Policy Watch

Education’s always changing, and it can be hard to keep track. Policy Watch is the easy way to make sure you stay up to date with the latest developments.

Keep up with what’s happening in education policy

Policy Watch is our regular policy update service, covering national and international developments in the world of education. We try to keep things simple, sharing the latest news and information with you through weekly updates, monthly summaries, papers and events.

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The latest from Policy Watch

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  • Highlights of the week ending 17 June

    The Times Education Commission published its final report, calling for an education reset. The report entitled Bringing out the best: How to transform education and unleash the potential of every child, makes a number of recommendations for change across the education system, from early years through to university. Its recommendation for a British Baccalaureate at 18 and fewer exams at 16 is the latest contribution to the ongoing debate as to whether the current system of assessment is fit for purpose. However, the government is clear that it is not considering changes, having reformed exams under Michael Gove.

  • Highlights of the week ending 10 June

    This week has seen a wealth of statistics published by the Department for Education, covering all parts of the education journey, including: the number of pupils in English schools hitting 9 million; a rise in those pupils receiving free school meals; 4,400 more full time teachers are in post; advanced apprenticeship accounting for 44% of starts in the first half of the academic year; a widening of the gap between the employment rates of working-age graduates and postgraduates and non-graduates (first time since 2013).

  • Highlights of the week ending 27 May

    Ahead of the short recess next week (for which Policy Watch will take a short break), we have seen a raft of announcements from government covering the whole education landscape. The week began with education questions in the Commons with ministers and topics that included SEND students in FE, mental wellbeing of students, and the funding of low performing areas.

  • Highlights of the week ending 20 May

    Nadhim Zahawi was urged by Shadow Schools Minister, Stephen Morgan, to correct the Parliamentary record after the Secretary of State claimed high-performing trusts “deliver the best outcomes”. The Office for Statistics Regulation had criticised DfE for using data that was potentially misleading.

  • Highlights of the week ending 13 May

    Details of the new Schools Bill were revealed ahead of Tuesday’s Queen’s Speech. The content provided few surprises given it provides a legislative footing for plans announced in the recent Schools White Paper. As with the White Paper, the Bill plans has been criticised by some, including Labour and teaching unions, for omissions including post-pandemic learning recovery.