Introduction This week the Minister announced that from August this year and subject to consultation, apprenticeship programmes should expect to last at least 12 months. For 16-18 year olds, there will be no exemptions while for 19+ programmes there will be some flexibility pending evidence of prior achievement. This is the latest in a series... Read on

Main talking points A huge number of Reports and Papers out this month (see below) with the Budget or at least funding generally, dominating many of them. Public sector pensions and pay apart, there was little in the Budget on education though many will have noticed the Chancellor’s continuing commitment to stick with current funding... Read on

Introduction This week the Dept published its eagerly awaited update on school funding reform. With a title like ‘Next steps towards a fairer system,’ it’s clear that the Dept is having to move pretty carefully towards what is now a longer-term of goal of introducing a simplified and better targeted funding system from 2013-14. This... Read on

Introduction At least a dozen of the 63 recommendations in the Final Report published this week by the independent Panel that has been looking into last August’s riots, are of direct interest to schools. Schools are not the only parties addressed in the Report; parents, communities, employers, Government, advertising bodies, the police, let alone the... Read on

Introduction The recent Interim Report from the Review Panel examining the role, status and professional development of lecturers in the FE sector has done a lot in its words “to clear the ground” in an area that has been knotty so far to say the least. It has come up with a number of pretty... Read on

How do things stand now? Essentially that proposals to move to a full post-results admissions (PQA) system, which had provoked strong opinions, will not now be introduced but a number of other refinements to the HE admissions system will be introduced, in many cases from the 2014 year of entry   Context A review of... Read on

(This blog post is the result of collaboration with YouGov-Cambridge) The current context Higher education (HE) in England continues to dominate the headlines. After the controversy, riots and delays that led up to the 2011 White Paper I now see a host of other issues arising. Although most of the funding changes seem to be... Read on

The Pearson  Centre for Policy and Learning is proud to be working in partnership with the Expansive Education  Network. The Network, which is based at the University of Winchester, provides a national and international forum for the development and exchange of ideas and development in teaching and learning.  As such it’s involved in a range... Read on

Professor Becky Francis has followed a research career focusing on education and social justice. Best known for her work on gender and achievement, Becky was a Professor of Education at Roehampton University before taking up the post of Director of Education at the RSA in 2010. This role involved thought-leadership on educational policy, directorship of... Read on

David Willetts, the Minister for Higher Education and Science, recently laid out his ambition for Britain to be the best place in the world to do science. After a tough 2011 battling over undergraduate funding and being accused by some of neglecting post-graduate researchers, the Minister clearly hopes to start 2012 on a more positive... Read on