Tackling educational inequality - CentreForum

Tackling educational inequality
Tackling educational
inequality
Paul Marshall
with Sumi Rabindrakumar and Lucy Wilkins
POLICY PAPER

Tackling educational inequality
Paul Marshall
Paul Marshall is chairman of Marshall Wace LLP, one of Britain’s leading
hedge fund groups. He is also a founder trustee of Absolute Return for
Kids (ARK), the children’s charity, and a co-Chairman of ARK Education.
He is chairman of the Management Board of CentreForum.
Previous publications include: “The Orange Book: reclaiming liberalism”
(2004) which he co-edited, and most recently “Britain after Blair: a
liberal agenda” (2006).
Sumi Rabindrakumar
Sumi graduated from Christ Church, Oxford University where she read
Philosophy, Politics and Economics. She worked for CentreForum until
January 2007 when she joined research consultancy, Local Futures.
Lucy Wilkins
Lucy joined CentreForum in February 2007 after working as a research
analyst in business banking. She previously completed her BA and MPhil
in History at Cambridge University.
Acknowledgements
Many people have influenced my thinking on this subject over recent
years, but I owe a particular debt of gratitude to Jennifer Moses, who is
both passionate in her concern for the educationally disadvantaged and
uncompromising in her analysis of the problem.
I would also like to thank Jay Altman and Amanda Spielman, at ARK
Schools, for their advice and inspiration, and Liz Rayment-Pickard and
Sir Michael Wilshaw for the insights they have provided into life at the
coal-face. I would also like to thank the team at CentreForum for their
comments and criticisms. Any errors are, of course, the author’s alone.
ISBN 1-902622-63-4
Copyright 2007 CentreForum
All rights reserved
Paul Marshall
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of CentreForum.

Tackling educational inequality
:
Contents
Executive summary 4
1. The ‘intractable tail’ 8
2. Understanding the drivers of
educational performance 22
3. Support for disadvantaged pupils 50
4. An end to poor schooling 77

Tackling educational inequality
:
Executive Summary
The intractable tail
Despite improvements to average levels of pupil attainment since 1997,
there remains a large and intractable tail of pupils who consistently fail to
meet minimum standards of literacy and numeracy. This tail is disproportionately
made up of children from economically deprived backgrounds.
When the pupil population is viewed as a whole, the statistics are
alarming enough. In 2006, 20 per cent of pupils failed to achieve
national standards in literacy at Key Stage 2 (age 11) and 24 per cent
in numeracy. In the same year 41 per cent of pupils failed to reach the
undemanding national standard of five good GCSEs (excluding English
and maths) and 56 per cent fell below standard when English and maths
were included. When the performance of the most deprived children is
examined in isolation, the true depth of the problem is exposed. Of all
those eligible for free school meals, only 19.5 per cent currently achieve
five good GCSEs (including English and maths).
The die is cast at an early stage but the English education system does
nothing to recast it. Recent research shows that by the age of three,
children from disadvantaged homes are typically up to a year behind
in their learning compared to their more privileged peers. By the time
children reach university age the contrast is extreme. While 44 per cent
of young people now go to university, only 17 per cent of those whose
parents are in the bottom income quartile move on to higher education.
The equivalent figure for the United States is 50 per cent.
In the face of this deep educational inequality, the British political
debate continues to fall hostage to the needs of middle income Britain
rather than those of the ‘voiceless’ bottom quartile. Thus, Conservative
education spokesman David Willetts’ attempt to raise the issue of
educational inequality has been drowned in an emotional tide of concern
about the status of the remaining 164 grammar schools. The argument
for more grammar schools is in many ways a distraction. As Willetts
rightly pointed out, grammar schools are educating only a tiny number
of truly disadvantaged children, and a much smaller proportion than live
in the areas in which they are situated.

Tackling educational inequality
Equally unhelpful, though, is the view that educational attainment is
bound to be normally distributed and that low attainment should simply
be catered for by greater use of vocational training. Not only does this
argument ignore the low value put on vocational training by the workplace;
it also, and more importantly, ignores the fact that low attainment
is driven more by a child’s background than by natural ability. Our schools
are not failing the least able. They are failing the disadvantaged.
This paper then is based on the premise that educational underachievement
is an urgent problem, requiring a radical programme of reform focusing
both on tackling educational failure, and its causes.
Support for disadvantaged pupils
Research suggests that pupil level variables (i.e. pupil intake) explain up
to 85 per cent of a school’s performance. Some argue that this figure
overstates the importance of background, but almost no one denies the
strong correlation between schools’ pupil profiles and their attainment
rates. Despite this, the education reforms of the past 20 years have
concentrated almost exclusively on school effectiveness, no doubt in
part because this approach provides easier levers for policy makers to
pull.
This paper argues for greater balance to be brought to educational policy,
matching measures to improve school effectiveness with measures
which tackle the inequality of school intakes at source.
Pupil premium
Such an approach must begin by looking at the funding system. This
paper calls for a reform of deprivation funding so that money directly
follows the pupil through a ‘pupil premium’ system. Such a change
would cut out the unnecessary duplication of funding analysis and
decision-making which currently exists between local authorities and
the Department for Education and Skills (DfES, now the DCSF - the
Department for Children, Schools and Families). More importantly, it
would ensure that deprivation funding reaches those most in need,
encouraging schools to take on – and even compete for – disadvantaged
pupils. Over time it would lead to a more balanced social spread of
intakes between schools.
A more explicit and rational system of differential funding – operating
much like a ‘weighted voucher’ scheme – would help reduce the variation
between school performance, both by narrowing the differentials
between pupil intakes and by providing extra resources for the more
challenging schools.

