EDUCATION - FURTHER EDUCATION
Achieving Green Colleges
AoC Press Release
19/02/2008
The new AoC report explores the definition of sustainable development, where colleges are now, and what will help colleges to achieve this.
Anti-immigration climate hits legitimate private colleges
Times Higher Education
21/02/2008
Bogus institutions have led to a siege mentality over visas, says Lord Tomlinson.
British business backs Brown's call for more apprenticeships
DIUS Press Release
25/02/2008
Leading employers have today committed to adding over 4,000 apprenticeship places.
Brown announces new arts apprenticeships strategy
The Guardian
22/02/2008
Young people will get the chance to work in the creative arts under a new government scheme to boost the UK's creative industries.
Clever move
The Guardian
26/02/2008
Parents evenings in China are one sign that overseas students are discovering UK sixth-form colleges.
Colleges show the way
The Guardian
26/02/2008
Student retention rates at colleges are high. News that the government has given universities £800m over the past five years to improve a 22% student drop-out rate without apparently getting a result prompted a robust response in the FE sector.
Huge fines may cripple colleges - Breaking new health and safety law may lead to penalties of up to 10 per cent of budgets
The Times Educational Supplement
22/02/2008
Lawyers are lobbying ministers to protect colleges from the Corporate Manslaughter Act which comes into force in April as it threatens catastrophic fines if students or staff die in their care.
Thousands excused training to 18
BBC Education News
22/02/2008
The government is to excuse youngsters in difficult personal circumstances from the new requirement in England to be in education until the age of 18.
EDUCATION - HIGHER EDUCATION
Blueprint for bosses to shape degrees - Academics fear for higher education status - Confidential paper aims to boost economy
The Financial Times
26/02/2008
Employers would gain significant new powers to shape higher education degrees under a confidential blueprint circulating inside Whitehall. The paper titled "Higher Level Skills Strategy" and seen by the Financial Times, sets out the case for devoting the bulk of extra university funding over the next three years to degrees jointly designed and funded by employers.
Don't sacrifice basic science for research, say MPs
The Guardian
21/02/2008
MPs have called into question the viability of the government's ambition to develop a world-class science and innovation campus at one of the UK's major physics facilities.
Future of engineering courses in doubt, say academics
The Guardian
25/02/2008
The Engineering and Technology Board (ETB) and the Engineering Professors' Council (EPC) claim the sustainability and the future quality of teaching is under threat because of the imbalance between the amount of public funding universities get and how much it actually costs them to teach engineering.
Policy watch - Green education declaration - V-cs sign up to cut emissions
Times Higher Education
21/02/2008
Vice-chancellors are calling on the Government to put the education sector at the forefront of action on Climate change.
Retirement law a grey area for staff
Times Higher Education
21/02/2008
A survey finds that many wish to work past 65 but are unclear on their institutions policies.
Success for medical school's access programme
The Guardian
19/02/2008
Students from poor-performing schools who are accepted into medical school with lower grades do just as well as their higher-grade peers, a unique study has found.
UK-India research projects win a bumper crop of cash
Times Higher Education
21/02/2008
Academic collaboration between the two nations gets a multimillion pound boost.
Universities get £105m to develop new courses
The Guardian
22/02/2008
The HEFCE is to provide at least £105m over the next three years to help universities develop new courses with costs split between students, government and employers.
Universities UK responds to report on retention of students
Universities UK Press Release
20/02/2008
Professor Rick Trainor, President of Universities UK, said "...the UK still has one of the most successful completion rates for higher education compared to other OECD countries."
University dropout steady at 22%
The Guardian
20/02/2008
An £800m drive to reduce the number of university dropouts has had virtually no effect, according to a report from a committee of MPs. The proportion of students who fail to complete their degree has remained at 22% for five years, it reveals.
University fees are not deterring people from poorer families
The Guardian
22/02/2008
The proportion of applicants from lower socioeconomic groups is rising, says Bill Rammell.
EDUCATION - SCHOOLS
Academy chief: make it easier to sack and expel
The Guardian
25/02/2008
The government should make it easier for academies to sack poorly performing teachers and exclude the worst-behaved pupils. Academy staff should also be paid as if they work in businesses, with bonuses linked to academic improvements, according to Richard Tice, chairman of Northampton academy and member of the United Learning Trust board, the largest academy sponsor, in a paper published by thinktank Reform.
Balls plans to send elite teaching teams into failing schools
The Guardian
25/02/2008
Local authorities have been set a summer deadline to develop individual "action plans" setting out how they are going to turn around 638 low-performing state schools. The options for such schools included becoming an academy or a trust school, federating with a high-performing local school, or closing. A London scheme involving school leaders being sent in to help improve failing schools will also be promoted. According to the children's secretary, Ed Balls, in an interview with The Guardian.
Distrust of school cohesion law
BBC Education News
25/02/2008
The requirement for schools in England to promote "community cohesion" is being treated with "a strong element of distrust" in some areas, says a report.
Free school meal pupils lose out in race for top A-levels
The Guardian
23/02/2008
Only just over half a per cent of pupils who got three As at A-level last year were eligible for free meals. The shadow children's secretary, Michael Gove, said they illustrated the struggle top universities face in trying to recruit top candidates from the poorest backgrounds.
Managers back controversial academies in House inquiry
The Birmingham Post
26/02/2008
Managers of controversial academy schools have insisted that they are the "real comprehensives" as they were quizzed in the House of Commons. Academies are controversial with teaching unions and some Labour MPs who claim academies allow religious groups to impose their ideology on children, that they amount to the "privatisation" of state education, and they create two tiers of school, placing ordinary comprehensives at a disadvantage.
School fees slip as parents feel pinch
The Birmingham Post
25/02/2008
Independent schools are suffering an income squeeze with parents struggling to meet fees as they battle against rising mortgages, a tightening of credit and reduced bonuses.
Tragedies may bring £1m fines for schools
The Times Educational Supplement
22/02/2008
Schools could face fines of up to £1 million under a new offence of corporate manslaughter, coming into force in April.
Trust in India
The Times Educational Supplement
22/02/2008
The UK's largest group of independent schools is expanding operations overseas by opening in the previously untapped market of India.
