PC16: Fixing schools

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Marty
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PC16: Fixing schools

Post by Marty »

What do you think of Will Croft's equity premium idea? How does it measure up against the government's Academies?
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Sir Jack Anderson
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Re: PC16: Fixing schools

Post by Sir Jack Anderson »

The Conservatives chose to starve schools of funding in their recent Shadow Budget - now their policy has changed so that they will starve only 'failing' schools of funding while using taxpayers money to fund schools in more affluent areas. While the government isn't going to decry parental choice, there's one fundamental flaw with picking winners and losers from our schools: schools only have limited places.

The government's academy programme, and our investment in schools including our Future Classrooms programme, are a commitment to this government aiming to lift standards up across schools, not picking winners and losers and calling that choice as the Conservative Party wish to do. This will hurt social mobility, hurt parental choice and will be deeply damaging to the fabric of our education system, all things this government opposes.
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Astrid Goldman
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Re: PC16: Fixing schools

Post by Astrid Goldman »

What Mr Croft forgets in his lacklustre proposal is that many of the schools he is referring to as "failed", his Government allowed to sail through as "Satisfactory." Parents know that this Government have a cast-iron commitment, and solid track record, on improving the standards in our schools and I remain wholly unapologetic about having high expectations of teaching.

The issue of school improvement is innately complex. More so than Mr Croft tries to paint it. It is simply not sufficient to juggle some top-funding about and call it parental choice. Under these proposals, schools in areas of high deprivation, which is the predominant catchment of the schools he's labelling as "failed", would have their improvement funding cut, and money would be funnelled away from struggling schools in communities that need support, and into middle class areas already performing well.

This Government has an ambitious, evidence-rich plan to improve schools in this country. Since 1997, we have entirely raised the standard of the National Curriculum, we have launched National Literacy and Numeracy strategies. These actions ensure teachers in every classroom in every school, for every child, are teaching with the most effective approaches. Parents deserve excellent public services; in every community. Giving up on some schools, and some children, is a real failure.
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Andy Edwards
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Re: PC16: Fixing schools

Post by Andy Edwards »

The absolute last way that you fix schools that need support is to pull out students and pull away funding- and yet this seems to be the very core of the Tories' "equity premium" idea. Instead of investing in schools in need, the Tories just want to subsidise and give more to schools that are good. This policy will do more to make education more unequal and leave more students behind than really doing nothing... so I have to congratulate the Tories on coming up with the worst possible solution.

This Government has been focused on investing in schools in need and lifting standards of education for all- not just those that are lucky enough to win the Tories' idea of a fair lottery. This Government has been focused on innovation in education and using new models to help reach out to students and communities in need. We're committed to an education that benefits everyone.

The Tories want to subsidise "good" schools while defunding schools- and students- in need. All that will do is leave more and more students behind. I absolutely oppose this idea that will do nothing to help our education system and only provide benefits to the very few.
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Amelia Lockhart
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Re: PC16: Fixing schools

Post by Amelia Lockhart »

The Conservative Party’s ‘kick them while they are down’ approach to schools hurts children, communities and our country as a whole. It seeks to starve schools of the funding at the moment they need it most: to lift standards and improve teaching. They would be unable to provide support to teachers, deliver on their pastoral duties, and ensure that every child learns better. And for many children, they’d be trapped in a failing school that the Conservative Party is determined to make worse. Mr Croft would drive the education system into chaos to deliver on an ideological approach that has no evidence to support it.
Amelia Lockhart
Labour Party
Deputy Leader of the Labour Party (2001 - )
MP for Great Grimsby (1992 - )

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Will Frost
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Re: PC16: Fixing schools

Post by Will Frost »

I've been watching the press coverage following the launch of my party's new policy, the Equity Premium, and the only conclusion I can come to is that... Labour MPs are just so sensitive. The focus of my remarks were to discuss a new, revolutionary policy aimed at uplifting disadvantage students and their parents. Yet all the Labour Party can talk about is how they don't deserve to be blamed, it's not their fault, blah blah blah. The enduring legacy of New Labour is to make excuses for the problems that continue to fester under their leadership, and to do everything in their power to pass off responsibility to someone else.

The reality is that I don't care who is responsible for the epidemic of failing schools in this country, I just want to fix it. If the previous Conservative Government was inaccurately labeling failing schools as "satisfactory," then we deserve to be held accountable for that failure. The Labour Party, however, has been in power for nearly half a decade, and their constant desire to point the finger at someone else for the challenges Britain faces does absolutely nothing to benefit the people we all serve. It is a fact that more schools are failing this year than in previous years. I say this not to be "mean" to the Labour Party, but to accurately reflect the situation we find ourselves in as a country.

When the existing policy has proven not to work, we need to try something different. The Equity Premium is that different approach. It makes a break from the past, a past shared by both major parties, in that it puts power directly into the hands of families and students. I think the Labour Party would be able to see that if they weren't so obsessed with vilifying their political opponents.
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Re: PC16: Fixing schools

Post by Blakesley »

1 XP to Edwards.
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