn £61,500 compared with £55,500 in local authority schools. Overall the number of headteachers earning six-figure salaries has increased to 700 – 300 [...]

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Steve Iredale is not exactly a reluctant national headteachers’ leader. However, the 57-year-old primary school headteacher from Barnsley, south Yorkshire, says he had “no aspiration” for such a role when he turned up at a branch meeting of the National Association of Head Teachers seven years ago. He thought it was just about coffee and [...]

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Headteachers are threatening to boycott the new compulsory grammar, spelling and punctuation test for 600,000 11-year-olds. The threat comes as schools face the prospect of an unprecedented number of disputes over the next 12 months. The test is to be introduced as part of the Government’s reforms of national curriculum testing next summer. But a union leader [...]

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At least 700 state school head teachers are earning £100,000 or more despite a public-sector pay freeze. The average income for senior staff rose last year, pushing the number of primary heads paid six-figure salaries to 100, with a total of 600 secondary school leaders in the same bracket. The figures published yesterday mean nearly a [...]

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Labour demanded urgent action to ensure proper oversight of Britain’s growing number of academies yesterday as it emerged that the Government has issued warning notices to eight of the schools that they are under-performing. Michael Gove, the Education Secretary, told MPs that his department has has sent “pre-warning” letters to the academies, stating that they [...]

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Boarding school in the 1960s usually conjures up images of cane-wielding disciplinarians, Latin lessons and smart uniform. But not if you had the fortune to go to the avant garde social experiment that was Burgess Hill – where lessons were voluntary. Fancy a cigarette during class? No problem. Plough through the school grounds on a motorbike? [...]

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Eight academy schools have been put on notice that they must boost their standards or face action, it was revealed today. Education Secretary Michael Gove said the schools have been issued with pre-warning notices because they are severely under-performing. It comes as MPs raised concerns that a government quango responsible for investigating complaints against academies is [...]

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The network of state-funded academies will have “well being” at the heart of the curriculum, with lessons in positive psychology for all pupils based on classes pioneered at Wellington College in Berkshire, where fees for boarders are £30,000 a year.   Anthony Seldon, the master of Wellington, has appointed James O’Shaughnessy, who until October was [...]

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A headmistress of a prestigious girls’ school ‘singled out’ a member of staff and bullied her because of her ‘inappropriate’ dress sense, a tribunal was told yesterday. Nicky Walsh, 57, was repeatedly reduced to tears by the ‘belligerent’ attitude of Elizabeth Robinson while she was employed at the £13,000-a-year Brigidine School. The sprawling school, which [...]

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Private schools are risking extinction because they are pricing themselves beyond the pockets of ‘normal’ parents, They are losing the confidence of the public because they are increasingly the preserve of the super-rich, according to Dr Martin Stephen, who was High Master of St Paul’s School. Parents earning more than £50,000 a year would struggle [...]

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Ofsted inspectors could be barred from classrooms across the country after teachers voted overwhelmingly to boycott the inspection body. The executive of the National Union of Teachers will now examine the proposals after teachers spoke out about the stress and damage to morale caused by the inspection regime, at the union’s annual conference in Torquay. [...]

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The quality of teenagers’ work experience is strongly linked to future careers but must rely on more than just their parents’ connections, a heads and employers report says. It calls for the potential of work experience to be better used to broaden pupils’ horizons. Head teachers’ leader Brian Lightman says he has seen young people [...]

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It is a unique example of co-operation between the state and private sector of schooling. Normally, co-operation means the independent schools open up their plush sports facilities to pupils from the neighbouring state school or share a teacher with them. In this case, though, the two private school headmasters concerned have rolled up their sleeves [...]

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Excluding pupils will cost schools £4,000 Schools permanently excluding pupils face having to pay a £4,000 levy under new rules being introduced by the Government. More schools will also be encouraged to use traditional methods such as detentions, suspensions, isolation rooms and lunchtime curfews to punish badly behaved pupils Photo: GETTY By Martin Evans5:52PM BST 13 [...]

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A gay deputy headteacher who held a “coming out” assembly says homophobia in schools should be treated in the same way as racism. Shaun Dellenty, from Alfred Salter primary in Southwark, warned that many talented gay people are put off teaching because of fears of homophobia, and schools are not taking the problem seriously enough. [...]

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In an education white paper published last summer, the coalition government set out its vision for the future of higher education. Underpinning the proposals was the desire to put students at the heart of the system, providing better advice and guidance on what and where to study and more one-to-one support and feedback from lecturers. [...]

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