LEVELLING UP
This report contains the ambitious and bold plans that are necessary for us to not only build back stronger but to level-up our education system. All children, everywhere, deserve an excellent education: it is in everyone’s interest that we succeed in this national priority.
Despite a decade of bold education reforms, many of the places with the weakest local economies also suffer from stubbornly underperforming schools and fragile education systems.
This report exposes that even before the coronavirus crisis, there were vast geographical inequalities in a child’s access to a good education. Working with the New Schools Network, we find that:
Some local authorities, such as Nottingham, Knowsley, Hartlepool and Middlesbrough, have ranked in the bottom decile for GCSE attainment since 1998 and remain there today, despite two decades of education reform to improve lagging areas.
In attempting to understand what is driving this underperformance, we identify deprivation and access to strong teaching and leadership as strong factors.
34% of Outstanding secondary schools were in the least deprived quintile as of 2019, compared to only 4% of Inadequate schools. Evidence suggests admission policies are augmenting this. Even when comparing similarly income deprived areas, outstanding schools take on the lowest percentage of pupils eligible for free school meals, suggesting their strong results may reflect their pupil intake rather than quality of education.
Over 200,000 primary age children live in local areas where there are no good or outstanding schools and 11 out of 12 local authorities in the North East have a higher than average share of pupils attending an underperforming school.
Areas of stubborn school under performance are disproportionately in places that suffer other forms of disadvantage, such as deprivation or weak social fabric, and strongly correlate with other levelling up measures. There exists a large number of “stuck schools” which, despite repeated interventions, re-brokering and investment, have not been able to improve quality and continue to deprive pupils of the benefits of a great education.
The best schools benefit from exceptional leadership and talented teachers. Underperforming schools, in contrast, are often characterised by high vacancy rates, low pupil-teacher ratios and high levels of teaching assistants. While no national data exists, there also appears to be wide variation in time spent in school.
The regions that tend to have more underperforming schools also have more vacancies, for example in secondary schools the North East has the greatest rate of vacancies at 0.8% and has the poorest leadership when assessed by Ofsted.
Despite numerous efforts to improve educational outcomes among disadvantaged pupils, most notably the pupil premium allowance, deprivation continues to be the biggest determinant of attainment and the disadvantage gap has remained the same since 2015.
Meanwhile, the Opportunity Areas programme has had limited effect, hampered by its limited scope of the toolkit used to deliver improvement.
We argue that the Government’s efforts to level up opportunity will founder unless ministers take sustained action to turn around failing schools in many of the poorest parts of England:
Over 200,000 primary age children live in local areas where there are no good or outstanding schools and 11 out of 12 local authorities in the North East have a higher than average share of pupils attending an underperforming school.
Areas of stubborn school under performance are disproportionately in places that suffer other forms of disadvantage, such as deprivation or weak social fabric, and strongly correlate with other levelling up measures. There exists a large number of “stuck schools” which, despite repeated interventions, re-brokering and investment, have not been able to improve quality and continue to deprive pupils of the benefits of a great education.
The best schools benefit from exceptional leadership and talented teachers. Underperforming schools, in contrast, are often characterised by high vacancy rates, low pupil-teacher ratios and high levels of teaching assistants. While no national data exists, there also appears to be wide variation in time spent in school.
The regions that tend to have more underperforming schools also have more vacancies, for example in secondary schools the North East has the greatest rate of vacancies at 0.8% and has the poorest leadership when assessed by Ofsted.
Despite numerous efforts to improve educational outcomes among disadvantaged pupils, most notably the pupil premium allowance, deprivation continues to be the biggest determinant of attainment and the disadvantage gap has remained the same since 2015.
Meanwhile, the Opportunity Areas programme has had limited effect, hampered by its limited scope of the toolkit used to deliver improvement.
We argue that the Government’s efforts to level up opportunity will founder unless ministers take sustained action to turn around failing schools in many of the poorest parts of England:
Lucy Heller, Chief Executive of Ark:
“This report sets out a strong and clear case for significant investment in education with a particular focus on improving outcomes for the most disadvantaged. Government would be wise to consider seriously its recommendations.”
Katharine Birbalsingh, Headmistress of Michaela Community School:
“A fascinating analysis of how schools enable social mobility, with suggestions on how to make this happen everywhere.”
Jonathan Gullis MP, MP for Stoke-on-Trent North:
“In my constituency, there is only one outstanding secondary school and this is reflected in Progress 8 scores being the seventh lowest in the country.
“If we are to successfully give young people the opportunities they deserve, we must start with providing them with a brilliant education in the place they call home.
“The recommendations within this report would go a long way to direct the leaders in school improvement into the places which have previously been home to entrenched underperformance.”
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