Record number of students accepted to university August 15, 2013 UCAS, the UK's university admissions service, has said the number of students accepted onto university courses reached a record high of 385,910 today – a nine per cent increase on the year before. Students across the country are waiting to find out their A level results today, with many hoping to continue on to higher [...]
Michael Gove promises to push ahead with abolition of GCSEs September 3, 2012 MICHAEL Gove yesterday confirmed plans to replace GCSEs – the standard exam for 16-year-olds in England, Wales and Northern Ireland – with a more rigorous qualification based on the old O-level tests by the autumn of 2014. The education secretary also said he would phase out modular assessment of students in the aftermath of this year’s [...]
Finance lessons on curriculum February 7, 2013 FINANCIAL education will be taught in all schools by 2014, under plans put out for consultation yesterday by education secretary Michael Gove. The new national curriculum will include basic household matters such as budgeting, as well as wages, taxes, debt, financial risk “and a range of more sophisticated financial products and services”. However Gove has [...]
One-size-fits-all isn’t the route to rigorous A-Levels January 23, 2013 THE announcement by Michael Gove that the government is planning to reform A-Levels in England will be broadly welcomed. Many syllabuses and exams are completely inadequate. They do not provide the preparation for university that the brightest students deserve, and are justifiably criticised by employers for lack of rigour. It’s also right for the government [...]
Finance education at school is the first step to empowering future consumers February 13, 2013 I AM sure that you and I have at least one thing in common: that one of the most useful skills in our lives is being able to manage money – making sure I live within my means, don’t run up excessive debts, can pay my mortgage, can make sure my savings earn interest, and [...]
Gove’s free school programme gets boost with £1bn injection December 5, 2012 ALMOST £1bn will be spent on building up to 100 new free schools and academies by the end of this parliament. The £980m fund, which will also be spent on expanding the size of top-performing schools, has been created in a bid to combat a squeeze on places in areas with the greatest pressure. The initiative [...]
Will 2012 be remembered by the public as a good year for the coalition government? December 20, 2012 YES David Skelton It’s been a tough year for so many people – the cost of living continues to rise and the economy continues to flat-line at best. Given that background, it might seem odd to argue that 2012 has been a good year for the coalition. But it has. Indeed, I would argue that [...]
Shake-up for teachers as pay linked to results December 5, 2012 TEACHERS will no longer get an automatic pay rise every year simply by virtue of staying in the job and will instead be paid by results, with the best performers getting the biggest pay rises under plans announced yesterday. But no changes are planned for NHS, prison service and civil service pay, as the government [...]
How Sweden reformed its state to lay foundations for future growth January 30, 2013 THE muted optimism of the coalition’s mid-term review has made way for the harsh reality of disappointing GDP figures. The economy’s most recent dip demonstrates the scale of the remaining challenge: public sector reform was David Cameron’s big idea, but too little has been achieved. Even the coalition’s more radical reforms, in health and education, [...]
Tory ministers want new deal with Europe October 14, 2012 A LEADING backbench MP yesterday told City A.M. that a majority of Conservative cabinet ministers would like to renegotiate Britain’s relationship with the EU. Douglas Carswell, MP for Clacton, made the comments following a report that education secretary Michael Gove wants Britain to threaten to leave the European Union if it does not claw back [...]