NEU demonstration in Norwich, February 2023. Credit: Roger Blackwell via Flickr (CC BY-NC 2.0).

by Sal Riordan.

Teachers are in the news, striking for better pay and working conditions. Whatever you think about the rights or wrongs of that—at the start of the action a slim majority of Brits supported it — it’s hard to ignore the country’s teacher workforce crisis. National Education Union (NEU) members have just rejected the government’s pay offer, triggering two further days of strikes. (more…)

Image credit: Africa Studio via Adobe Stock.

John Jerrim.

Online fraud is very serious business. We are faced with it every day. Indeed, as I am writing this blog, I’ve just received an email from a prince from a far-off-land who has an “exciting” business opportunity he wishes to discuss with me…….

I’m sure you have all received such emails as well: it is estimated that around 3.4 billion spam emails are sent every day. But how many young people are actually at risk of being duped by such a primitive digital scam?

Given that in many countries today it’s April Fools’ Day, essentially a day where we celebrate gullibility, let’s take a look. (more…)

Credit: Zef Art / Adobe Stock.

Ellis Brooks and Hans Svennevig

When is a good time to teach nuclear disarmament in the classroom? You might be surprised to see it phrased liked that, rather than something more anodyne like ‘explore the topic of nuclear weapons’. But disarmament is not a controversial topic. It is an agreed international goal. The Non-Proliferation Treaty of 1968 committed nuclear armed states, including the UK, to disarmament in good faith. (more…)

Credit: Phil Meech for UCL IOE.

John Jerrim, Sam Sims and Christian Bokhove

This is the final post in a five part series on Ofsted inspections. Jump to: previous.

We have published a new academic paper investigating how Ofsted inspection outcomes vary across inspectors with different characteristics. This has been supported by the Nuffield Foundation and uses data we have pulled together on approximately 30,000 school inspections conducted between September 2011 and August 2019.

You can read a full version of our academic working paper along with our responses to some FAQs about the research.

This final blog in the series looks at the relationship between lead inspector characteristics and short inspection outcomes of primary schools. (more…)

Credit: Phil Meech for UCL IOE.

John Jerrim, Sam Sims and Christian Bokhove

This is the fourth post in a five part series on Ofsted inspections. Jump to: previous and next.

We have published a new academic paper investigating how Ofsted inspection outcomes vary across inspectors with different characteristics. This has been supported by the Nuffield Foundation and uses data we have pulled together on approximately 30,000 school inspections conducted between September 2011 and August 2019.

You can read a full version of our academic working paper along with our responses to some FAQs about the research.

This fourth blog in the series provides an illustrative example of how inspection outcomes differ across two lead inspectors with very different characteristics. (more…)

John Jerrim, Sam Sims and Christian Bokhove

This is the third in a five part series on Ofsted inspections. Jump to: previous and next.

We have published a new academic paper investigating how Ofsted inspection outcomes vary across inspectors with different characteristics. This has been supported by the Nuffield Foundation and uses data we have pulled together on approximately 30,000 school inspections conducted between September 2011 and August 2019.

You can read a full version of our academic working paper along with our responses to some FAQs about the research.

This third blog in the series explores how Ofsted inspection judgements are related to inspection team size. (more…)

John Jerrim, Sam Sims and Christian Bokhove

This blog is the second in a five-part series on Ofsted inspections. Jump to: previous and next.

We have published a new academic paper investigating how Ofsted inspection outcomes vary across inspectors with different characteristics. This has been supported by the Nuffield Foundation and uses data we have pulled together on approximately 30,000 school inspections conducted between September 2011 and August 2019.

You can read a full version of our academic working paper along with our responses to some FAQs about the research.

This second blog in the series explores differences between inspectors who hold different contractual relationships with Ofsted – Her Majesty’s Inspectors (HMI) and Ofsted Inspectors (OI). (more…)

Credit: Phil Meech for IOE.

John Jerrim, Sam Sims and Christian Bokhove.

This post is the first in a five part series on Ofsted inspections. Jump to: next.

We have published a new academic paper investigating how Ofsted inspection outcomes vary across inspectors with different characteristics. This has been supported by the Nuffield Foundation and uses data we have pulled together on approximately 30,000 school inspections conducted between September 2011 and August 2019.

You can read a full version of our academic working paper along with our responses to some FAQs about the research.

This first blog in our series focuses on differences between male and female inspectors. (more…)

Credit: Phil Meech for UCL IOE.

Guy Roberts-Holmes and Lucy Kaufmann.

The Department for Education (DfE) had attempted to introduce its contested and controversial Reception Baseline Assessment (RBA) for four-year-olds since 2015. Reflecting a wider realisation of the COVID-19 pandemic as a powerful catalyst for ‘re-imagining’ education with digital education technologies, the DfE implemented RBA as a statutory assessment in September 2021. (more…)

The School Belonging Colloquium Team: Julia Dobson, Professor Kathryn Riley (back row, left to right); Kristy Campbell, Dr Rahil Alipour (front row, left to right)

Kathryn Riley.

It’s time to hone our skills. As educators in a chaotic national climate, we need to bear witness to what is happening today and its impact on our young people. We also need to walk the path of hope and possibilities. This is not easy.

Disconnection, disengagement and disillusionment are in the air. Poverty and insecurity are growing, with significant consequences for the very fabric of society. Yet how we talk and act as educators, will influence how young people see themselves today and view their future place in the world.

At a recent UCL School Belonging Colloquium, Dame Mary Marsh, one-time CEO of the NSPCC saw the contemporary challenge in these terms: ‘the biggest poverty of all is that of hope’. In today’s strange, dark and difficult times schools, wherever they are in the world, need to be places of belonging and hope. (more…)