Tackling educational inequality
Doubling Deprivation Funding
Government research shows that extra spending has significantly greater
impact on the attainment of deprived pupils than on more affluent
children. This argues for a greater bias of funding towards disadvantaged
pupils. A properly functioning ‘pupil premium’ system would create the
right framework for such a rebalancing of the education budget.
A doubling of deprivation funding would enable the most deprived pupils
in the state sector to receive the same level of per capita funding as in
the private sector. This would cost an estimated £2.4 billion and be
a much more manageable – and efficient – use of funds than Gordon
Brown’s 2006 commitment to bring per capita spending for all pupils to
the level of the private sector, which would cost an extra £17 billion.
As liberals who believe in raising standards by giving parents real choice
and voice, we instinctively baulk at the idea of central planners telling
schools how best to use each pound of the additional deprivation
funding proposed. The list of recommendations in this paper should be
seen, therefore, as a ‘menu’ of options – with prices attached – from
which schools might wish to choose. The precise balance between
the individual reforms should be determined by those with a detailed
knowledge of the school in question.
The reforms put forward include:
:
:
:
Smaller class sizes at primary school
Significantly more hours of teaching time for disadvantaged
pupils, (including new powers for schools to make longer school
days compulsory, Saturday schools and summer programmes)
‘Hard to Serve’ bonuses, linked to performance related pay
schemes, to attract and reward excellent teaching staff working
in the most challenging schools
An end to poor schooling:
higher aspirations and standards for all
It is important not to fall into a deterministic approach in emphasising
the impact a pupil’s background has on his or her educational prospects.
The quid pro quo for a doubling of deprivation funding is the expectation
that deprivation will no longer be used as an excuse for low attainment.
We need to challenge the poverty of aspiration in our education system,
particularly for the worst performing schools. This paper is optimistic
about the potential for individual schools to make a difference, and is encouraged
by the achievements of a small but growing number of US charter
schools and UK schools in delivering high attainment for deprived children.

Tackling educational inequality
The success of these ‘high poverty, high performance’ schools can
provide signposts to the UK for new policy initiatives. This paper calls
for more ambitious long term attainment targets for the state sector: in
particular, the gap between the minimum (30 per cent of pupils in all
schools achieving five good GCSEs by 2008) and the average (60 per
cent of 16 year olds achieving five good GCSEs) expectations at GCSE
level should be closed.
Attainment targets should be set, monitored and upheld by a new
Educational Standards Authority, independent of the Qualifications and
Curriculum Authority, accountable to Parliament and entirely independent
of ministerial interference.
A range of additional measures are also proposed to tackle poor schooling,
at minimal or zero cost to the taxpayer. These include:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Bringing a greater focus and rigour to the first years of primary
school, including more systematic Foundation Profiling and Key
Stage 1 tests to promote the most effective teaching methods
Expanding the use of synthetic phonics for disadvantaged
pupils
Granting more freedom for all schools, of the sort already
extended to Academies, to vary the curriculum at Key Stage
3 so that pupils are given enough time to master the basics of
literacy and numeracy.
Reviewing the role of head teacher and, if appropriate, opening
it up to outside professionals
Ensuring that teachers are able to seize the opportunities of the
data revolution as other professions have done, to help them
track pupil progress, develop more personalised learning strategies
and evaluate teaching methods
Providing more information to parents and other stakeholders,
including the publication of pupil intake attainment data at
secondary school.
Training school governors in the assessment of school data
Giving schools kite-marks on the quality of their data systems
using a Michelin star-style system. These will be awarded by
Ofsted and published on school websites

Tackling educational inequality
:
1. The ‘intractable tail’
The majority of children in this country develop the skills and qualifications
that they will need in adult life. But there remains a stubbornly long
‘tail’ of children who leave school without those skills. While the education
reforms of the past ten years have led to some overall improvement,
they have been least effective in improving attainment for the bottom
quartile of pupils.
Part 1 of this paper examines the extent and nature of educational under
attainment, both by pupils and by schools. The analysis is based on
publicly available data and has taken as its starting point the existing
framework of standards and targets, as set out in table 1. While this
allows certain conclusions to be drawn about the extent of under attainment,
there are legitimate questions about the appropriateness of the
standards and target setting framework itself. This issue is returned to
in part 4.
Table 1: Summary of current standards and ’floor
targets’ for school attainment
Key Stage 1
(age 7)
Key Stage 2
(age 11)
Key Stage 3
(age 14)
Key Stage 4
(age 16)
Expected Floor Target
Deadline
Standard
Level 2 n/a -
Level 4 85 per cent of 11 year olds achieve at least level 4
in English and maths
Proportion of schools in which fewer than 65 per
cent of pupils achieve at least level 4 reduced by
40 per cent
Level 5 85 per cent of 14 year olds achieve at least level 5 in
English, maths and ICT; and 80 per cent in science
50 per cent of pupils in all schools achieve at least
level 5 in English, maths and science
Five or
more
A* to C
graded
GCSEs
60 per cent of 16 year olds achieve equivalent of
five good GCSEs
25 per cent of pupils in all schools achieve five good
GCSEs, (rising to 30 per cent by 2008)
2006
2008
2007
2008
2008
2006
Source: Current targets from DfES Publlic Service Agreements in the HM Treasury 2004
Spending Review

