Michael gove

Multiple entry is making a mockery of the GCSE system. Michael Gove needs to clamp down

When I took my O Levels in 1983, I was nervous enough taking each exam once. But this year, increasing numbers of teenagers will take their GCSE exams in the same subject more than once. Some took their maths GCSE more than seven times. Michael Gove will be familiar with this – he took his driving test seven times in total before he passed. Today, he needs to get a grip on multiple entry at GCSE. More and more pupils are sitting exams in the same subject with more than one exam board. Many are also being entered for alternative ‘IGCSEs’, originally designed for international students, alongside a GCSE in

Twigg fights reshuffle fears with Sharknado

Ed Miliband is rumoured to be on the verge of sacking shadow education secretary Stephen Twigg, who is simply no match for Michael Gove’s flair and intellect. I hear that Vernon Coaker, who was Children, Schools and Families Minister under Brown and Balls, is in line for promotion. Coaker is a former teacher and seasoned political pugilist, so he would certainly brighten things up. But the damp Twigg has not given up, not yet. As is his wont, he has penned a letter to the Times Education Supplement. And, as ever, it is not a success. Among the usual bleats about Gove being a rabble rousing ‘ideologue’, I noticed this line: ‘Like a shark in

The King’s School merger will go ahead unchallenged — Labour should be celebrating

The battle for The King’s School is over, and Labour has lost. As reported in today’s Newcastle Chronicle, North Tyneside Council met yesterday and voted against pursuing a judicial review of the new Kings Priory Academy in Tynemouth. After threatening to halt the merger of the independent King’s School and state Priory Primary School since May, the council has accepted that it is on the wrong side of parents and the local community. The council is not celebrating the arrival of a new state school. The Labour mayor of North Tyneside, Norma Redfearn, said of the decision: ‘I have been in education for years and I can’t believe how this

Free schools become deeper entrenched in the education system

Michael Gove’s team is cock-a-hoop about the performance of free schools in the latest round of Oftsed reports. Of the 24 schools tested, 4 were judged outstanding, 14 were rated good, 5 have room for improvement and 1 was declared inadequate. A quick turnaround is required of the 6 substandard schools. The Department of Education emphasises that the tests were vigorous, carried out under Ofsted’s ‘tougher new inspection framework’ introduced last September. Michael Gove is making some political hay from this admittedly small sample. He said, ‘Too often the best schools are only available to the rich who can afford to go private or pay for an expensive house in

Yet again, Labour’s self-serving efforts to block The King’s School merger have failed

Labour’s war against The King’s School merger continues to be fought fruitlessly, despite rebuttal after rebuttal from the Department of Education. As first reported in the Spectator two weeks ago, Michael Gove has signed off funding for the independent King’s School and state Priory Primary School in Tynemouth to merge into the new Kings Priory Academy. North Tyneside Council are not happy with Gove’s decision and decided to call an ‘Extraordinary Council Meeting’ last week to decide what to do next. Like many of the school wars in Britain, Labour’s response has been a bureaucratic one. If they can keep the indecision rolling until September, the new academy would be

Michael Gove: a Labour government would have no choice but to continue my reforms

Will Michael Gove’s education reforms really have a lasting impact? It’s a question that perturbs his supporters no end, as the Education Secretary is attempting to do a great deal in five years that a Labour government could still unpick. Perhaps the funding for more free schools, a key dividing line, announced in the 2015/16 spending review, will make a difference, but Gove was today pretty optimistic about the chances of Labour embracing, rather than just tolerating, his reforms. In a question-and-answer session, Gove said: ‘I think that it’s certainly the case that there’s a lot of momentum in the department for education at the moment for continued reform. One

