HEP Talks

The Education Brief: Saturday 29 March 2025 - Top stories include: The Schools Bill has ignited fierce debate between councils and academies over admissions. Oracy is now back in the spotlight of the national curriculum review. Ofsted’s Sir Martyn Oliver has declared full support for headteachers who ban mobile phones. International schools are growing uneasy over the US government’s rapid rollbac...

The Education Brief: Saturday 22 March 2025 - Top stories include: The government’s interim curriculum review outlined 4 areas of focus for the national curriculum. Severe absence has reached its highest point on record, especially affecting those with SEND. The UK’s "lost learning crisis" has worsened; researchers propose 10 bold solutions. Government support for rising employer nationa...

The Education Brief: Saturday 15 March 2025 - Top stories include: Ofsted Chief Inspector Sir Martyn Oliver insisted that inspections must involve grades. School leaders have warned that budgets for next year are even tighter than expected. Councils given approval to divert £82 million from education budgets to cover SEND deficits. The latest TES investigation into academy CEO pay has revealed soa...

The Education Brief: Saturday 8 March 2025 - Top stories include: England’s £11 billion EHCP budget is not improving outcomes for children with SEND. School leaders across England are facing an alarming surge in parental abuse. Concerns are growing over the government’s decision to scrap behaviour hubs. The government’s supervised toothbrushing scheme is set to roll out in England. This week’s dee...

The Education Brief: Saturday 1 March 2025 - Top stories include: Ofsted is set to trial its proposed new inspection framework with visits to around 240 schools. New analysis reveals that CEO pay at the largest multi-academy trusts continues to rise. Teachers in four Haringey secondary schools have gone on strike over plans to raise class sizes. The 750 schools that will take part in a pilot offer...

The Education Brief: Saturday 15 February 2025 - Top stories include: Ofsted reports marks down for behaviour have halved since Covid, but teachers disagree. Teach First has announced James Toop as its new CEO. 60% of academy trust CEOs say new reforms would have no impact on their schools. Government minutes reveal a heated exchange between Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson and headteacher K...

The Education Brief: Saturday 8 February 2025 - Top stories include: Academy trusts are under growing financial pressure. The government is investing £2 million in a new “writing framework” and literacy training. The Education Secretary has voiced concerns over the growing number of parental complaints. School leaders have slammed the government’s new intervention plans for “stuck schools.” This w...

The Education Brief: Saturday 1 February 2025 - Top stories include: Schools are becoming a vital safety net for struggling families. Exam board Pearson has been fined £250,000 pounds after it breached confidentiality rules. Whistleblowers have slammed Ofsted’s planned report cards as “rushed and botched.” Per-pupil school funding will rise by 1.2 per cent after inflation, which won’t keep up with...

The Education Brief: Saturday 25 January 2025 - Top stories include: Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson unveiled a series of measures at BETT to integrate AI and technology into schools. New data reveals a 220 per cent rise in suspensions for racist abuse in primary schools. The government has appointed two expert panels to advise on making mainstream schools more inclusive and reforming the S...

The Education Brief: Saturday 18 January 2025 - Top stories include: Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson spoke in front of the Education Committee. The Confederation of School Trusts raised concerns over the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill. Sir Kevan Collins has been named lead non-executive board member for the DfE. A new report from Headrest calls trust in Ofsted "almost irrecovera...

The Education Brief: Saturday 11 January 2025 - Top stories include: IFS warns rising SEND costs are set to devour any potential school savings. The NEU is launching an indicative strike ballot over the government’s proposed teacher pay rise. Ofsted chief inspector Sir Martyn Oliver talked with the Education Select Committee about report cards, SEND, and the Ofsted complaints process. Labour has s...

The Education Brief: Saturday 21 December 2024 - Top stories include: The Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill Ofsted criticises curriculum ‘barriers’ for SEND pupils in mainstream Survey reveals an increasing formalisation of SATs practice in the first term of Year 6 across UK primary schools This week’s deep dive: Autumn Term wrap-up with Fran and James We’ll also tell you what’s happening at H...