Tackling educational inequality
1.1 PUPIL ATTAINMENT
Progress in pupil attainment during the past ten years has followed a
broadly similar pattern at Key Stages 1, 2, 3 and 4. The introduction of
specific standards and targets in 1995 alongside the National Curriculum
Tests (also called Standard Assessment Tests or SATs) was initially
followed by very rapid progress against national attainment targets.
However, in the past five years the pace of improvement has slowed
significantly, suggesting that we are reaching a stubborn ‘tail’ of pupils,
who are not meeting national standards.
This pattern is most obvious at Key Stages 1 and 2. The proportion
of children achieving the expected level in maths at Key Stage 1 rose
rapidly from 79 per cent to 90 per cent between 1995 and 2000, but
has since stagnated. In reading and writing, the improvement was less
marked but the pattern of stagnation very similar (see figure 1).
Likewise, at Key Stage 2 the proportion of pupils reaching level 4 or
above in English increased sharply from 49 per cent in 1995 to 75 per
cent in 2000, but appears now to be approaching a ceiling of about 80
per cent. A similar pattern can be observed in maths (see figure 2).
Figure 1: Percentage of pupils achieving level 2+ at Key
Stage 1, 1995-2006
Writing
Maths
Reading
95
91
% achieving level 2+ at Key Stage 1
87
83
79
75
1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006
Source: DfES, ‘Attainment, Key Stage 1’, January 2006

Tackling educational inequality
Figure 2: Percentage of pupils achieving level 4+ At Key
Stage 2, 1995-2006
English
Mathematics
100
% achieving level 4+ at Key Stage 2
80
60
Floor target
40
1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006
Source: DfES, National Curriculum Assessments at Key Stage 2 in England, 2006
(Revised), December 2006
At Key Stage 3, the picture is one of continued progress in terms of
pupils achieving the expected level 5 or above (see figure 3). However,
the proportion achieving the national target is lower than at earlier Key
Stages. It is possible that once attainment at Key Stage 3 reaches levels
similar to those at Key Stages 1 and 2, progress will also falter.
Progress has also been made at Key Stage 4 (GCSEs and equivalents),
with the percentage of pupils attaining five good GCSEs rising from
44 per cent in 1997 to 59 per cent in 2006. Here too, however, the
proportion of students reaching the floor target is significantly lower
than at earlier stages of education, despite the widespread perception
that GCSEs have become easier to obtain.
This perception has been fuelled by the inclusion of GNVQs in GCSE
statistics as equivalent vocational qualifications. Intermediate GNVQs
at any grade count as four good GCSEs: a pupil now needs only one
GCSE plus one GNVQ to meet the five good GCSE benchmark. There is
evidence that some schools have encouraged the uptake of GNVQs to
boost their place in the league tables. 1
In fact, it was recently revealed
that nine of the ten schools ranked as the most improved in GCSE passes
achieved this via the vocational route. When GNVQs are excluded, the
nationwide percentage of pupils gaining five good GCSEs has stalled at
around 50 per cent for the past four to five years (see figure 4).
10

Tackling educational inequality
Figure 3: Percentage of pupils achieving level 5+ at Key
Stage 3, 1995-2006
Maths
Science
English
% achieving level 5+ at Key Stage 3
100
80
60
40
English/
maths target
Science target
1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006
Source: DfES, 2006
Figure 4: Five good GCSEs, 1996-2005
GCSEs
and equiv.
GCSEs only
inc. English
& Maths
% achieving 5 good GCSEs (A*-C)
60
50
40
30
1996/97
1997/98
1998/99
1999/00
2000/01
2001/02
2002/03
2003/04
2004/05
2005/06
Source: DfES, 2006
11

Tackling educational inequality
1.2 EXAMINING THE ‘TAIL’
Table 2 sets out what these rates mean in terms of the total number
of pupils failing to reach the expected standards at the different Key
Stages.
Furthermore, within the ‘tail’ there is a group of particularly low achievers
who are making virtually no progress at all. According to the government,
every year around 6 to 7 per cent of 11 year olds in England leave
primary school with “very poor” literacy skills (below National Curriculum
level 3 in English – the expected attainment level of a seven year old).
A similar proportion leaves primary school with “very poor” numeracy.
Moreover, the proportion of these ‘low achievers’ at Key Stage 2 has
actually increased (see figure 5). In percentage terms the figures appear
small, but they refer to a large number of children. The number of 11
year olds significantly underachieving in English, maths and science in
2006 stood at 35,900, 25,600, and 17,000 respectively.
A similar pattern can be found at GCSE level. Although fewer pupils
are now failing to achieve any GCSEs at all, the percentage of those
achieving five GCSEs has remained virtually unchanged since 2000 (see
figure 6). Since 1997, approximately 11 per cent of 16 year olds have
consistently achieved fewer than five GCSE passes of any grade. This is
despite the government’s decision to include equivalent GCSE qualifications,
such as GNVQs, previously excluded from the statistics.
Table 2: Numbers and percentages of pupils falling below
expected standards
Key
Stage 1
Key
Stage 2
Key
Stage 3
Key
Stage 4
English
Maths
Speaking
and listening
Reading
Writing
70,700
(13%)
86,400
(15%)
103,600
(19%)
53,700
(9%)
118,000
(20%)
138,600
(23%)
147,800
(24%) 263,500
(41%) 2
127,600
(20%)
Source: Calculations from DfES, ‘National Curriculum Assessments at Key Stage 1 in
England, 2006 (Provisional)’, August 2006; DfES, ‘National Curriculum Assessments at
Key Stage 2 in England, 2006 (Revised)’ December 2006; DfES, ‘National Curriculum
Assessments at Key Stage 3 in England, 2006 (Provisional)’, September 2006; DfES,
‘GCSE and equivalent examination results in England 2005/06 (Revised)’, January 2007
12