Steerpike

No Nigella slump for Scott’s

You might have thought that being the scene of a tabloid sensation — and one concerning a national treasure — could have spelled a tricky period for Scott’s of Mayfair. Not a bit of it. My man with a corkscrew says that the place has been packed with Tories all week. They had Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith in for lunch on Monday, before Boris and Gove dined (after a fashion) that evening. No one was at anyone else’s throat on either occasion. Joe Public does, though, have a wicked sense of humour. The terrace tables, the very spot where Nigella and Charles Saatchi’s marriage ended, are particularly sought-after at present. However, reports

Steerpike

Michael Gove denies that Boris was drunk in charge

Michael Gove leads a lively life. In the past week he’s landed himself in the doghouse with his wife after a night on the town with Boris Johnson, and has been exposed as a gentleman rapper. Today, after giving an impassioned speech on teachers’ pay, the Education Secretary found himself being grilled by members of the lobby about both activities (rather than his desire to improve classroom standards). Did he leave Boris drunk in charge of a bicycle, wondered one member of the press pack. ‘As far as I could tell on Monday night, Boris was on sparkling form, and that was due more to his natural joie de vivre than

Poll shows public support teacher pay changes reviled by unions

The coalition’s biggest clash with trade unions so far is fast approaching. From October, the NASUWT and NUT teaching unions are carrying out a series of regional walkouts over the introduction of performance related pay. Unfortunately for the unions, new polling from Populus shows the public are not on their side. When questioned on how teachers’ pay should be decided, 61 per cent of those polled said they agreed that ‘schools should be able to set the pay of individual teachers based on the quality of their performance as determined by an annual appraisal’, as opposed to 28 per cent who believe teachers should receive the same amount, based on

Parents vs. the system: which side is Labour on?

Should Labour support private schools joining the state sector? Yes, is probably your immediate response but in reality, Labour’s position is unfathomable. A case in point is the battle for The King’s School, which I’ve written about in this week’s Spectator. The King’s School is due to move into the state sector this September and merge with the local Priory Primary School to create the all-new King’s Priory Academy. North Tyneside, where both schools reside, is one of the poorest boroughs in the country. Opening up an excellent fee-paying school to parents who (like mine) can’t afford a £10,000 per-year education should be welcomed by all. But Labour, locally and

Ed West

Dear Michael Gove, please abolish yourself

When I was at secondary school my lunch usually consisted of a packet of Space Raiders and a Toffee Crisp, washed down with a healthy can of Dr Pepper, at least until I started spending the lunch money on fags. And look at me now – a strapping hulk of a man with teeth like Donny Osmond. Partly the reason I avoided school dinners was because they looked, smelled and tasted like something served up in Attica Penitentiary; that seems to have improved, as has the quality of food across British society. But many people prefer packed lunches, large proportions of which are apparently devoid of nutrition and presumably contribute

New curriculum offers political points to Tories

The funny thing about the new National Curriculum, published today, is that after all the fuss of the past few months, particularly over the history curriculum, it’s probably the last ever national plan from the government. As more and more schools convert to academy status, and more free schools pop up to compete with poorly-performing schools, there will be fewer and fewer who must conform to this: the rest have been given freedom to teach what they judge is best for their pupils. Michael Gove’s critics like to argue that he is a great centraliser, dictating the curriculum from Westminster while claiming to give schools freedom. But he only remains

The Gove guide to composition

Michael Gove is not the only minister to be frustrated by the poor quality of letters drafted for his signature. One minister was horrified to find his reply to the Prime Minister starting ‘Good to here from you’. Another complains that his name is still spelt wrong, three years after he started in the job. But Gove is, probably, the only one who would send a memo to his ministers and civil servants urging them to read ‘George Orwell and Evelyn Waugh, Jane Austen and George Eliot, Matthew Parris and Christopher Hitchens’ to improve their prose.’ The memo contains, what he dubs, Gove’s Golden Rules for writing a letter which

The greatest scandal in Britain is the failure to give poor children a proper education.

