The Department for Education (DfE), which was last week accused of being “surprisingly resistant” to investigating the shortfalls in its Covid response, is now reportedly backing “sweeping reform” to help make up for the disruption caused to education by lockdown – and to avoid the £1.5 trillion cost of doing nothing. This could include extending the school day by half an hour under a £15 billion “Covid [that is, lockdown] rescue plan”. The Times has the story.
A leaked presentation of a report by Sir Kevan Collins, the Government’s Education Recovery Commissioner, calls for all children to receive an extra 100 hours of schooling each year from 2022, with a minimum 35-hour week.
The ambitious plan for England proposes extra tutoring for five million pupils and additional training for 500,000 teachers. It also hints that an extra year of sixth-form should be considered if teenagers cannot complete A-level courses in time.
The report warns that the cost to the country of inaction could be £1.5 trillion, 100 times the cost of the three-year package, but the Treasury is thought to be offering only £1.5 billion, a tenth of what is said to be needed to help pupils to bounce back from the pandemic.
A 56-page presentation based on the report, dated April 15th, is described as a draft that is 90% complete. One Whitehall source said that nothing had “changed fundamentally” since then.
At the heart of the document are the “three Ts” – extra time, teaching and tutoring. It says that all three combined are essential to catch up. This means lengthening the school day, improving teaching through more training, and providing tutoring on top of lessons.
Schools are likely to have a degree of freedom over how they choose to extend the day. Adding the 100 hours evenly each day would roughly add up to half an hour of extra schooling. Teachers would be paid more for the work.
Boris Johnson has been briefed on the findings, and in meetings with Collins has indicated support for the plan…
The DfE is also backing sweeping reform. However, Rishi Sunak, the Chancellor, has balked at the cost of the package, which is equivalent to about £700 per pupil over three years. One insider described the £1.5 billion offered by the Treasury as “ridiculous”.
The news comes as the Times Education Commission embarks on a year-long inquiry that will lead to recommendations for reform…
Children have missed almost half a year of in-person schooling, with about 23 weeks of school closures during the pandemic. According to the report, the U.K. had the longest closures of schools and universities combined in Europe.
Worth reading in full.
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Not my problem, I always thought that lockdowns were a terrible idea.
Confronting child abuse, in all its forms, should be everyone’s problem.
I’m completely past giving a fuck about anybody – the sheep backed lockdowns, this is on them,not me. That said, none of this is accidental, and will have been forseen, and accepted, by TPTB
You do know that whenever you do a ‘Victor Meldrew’ I’m going to troll you with the antidote for your condition don’t you?
https://twitter.com/shouldhaveanima/status/1686821775890595840
That all looks like food to me.
So this is what becomes of our apathetic, ovine capitulation to rules that never made any sense, even with respect to physical health or control of a pathogen. The rules were ostensibly in place to “flatten the curve” – even to “save lives”. The result: child abuse and deaths, and a virus that becomes stronger due to our lack of exposure to it and subsequent immunological naivety, along with greater vulnerability to many other viruses for the same reason!
Look, I’m getting extremely tired of this now, tired of the ongoing debate about how Lockdowns were bad.. Yes we knew and know they were an appalling way to treat a society in all forms and metrics.
Stop the debate and start talking about who is accountable, what punishments and how we can ensure this never ever happens again
What a surprise. One of many items that they didn’t think through when they went mad. Jot it down and present to the Inquiry.
One doubts that these deaths (and it does not seem to include other forms of domestic abuse) will even be considered by the “We-should-have-locked-down-sooner-and-harder” Covid Enquiry.
NSPCC, Children’s Services et al can go to hell. Lest we forget individuals in these roles were some of the most vocal advocates of lockdowns and the other Covid restrictions.
They were told of the risks to these children yet plowed on regardless.
The data for the following year and after will be coming out too but may not be linked to the lockdowns even though they should be – having worked in childcare especially with those at risk knew the precious little ones would be in danger but it fell on deaf ears – “home visits” done via zoom or not at all – are you kidding me
.
How many where children were flagged by a medical professional but did not have a home visit because of the Local Authority having new guidance and policies due to Covid measures?! How many where abuse was reported by family or neighbours in close proximity but these reports fell through the cracks?!
These deaths are just the tip of the iceberg. How many of these death cases also had siblings? One baby to be included in the 2022/23 died but had 4 siblings all experienced abuse but will not have their circumstances acknowledged as part of these figures…Another family again a sibling group of 5 one disabled in the home with a violent child among them. How about the children that were put into foster placements that did not have proper checks done as proper safeguarding went out the window due to covid – child placement with a foster carer that sexually abused her…
These poor children were murdered by their evil parents/step-parents/guardians ….. but that murder was facilitated by:
SAGE
Prof Neil Ferguson
The Quad: Johnson, Handcock, Gove and Sunak
Every MP who failed to even question the Government’s lockdown policy (that’s virtually all of them)
The Mainstream Media, who acted as cheerleaders for the murderous policy
All the above are accomplices to murder.