Tackling educational inequality
Figure 5: Low achievers (level 2 or below) at Key Stage 2
8
English
Mathematics
Science
% of pupils in maintained schools
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
Source: DfES, December 2006
Figure 6: Low achievers at Key Stage 4, 1998 to 2006
15
Fewer than 5 GCSEs
No passes
12
% of fifteen year olds
9
6
3
0
1997
/98
1998
/99
1999
/00
2000
/01
2001
/02
2002
/03
2003
/04
2004
/05
2005
/06
Source: DfES, January 2007
13

Tackling educational inequality
1.3 PERFORMANCE AT THE SCHOOL LEVEL
At the school level, headline improvements are also not quite what
they seem. Official statistics show a steady reduction in the number
of schools in special measures (from 515 in 1997 to 243 at the end
of 2006) as well as in the numbers of “low attaining” secondary and
primary schools (figures 7 and 8), defined as those failing to achieve the
government’s floor targets.
However, despite this apparent improvement, the overall number of
schools described as poorly performing remains high. In August 2005,
1,557 schools were classified as poorly performing (see figure 9), over
7 per cent of the total number of maintained schools. 3
Figure 7: Low-attaining secondary schools by proportion
of pupils achieving at least 5 GCSEs grades a* to c,1997
to 2005
Below 30% Below 25% Below 20%
1000
896
800
600
Number of schools
400
232
Floor target
aims
200
0
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008
Source: Unpublished DfES data, 2006
14

Tackling educational inequality
Figure 8: Low attaining primary schools, 1997 to 2005
English
Maths
8000
7000
6000
6,471
6,129
5000
4000
3000
2000
1,870
2,797
Floor target
aims
1,709
2,142
1000
0
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008
Source: Unpublished DfES data, 2006
Figure 9: Share of poorly performing schools, 2005
Special Measures (Ofsted)
Notice to Improve (Ofsted)
Low-attaining (DfES)
Under-performing (DfES)
Underachieving schools (Ofsted)
Source: Ofsted and NAO, 2006
15

Tackling educational inequality
Primary school problems understated
Furthermore, these figures significantly understate the number of poorly
performing primary schools. In 2005, 402 schools (53 secondary and
349 primary schools) were deemed “low attaining”. To be classified as
low attaining, secondary schools need only miss the government floor
target of 25 per cent of pupils achieving five or more ‘good’ GCSEs for
a single year. Primary schools are classified as low attaining only if they
miss their floor target (65 per cent of pupils reaching level 4 in English
and maths) for four years in a row. The National Audit Office (NAO) use
the different measure to avoid the sensitivity of primary school data to
small pupil numbers. 4 If we use the same benchmark for primary as for
secondary schools, the number of primary schools where less than 65
per cent of pupils reached level 4 in 2005 rises to 1,870 for English,
and to 2,797 for maths – a big jump from the 402 schools that appear
in the official statistics.
In addition, the total number of poorly performing schools includes
‘underperforming’ schools – a category that only applies to secondary
schools. This is a category based on value added to the school intake,
which is currently unavailable for primary schools (as measured by CVA
scores). 5 The education department promised equivalent primary school
data by September 2006, but nothing has yet been forthcoming. The
figures above, therefore, do not include those primary schools that are
not performing as well as they should be, given their circumstances.
In summary: 1,557 schools were defined as underperforming in 2005.
They educated roughly 980,000 pupils and represent 4.1 per cent of
primary schools, 23 per cent of secondary schools and 3 per cent of
‘other’ schools. 6 If the same performance criteria for primary schools is
employed as those that apply to secondary schools, the total rises to
5,878 schools (20.5 per cent of all primary schools), affecting a total
of 1.6 million pupils. This still ignores primary schools that would be
defined as underperforming in relation to value added criteria. This is an
unacceptable level of underperformance.
The Fat Tail of School Underperformance
There is a further problem. In a genuinely non-selective, mixed ability
comprehensive system, performance of secondary and primary schools
would be normally distributed, with most schools clustered around the
mean. Instead, there exists what statisticians call a “fat tail” of schools
at secondary level (primary school level data is not available) which
significantly underperform relative to their peers.
Figure 10 shows the distribution of secondary school performance at
GCSE. It reveals two abnormalities: an unexpected number of extremely
16

Tackling educational inequality
Figure 10: Distribution of secondary school
performance at GCSE
800
700
Number of maintained
mainstream schools
600
500
400
300
200
100
0
0 -14
15-19
20-24
25-29
30-39
40-49
50-59
60-69
70-79
80-89
90+
% of pupils achieving 5+ A*-C grades
including English and Maths
Source: Unpublished DfES data, 2006
high performing schools (essentially corresponding to the 164 grammar
schools) and a much longer, fatter tail of underperforming schools.
The skewed distribution of school outcomes is highly relevant to arguments
about school choice. It is much easier – and more equitable – to
encourage parental choice when there is a low level of school variation
in terms of attainment. If choice is extended at a time when there is an
insufficient number of good school places and still a very large tail of
schools producing unsatisfactory results, a severe rationing of places at
the good schools will result. Since the system used most often to ration
places (catchment areas) favours those families with enough money to
buy the more expensive properties near the good schools, the result will
almost certainly be the further social segregation of pupils. It is for this
reason that advocates of choice in education (which includes this author)
should guard against getting too far ahead of reality. Choice requires an
excess, as well as a diversity, of supply. Meaningful choice requires
that supply to be of a high quality. Until such time as the supply side
has been liberalised, those pupils currently in underperforming schools
(clustered at the left hand side of the school performance chart above)
will find it difficult or impossible to access a place at a higher performing
school.
17