Earlier this week, I was part of a panel on Newsnight Scotland discussing the latest – some would say, belated – efforts designed to improve Glasgow’s dismally underachieving state schools. That they need improvement is beyond doubt. In Scotland’s largest city, only 7% of state-educated pupils leave school with five good Higher passes. In Scotland as a whole a mere 220 children from the poorest 20% of neighbourhoods achieved three As at Higher (the minimum grades required for admission to leading universities such as St Andrews). As I said on the programme, this should be considered a national scandal. More than that, a disgrace. (Like Fraser, I wish more people

Most opinion polls are junk: blame the ignorant general public for that.

One of the very good things about Lord Ashcroft is that he is happy to commission large-scale opinion polls. Sometimes these are mischievous. Take today’s example, for instance. It is always useful to be reminded that most members of the public can only recognise a handful of politicians. One would expect David Cameron and Boris Johnson to be at the top of the public recognition table. They are the only politicians in Britain recognised – and correctly identified – by more than 90% of those surveyed. 89% of respondents claim to recognise Ed Miliband but only 77% can actually identify him (some think he’s actually his brother which, given David

Michael Gove’s fantasy Labour education team

Michael Gove and his colleagues have enjoyed poking Labour on education policy recently. His catty letter exchange with Stephen Twigg last week left Twigg with the victory for style with a supremely bitchy reply, while Gove won on substance (largely because he asked whether Labour’s education frontbench possessed any). Today he tried to assemble his own fantasy Labour education team as he took questions from MPs in the House of Commons chamber. Kate Hoey gave him a forthright prod about the delay in a school converting to an academy in her constituency. Gove didn’t really answer her question, instead saying: ‘I’m very grateful to the honourable lady. She’s a brilliant

Why is it only the right that get angry about how state schools fail the poor?

Does it matter if the poor are given a bad eduction? Christine Blower, head of the National Union of Teachers, has just been on BBC1 Sunday Politics. She’s very influential (as her £155,000 pay package suggests) especially at a time when Labour policy is aligning behind NUT policy. When confronted with figures showing how the poor achieve far worse exams results than the rich, she had this to say:- listen to ‘Christine Blower on BBC Sunday Politics, 23 June 2013’ on Audioboo

It’s vital that children translate English to Latin at GCSE

One of the most rewarding exercises a Latinist can attempt is to turn a piece of English prose into Latin. The reason is quite simple: it means getting under the surface of the English meaning — to ‘get beyond the word to the thought behind it’ (Gilbert Murray) — and transferring it into a form most closely corresponding to a Roman way of thinking and writing. It takes one to the very heart of how Romans made sense of their world. Only someone with a supreme understanding of the Latin language and its culture can do that effectively. That master prose-composer Colin Leach was once asked in an exam to

Michael Gove kindly warns Stephen Twigg: people think you’re weak

What a lot of fun Michael Gove is having with Stephen Twigg’s latest policy pronouncements. The Education Secretary has written a fabulously long letter to his Labour shadow following up on Monday’s speech with 36 questions. He charmingly writes: ‘I am sure your speech was the result of a well-thought-through reflection on schools policy and all of the above questions were considered, and fully addressed, in preparation for your announcement and so you will be able to reply promptly and put to rest the idea, which more and more people are regrettably succumbing to, that Labour schools policy is a confusing, uncertain and incoherent assemblage of sops to the trades

School choice is not a scandal: Gove nails Twigg’s rum brand of localism

Michael Gove is naturally having some fun with Stephen Twigg’s schools speech. The Education Secretary has responded to Twigg’s plan for ‘parent academies’ by saying: ‘Labour’s policy on free schools is so tortured they should send in the UN to end the suffering. On the one hand Stephen Twigg says he will end the free school programme, but on the other he says he would set up ‘parent-led’ and ‘teacher-led academies’ – free schools under a different name. As Andrew Adonis has said this morning, “free schools are academies without a predecessor school”. When is a free school not a free school? When Stephen Twigg is trying to appease the