Schools White Paper 2005: a summary of proposals
A new schools system
-
Every school will be able to acquire a self-governing trust — similar to those supporting Academies which will give them the freedom to work with new partners to help develop their ethos and raise standards.
-
Academies will remain at the heart of the programme, with continued and new opportunities to develop them in schools and areas of real and historical underperformance and underachievement.
-
Independent schools will find it easier to enter the new system.
-
A national schools commissioner will drive change, matching schools and new partners, promoting the benefits of choice, access and diversity, and taking action where parental choices are being frustrated.
-
This will create a system of independent non-fee-paying state schools, where schools can decide whether they wish to acquire a self-governing trust or become a self-governing foundation school. They will do so without unnecessary bureaucratic interference, in a system of fair admissions, fair funding and clear accountability.
Choice and access for all
We will ensure that choice is more widely available to all within an
increasingly specialist system, not just to those who can pay for it. Key
to choice is the provision of more good places and more good schools. This will
be supported by:
-
Introducing better information for all parents when their children enter primary and secondary school, and dedicated choice advisers to help the least well-off parents to exercise their choices.
-
Extending the rights to free school transport to children from poorer families to go to their three nearest secondary schools within six miles of their home (where they are outside walking distance) and piloting transport to support such choices for all parents, which will help the environment as well as school choice.
-
Making it easier for schools to introduce fair admissions policies, including banding, so that they can keep a proportion of places for students who live outside traditional urban school catchment areas within a genuinely comprehensive intake. Some specialist schools and Academies already successfully use this approach.
Parents and pupils fully engaged in improving standards
-
Parents will receive regular, meaningful reports during the school year about how their child is doing with opportunities to discuss their child's progress at school.
-
Parents have the chance to form elected Parent Councils to influence school decisions on issues such as school meals, uniform and discipline (such councils will be required in Trust schools).
-
Parents have better local complaints procedures and access to a new national complaints service from Ofsted.
-
Parents have access to more and clearer information about local schools, how to get involved and how to lever change including the creation of new schools.
-
Parents are able to set up new schools supported by a dedicated capital pot.
Education tailored to the individual
We have dramatically expanded our knowledge about how different young
people acquire knowledge and skills. Coupled with increased resources in our
schools, a reformed school workforce and the greater availability of ICT, this
gives teachers the opportunity to tailor lessons and support in schools to the
individual needs of each pupil. So there will be:
-
Targeted one-to-one tuition in English and Mathematics in the schools with the most underperforming pupils, to help those falling behind to catch up with their peers
-
More stretching lessons and opportunities for gifted and talented pupils
-
Extended schools, offering many new opportunities to learn and develop beyond the formal school day
-
More schools adopting grouping and setting of pupils in particular subjects according to ability
-
A national training programme to enable each school to have one leading professional to help develop tailored lessons
Measures to tackle failure and underperformance
-
Failing schools will be more quickly turned around; and where no progress is made after a year, a competition for new providers will be held. Coasting schools will put on notice to improve, and if progress is not made, will enter special measures within a year.
-
Competitions will be required for new schools and the replacement of failing schools, for the first time providing a straightforward route to bring new providers into the system. All new schools will be self-governing foundation schools, voluntary aided church schools or Academies.
-
Parents will be able to urge Ofsted action or request new providers, and where there is strong demand or dissatisfaction with existing choices, authorities will have to meet their concerns.
Lighter touch for good schools
-
Good schools will be able to expand or federate more easily with other schools to expand their influence and increase the supply of good places, improving choices for parents.
-
The best specialist schools will be able to acquire extra specialism and funded for new responsibilities such as teacher training.
-
Ofsted will consult on an even lighter-touch inspection system for high-performing schools.
Better discipline
The DfES will implement the Steer recommendations by:
- Introducing a clear and unambiguous legal right for teachers to discipline pupils backed by an expectation that every school has a clear set of rules and sanctions
- Extending parenting contracts and orders, so that schools, individually or collectively, can use them to force parents to take responsibility for their children's bad behaviour in school
- Requiring parents to take responsibility for excluded pupils in their first five days of a suspension (by ensuring they are properly supervised doing schoolwork at home) with fines for parents if excluded pupils are found unsupervised during school hours
- Expecting headteachers to use their newly devolved powers and funding collectively to develop on— and off-site provision for suspensions longer than five days (instead of 15 days at present) and insisting that all exclusions are properly recorded.
A new role for local authorities
-
To support all these reforms, the role of the local authority will change from provider to commissioner.
-
As a part of their wider responsibilities for children and young people, local authorities will be expected to become parents' champions, commissioning rather than providing education. They will have a new duty to promote choice diversity and access to school places and school transport.
-
It will be easier for new schools to be established, where there is parental demand.
-
The school organisation committee will be abolished and their decision-making powers transferred to local authorities; disputes will continue to be resolved by the Schools Adjudicator.
-
Local authorities will work with the newly created Schools Commissioner to ensure more choice, greater diversity and better access for disadvantaged groups to good schools in every area.
-
Local authorities and Learning and Skills Councils will work more closely together to ensure real choice and higher standards in the provision of education for 14 to 19 year-olds in schools and colleges.
Last updated 10 November 2005.