Tackling educational inequality
1.4 WHY LOW ATTAINMENT MATTERS
Education and Employment
The level of qualifications obtained at school has a very high bearing
on subsequent earning power. If those with low levels of skills do find
employment, it is far more likely to be in lower paid work than those
with higher skill levels, as shown in figure 11.
The lower their qualification levels, the less chance young people have
of continuing into or preparing for employment: a 2004 survey from the
Department for Education and Skills (DfES) — recently re-named the
Department for Children, Schools and Families — found that 2 per cent
of young people with five or more good GCSEs were classified as not in
education, training or employment (NEET), compared with 39 per cent
of young people with no qualifications. 7
At worst, low skills can lead to long term unemployment. The accountancy
firm KPMG has estimated that those with very low literacy or
numeracy skills are up to eight times more likely to be living in a household
where both partners are out of paid employment than those with
good skills. 8 And 4 per cent of those who left school at 16 with very low
literacy had never worked. The effects of long term unemployment can
be severe, with proven detrimental consequences for individuals’ mental
and physical well being.
Figure 11 Gross mean hourly earnings of working age
employees, 2001-05
20
15
£
10
5
0
Degree
or higher
A Level
GCSE
A* to C
GCSE
D to G
No
qualifications
Source: DfES, ‘The level of highest qualification held by young people and adults: England
2005’, estimates from Labour Force Survey
18

Tackling educational inequality
The Market for Unskilled Jobs
There is a body of opinion which holds that intelligence is normally
distributed; that society needs a mix of skilled and unskilled jobs; and that
we should therefore accept the current wide dispersion of educational
outcomes. But there is also a large (and fast growing) body of evidence
to suggest that the most intelligent young children do not always go on
to become the most successful students and workers, just as the least
intelligent do not find themselves grouped together, twenty years later,
in the least skilled jobs or among the unemployed. Our education system
is not failing the least able. It is failing the most disadvantaged.
What is more, there is a big difference between identifying an ongoing
demand for unskilled labour in the economy and concluding that such
demand will always remain at current levels. Most estimates suggest
a continuing decline in the number of unskilled jobs. The government
forecasts that the number of unskilled jobs in the economy will shrink
from 3.4 million today to as few as 600,000 by 2020. 9
If the government is right (and several decades of labour market history
suggest it is), this will have a profound impact on children who fail to
achieve basic levels of numeracy and literacy by school leaving age.
Even if we accept that a minority of pupils will always fail to reach the
expected standards, the important question is the size of that minority.
We should presumably expect Britain to be amongst the top tier of OECD
countries rather than the bottom tier. To be in the OECD’s top tier today
would require that no more than 10 to 15 per cent of Britain’s workforce
should be without basic levels of literacy and numeracy (referred to as
‘upper secondary qualifications’ in the chart below) compared with the
current total of 35 per cent (see figure 12).
Figure 12: Percentage of 25-64 year olds who have not
achieved upper secondary qualifications, 2006
50
40
%
30
20
10
0
United States
Norway
Czech Republic
Switzerland
Canada
Japan
Germany
Sweden
Denmark
New Zealand
Austria
Source: OECD, ‘Education at a Glance 2006’, 2006
19
Finland
Netherlands
United Kingdom
Korea
France
Australia
Belgium
Ireland
Poland

Tackling educational inequality
The Vocational Alternative
We should also be cautious about over promoting the ‘vocational
alternative’. Politicians have long talked of ’parity of esteem’ between
vocational and academic qualifications, but the labour market has never
granted that parity. The detailed reasons for this are beyond the scope
of this report; but one explanation, borne out by business and industry
surveys, is the widespread assumption among employers that pupils
who go down the GNVQ route cannot be relied upon to be literate and
numerate. In this respect, the government’s plans to retain an emphasis
on literacy and numeracy within the reformed GNVQ programmes should
be welcomed. Nonetheless, there is a long way to go before employers
will see vocational qualifications as a guarantee of basic levels of
literacy and numeracy.
Wider Costs to Society
Educational failure incurs significant social costs which extend well
beyond the workplace. KPMG has estimated that the total cost (in terms
of consequences for welfare, health and crime up to the age of 37) associated
with a single pupil failing to learn how to read in primary school
is between £45,000 and £53,000. 10 This provides a useful context in
which to consider the funding proposals in part 3.
20