The Education Brief: Saturday 14 December 2024 - Top stories include: Home education in England has risen by 21 per cent over the past year. The DfE has proposed a 2.8 per cent teacher pay rise for 2025 to 2026. Exam malpractice in schools and colleges has reached a three-year high. Ofsted will investigate how schools and colleges are using artificial intelligence. This week’s deep dive:  Key Stag...

The Education Brief: Saturday 7 December 2024 - Top stories include: The government missed its teacher recruitment targets, with the worst shortfall on record. The government has announced £740 million to create more SEND places in mainstream schools. Plans to introduce on-screen GCSE exams by 2025 and 2026 have been delayed. Ofsted’s annual report highlights rising concerns over “flexi-schooling”...

The Education Brief: Saturday 30 November 2024 - Top stories include: Rising costs in schools are set to outpace the government’s latest funding boost. Suspensions in England's schools have soared to a record high, with rates jumping 40% last year. New data reveals a widening disadvantage gap among reception pupils. New EPI research reveals that 3,500 schools in England are "isolated" from leaders...

The Education Brief: Saturday 23 November 2024 - Top stories include: A new Teaching Commission aims to address the teacher recruitment and retention crisis. Ambition Institute, Education Development Trust, Teach First, and UCL Institute of Education secured contracts to deliver the Early Career Framework from 2025. A report on the Behaviour Hubs programme reveals contrasting outcomes. The governm...

The Education Brief: Saturday 16 November 2024 - Top stories include: The government has reversed a 20-hours training mandate for trainee teacher mentors. The EEF announced a £700,000 initiative to improve student outcomes across 300 schools. An OECD report dispels the idea that English students have an “anti-maths mindset”. The government has proposed raising teachers' pension contributions. This...

The Education Brief: Saturday 9 November 2024 - Top stories include: Bridget Phillipson has said struggling academies can return to local authority oversight. Phillipson emphasised pupil wellbeing, happiness, and inclusivity as core missions. Professor Becky Francis spoke about emerging themes in the national curriculum review. Ofsted clarified their new inclusion focus won’t penalise legitimate u...

In this episode of HEP Talks, host Luke Kemper sits down with Sonia Gill, educational leadership coach, author, and founder of Heads Up, to explore what school excellence looks like and how to successfully deal with difficult conversations. Sonia shares her insights on high-performing teams and the importance of cultivating school culture, offering practical strategies for school leaders to unlock...

The Education Brief: Saturday 26 October 2024 - Top stories include: End-of-year maths scores may predict Year 8 English performance more accurately than English scores. Research reveals a gap in maths anxiety between disadvantaged Year 6 pupils and their peers. Unions representing school support staff have accepted a pay rise of at least £1,290. Concerns about inconsistency have been raised about...

The Education Brief: Saturday 19 October 2024 - Top stories include: Ofsted has released its first set of school inspection reports without overall headline grades. The DfE is set to change the law to allow schools to open nurseries more quickly. The DfE spent over £13 million pounds on SEND tribunals last year. Parentkind’s latest national survey reveals that most parents are ok with children’s a...

In this episode of HEP Talks, host Luke Kemper speaks with Iona Jackson, Director of Strategy at Edurio, to explore the key findings from Edurio's latest reports on staff wellbeing and teacher retention in academies. Together, they unpack data from surveys of school staff across England, discussing the impact of workload, leadership dynamics, and wellbeing on staff retention. Iona reveals how fact...

The Education Brief: Saturday 12 October 2024 - Top stories include: 80 per cent of Year 1 pupils met the government's "expected standard" in phonics. The DfE has relaunched a £7 million programme to combat antisemitism in schools. Government cost-saving measures and delays have affected several key education initiatives. A longer school day has been shown to provide a “small yet positive” boost t...

The Education Brief: Saturday 5 October 2024 - Top stories include: Ofsted has revealed plans to assess schools on inclusion in upcoming inspections. The government has released key dates for primary assessments. A new "high level research commission" has been established to examine pupil engagement and its impact on school attendance, amid rising absence rates. Bridget Phillipson has committed to...

The Education Brief: Saturday 28 September 2024 - Top stories include: Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson delivered her first speech at the Labour Party Conference this week. Phillipson announced plans to open the first 300 school-based nurseries by next September, as part of a £15 million capital scheme. Ofsted is launching the Ofsted Academy later this term by publishing inspector training m...