Tackling educational inequality
Endnotes
1 BBC News, ‘Schools seek new qualifications’, 25 August 2006.
2 Key Stage 4 target is taken as 5+ A* to C; note that new ‘gold standard’ includes English and
mathematics GCSEs.
3 Although these figures combine two distinct groups of failing schools – those identified by Ofsted
and those identified by the DfES – no school appears in more than one segment in the chart. The
‘low attaining’ figure excludes those in Ofsted categories; low-attaining primary schools are only
those persistently below the Key Stage 2 target. The underperforming figure excludes those in
Ofsted and low-attaining categories, and those receiving Excellence in Cities funding. Data uses pre
September 2006 categories.
4 NAO and DfES, ‘Improving poorly performing schools in England’, January 2006
5 CVA (contextual value added) predicts what a given child’s attainment should be based on the
attainment of other children with similar prior attainment and similar backgrounds. The CVA score
is the difference between the predicted outcome and the actual results.
6 Special schools and Pupil Referral Units.
7 DfES, ‘Youth cohort survey’, 2006.
8 KPMG, ‘The long term costs of literacy difficulties’, December 2006.
9 HM Treasury/The Leitch Review of Skills, ‘Skills in the UK: The long-term challenge (Interim Report)’,
December 2005.
10 KPMG, ‘The long term costs of literacy difficulties’, December 2006.
21

Tackling educational inequality
:
2. Understanding the drivers of
educational performance
Since the 1980s, discussion of educational performance has largely
focused on school level variables, such as teaching, governance and
organisational models, and curriculum. Each of these is important, but
the emphasis on them has tended to crowd out discussion of important
pupil level variables. 1
The first major study of school effectiveness, the Coleman Report of
1966, concluded that the home environment was more important to
educational achievement than the quality of the school. Coleman found
that school factors accounted for only 10 per cent of the variation in
student achievement between schools.
The Coleman findings have been subject to challenge and revision but
have broadly stood the test of time. 2 Two recent studies estimated that
variation in pupil intake explains between 80 and 90 per cent of the
differences between schools. 3 To accept these findings is not in any
way to diminish the importance of good teaching – quite the opposite.
As more examples of ‘high poverty, high performance’ schools emerge,
and as best practice spreads, so the relative weight of school effectiveness
variables will rise. But it is important first to understand the nature
of pupil level problems in order to identify and spread good practice at
the school level. The policy implications which flow from this analysis
will be addressed in parts 3 and 4.
2.1 PUPIL LEVEL VARIABLES
Educational failure is correlated with a number of interconnected pupil
characteristics. These are set out below.
Socioeconomic Status
A considerable body of research has demonstrated the persistence of a
positive correlation between educational attainment and socioeconomic
status (SES). 4 By the age of six, children with a low SES who performed
well in early tests (at 22 months) have been overtaken by higher
SES children who performed less well in early tests (see figure 13).
22

Tackling educational inequality
Moreover, the gap between high SES/high ability and low SES/high ability
pupils widens as the pupils reach ten years of age.
Recent figures from the education department confirm the strong correlation
between SES and educational attainment. For example, those with
eligibility for free school meals (FSM) do considerably worse than their
classmates at Key Stage 4 (see figure 14). 5
Figure 13: Average rank of test scores, by parents’ SES
and early rank position
High SES, high rank
Low SES, low rank
100
Low SES, high rank
High SES, low rank
Average position in distribution
80
60
40
20
0
22
42
60
120
Age (months)
Source: L Feinstein, ‘Inequality in the early cognitive development of British children in the
1970 cohort’, Economica, 70(1), 2003
Figure 14: Percentage of pupils with five good GCSEs, by
FSM status, 2006
Non-FSM FSM
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
5 A* to C
5 A* to C including E&M
Source: DfES, ‘National curriculum assessment, GCSE and equivalent attainment and post-16
attainment by pupil characteristics in England 2005/06 (provisional)’, December 2006
23

Tackling educational inequality
Figure 15: Attainment of pupils with FSM, relative to
baseline attainment of non-deprived girls, 2006
Non-FSM girls
FSM girls
Non-FSM boys
FSM boys
100
80
%
60
40
Key Stage 1 Key Stage 2
Source: DfES/CentreForum, 2006
Key Stage 3
Key Stage 4
The relationship between SES and relative attainment grows stronger as
pupils progress through school. Figure 15 (above) compares the national
attainment at Key Stages 1-4 for boys and girls, according to whether
pupils are eligible for FSM. The gap between FSM and non-FSM attainment
rises progressively over time.
It is crucial to understand how SES influences educational attainment
to gain a better understanding of how best to fund, and teach, deprived
school children.
Parental income
One way of looking at the issue is to explore the direct correlation
between parental income and levels of attainment. 6 Many recent studies
have concluded that it is the effects of permanent income that is
significant. In other words, it is not immediate cash flow that affects
attainment, but the long term factors associated with having a higher
household income, such as family background and parental education.
These help to produce important intellectual and social skills, as well
high expectations of, and interest in, education. All of these are key
to immediate educational success and to further sustained progress in
education and in employment. 7
24

Tackling educational inequality
Parental education
Parental education is an important predictor of children’s educational
success. This is partly a result of genetic inheritance. However, figure
13 above shows how quickly the influence of early IQ can be outweighed
by a person’s socioeconomic status.
The link between the educational accomplishments of parents and
those of their children underlines the degree to which high attainment
within families creates a self-sustaining cycle of success. Higher levels
of education usually mean higher earnings, and greater parental income
has the above-mentioned benefits for pupils’ educational attainment. 8
Higher levels of education also mean a lower risk of long term unemployment,
early childbearing and early dissolution of partnerships, drug
addiction and involvement in crime. 9 This virtuous circle can, of course,
turn in the opposite direction, to devastating effect: if a parent has a low
level of education, there is an increased risk of children growing up in an
environment characterised by one or more of these associated problems,
which in turn make low attainment more likely.
Higher parental education has also been identified as a form of ‘cultural’
or ‘social’ capital. 10 Higher social capital results in parenting styles
which are more conducive to higher educational attainment. Research
has found that parental involvement in a child’s education is closely
Figure 16: Predicted probability of having no
qualifications, by parental involvement at age 11
80
70
60
50
Mother
Father
%
40
30
20
10
0
Low
Moderate
Level of parental involvement
High
Source: D Hango, 2005
25

Tackling educational inequality
associated with the child’s attainment. 11 A study by Feinstein and
Symons found that active parental involvement was the most powerful
predictor of achievement at 16 years of age. 12 This does not suggest
that parents’ interest in their child’s education is determined by their
SES; rather that the quality of parental involvement is higher amongst
parents with higher levels of education. 13
Finally, well educated parents are better able to ‘work the system’ – visit
schools, ask the right questions, interact with teachers, prepare children
for tests, help with homework and so on. This makes it more likely that
such parents will choose, and gain access to, the best schools, and in
turn ensure that their children will prosper once there.
Location and concentrated poverty
Location also plays a part in educational disadvantage. When a lack
of employment opportunities combines with other demographic and
neighbourhood factors, the consequences for children’s educational
prospects can be devastating. Unemployment ‘black spots’ still remain
heavily concentrated in industrial cities in the North and the midlands. 14
Post industrial economic changes have not just been felt in terms of the
loss of income, with its detrimental effect on educational attainment,
but also in terms of aspiration and educational culture. For generations,
people from ’blue collar’ backgrounds had reliable employment opportunities
in the manufacturing and mining industries. This meant that
educational attainment was not critical to employment prospects – a
perspective which is sometimes difficult to reverse. 15
Figure 17: Secondary schools under special measures,
by Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD) decile at Local
Authority level, 2006
35
30
25
20
%
15
10
5
0
Poorest
decile
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
Richest
decile
Source: Ofsted, July 2006; DCLG, IMD 2006
26

Tackling educational inequality
Location can also influence educational attainment via ‘peer effects’ and
‘neighbourhood effects’ at school. The composition of a school’s intake
can have a significant impact on attainment. 16 The government’s Social
Exclusion Unit found that secondary schools in the “worst neighbourhoods”
have five times the average number of schools in the Ofsted
”serious weaknesses” category. Figure 17 (above) demonstrates the
strong correlation between area deprivation and the location of schools
in special measures.
The problem is compounded by the fact that those areas with the highest
proportions of young people without any qualifications have often
been found to have the fewest teachers available – an issue which is
returned to in section 3. 17
Special Educational Needs
Given that special educational needs (SEN) are defined by learning difficulties,
it is unsurprising that there is a strong relationship between SEN
and attainment. The data implies that the impact of SEN on attainment
strengthens after Key Stage 1 and is maintained through to Key Stage 4.
The attainment gaps in figure 18 show how the effects of SEN on attainment
build as pupils progress through school.
Figure 18: Attainment of pupils with SEN and with FSM,
relative to baseline attainment of non-deprived girls, 2006
Non-FSM girls
FSM girls
SEN girls
Non-FSM boys
FSM boys
SEN boys
% of pupils achieving required level
100
80
60
40
20
Key Stage 1 Key Stage 2 Key Stage 3 Key Stage 4
Source: Data from DfES, 2006. Note that these patterns are indicative: as past data on
these pupil characteristics is not available, the analysis does not follow a cohort but takes
different sets of pupils in one year. The same applies to similar graphs below.
27

Tackling educational inequality
But what is more significant than the correlation between SEN and
low attainment is the clear evidence of a strong relationship between
SEN and socioeconomic background. In 2006, pupils with SEN were
more than twice as likely to be eligible for free school meals as those
without.
It is possible to isolate the link between special educational needs and
deprivation by breaking down different types of SEN. Research has
found that Moderate Learning Difficulty and Behavioural, Emotional and
Social Difficulties categories are the two types of need most strongly
associated with deprivation. Together, they account for over half of
pupils with SEN provided for by School Action Plus (those pupils requiring
specialist support for their learning difficulties) or with a statement.
Deprived pupils with special educational needs are 2 to 2.4 times as
likely to have moderate learning difficulties or emotional and social difficulties,
compared with pupils with SEN overall. 18 Many pupils with SEN,
perhaps the majority, are therefore likely to have underlying educational
needs that directly relate to deprivation. 19
Figure 19: Correlation between FSM and SEN in London
secondary schools, 2005
80
% of pupils with SEN
(with and without statements)
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
R 2 =0.3765
0
0 20 40 60 80 100
Source: DfES, London Challenge, 2006
% of pupils known to be eligible for FSM
Ethnicity
As figure 20 shows, Indian and East Asian pupils have persistently
outperformed all other ethnic groups, including White British pupils at
GCSE.
However, the inclusion of some rather broad ethnic groupings in this
chart tends to oversimplify the real picture. A breakdown of such
28

Tackling educational inequality
categories by country of origin produces a more nuanced picture. 20 For
instance, not only do Black Caribbean children perform differently to
Black African children, but when the (relatively low attaining) Black African
ethnic group is broken down, further differences emerge (see figure
21). Nigerians, for example, achieve above the national average. 21
While much of the literature has focused on the attainment of minority
ethnic groups, the data increasingly shows a problem with the
performance of White British pupils. White British pupils to be the worst
performing category of pupils on FSM. White British pupils overall also
under perform by the end of Key Stage 4, relative to pupils with similar
prior attainment. And a report by Wilson et al demonstrated that all ethnic
minority groups made greater progress than White British students over
secondary schooling once pupil poverty was accounted for. 22
Figure 20: Attainment of five or more A* to C grade
GCSEs, 1992 to 2004
Other Asian
White
Black
80
Indian
Pakistani
Bangladeshi
70
60
%
50
40
30
20
10
1992
1994
1996
1998
2000
2002
2004
Source: DfES, ‘Youth cohort study’, 2004
Figure 21: Black African pupils achieving 5+ A* to C
GCSEs, 2003
60
national average
50
40
%
30
20
10
0
Black Somali
Black Ghanaian
Black Nigerian
Source: DfES, ‘Ethnicity and education’, 2006
29

Tackling educational inequality
Ethnicity and deprivation
Figure 22 shows how deprivation affects the attainment of different
ethnic groups. For all ethnic groups, deprivation, as measured by free
school meals, is linked to underperformance. Moreover, for all deprived
ethnic groups shown (except Bangladeshi pupils), the attainment gap
widens as pupils progress through school.
Ethnicity and language
There is a general assumption that language problems amongt immigrant
communities act as a barrier to attainment. Indeed, English as an
Additional Language (EAL) forms part of the basis for the allocation of
deprivation funding. However, overall attainment data shown in figure
23 reveals that the initial disadvantage of English not being a pupil’s
‘mother tongue’, is overcome by later years. In fact, girls with EAL overtake
both the overall national average and non-EAL pupils’ attainment
levels by Key Stage 3. Thus, with appropriate support, the language
barrier is not a permanent one.
Ethnicity and behaviour
Behavioural problems are most clearly indicated by exclusion rates.
Prolonged periods of exclusion are highly detrimental to pupils’ educational
prospects.
Exclusion rates reveal a clear pattern along ethnic lines, with pupils of
Caribbean descent reporting much higher permanent exclusion rates
(see figure 24). Although rates have fallen since 1997, Black Caribbean
pupils were still three times more likely to be permanently excluded than
White British pupils in 2005, and almost twice as likely to be excluded
for a fixed period. More worryingly, these figures are suspected to
be underestimates, due to ‘unofficial’ exclusions – when parents are
‘advised’ to remove their child from a school in order to minimise the
school’s official rates. 23
30

Tackling educational inequality
Figure 22: Attainment by FSM status, relative to baseline
attainment of all pupils, 2006
All non-FSM Bangladeshi FSM Pakistani FSM
Black Caribbean FSM Black African FSM White FSM
120
100
All
%
80
60
40
Reading
English
English
5 good GCSEs
KS1
KS2
KS3
KS4
Source: Data from DfES, 2006
Figure 23: Attainment gaps by language status, relative
to baseline attainment by all pupils, 2006
All non-EAL
All EAL
120
EAL girls
EAL boys
110
100
All
90
80
Reading
English
English
5 good GCSEs
KS1
KS2
KS3
KS4
Source: Data from DfES, 2006
31

Tackling educational inequality
Figure 24: Permanent exclusions by ethnicity, 2004/05
0.5
% of school population
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0.0
White British
Irish
Any other White background
White and Black African
White and Black Caribbean
White and Asian
Any other mixed background
Indian
Pakistani
Bangladeshi
Any other Asian background
Black Caribbean
Black African
Any other Black background
Chinese
England
average
Source: DfES, ‘Permanent and fixed period exclusions from schools and exclusion appeals
in England, 2004/05’, 2006. Excludes data for Traveller of Irish heritage and Gypsy/Roma
categories due to small numbers recorded.
Gender
Girls are now significantly outperforming boys at GCSE across all ethnicities.
As noted previously, even girls for whom English is an additional
language, who lag behind average pupil attainment at Key Stage 1, have
overtaken the average by Key Stage 4. EAL boys, by contrast, still lag
behind the average.
Opinion as to why girls tend to do better at school than boys varies.
Some suggest it is because they are better at applying themselves,
others that they fear disapproval and punishment more.
Given that boys are nearly four times as likely as girls to be permanently
excluded, it seems reasonable to assume that behaviour is key. A longterm
University of Cambridge/DfES research project on raising boys’
achievement included a pilot project with four primary schools. It was
found that early intervention strategies that targeted motivation, behaviour
and self-esteem significantly helped to reduce disruptive behaviour
and disengagement from education amongst boys.
32

Tackling educational inequality
Family structure
The potential effects of family structure and the educational risks
associated with step parenthood, lone parenthood, divorce, and marital
conflict are clear. Children of divorced parents are much more likely to
be educationally disadvantaged. The psychological impact on the child is
associated with other effects that have an indirect impact on attainment
such as behavioural problems, health problems, criminal activity, early
pregnancy and lone parenthood, each of which damages job prospects
and ‘life chances’. 24 These can have long term effects and damage job
prospects. Lone parent households are more likely to have lower skill
profiles, and therefore less likely to have well-paid secure jobs. Lone
parents are therefore more likely to live in poverty and experience persistent
low income, which is itself strongly correlated with children’s lower
educational attainment, as demonstrated above. 25 Children of divorced
parents are more likely to leave school at 16 without qualifications than
children of married biological parents. 26 A Joseph Rowntree Foundation
report estimates that “many adverse outcomes are roughly twice as
prevalent among children of divorced families compared with children
from intact families”. 27
Prior Attainment
Prior attainment is, unsurprisingly, one of the best indicators of attainment
at later stages. According to 2003 DfES statistics, prior attainment
accounted for 62 per cent, 73 per cent, and 69 per cent of variation in
pupil attainment at Key Stages 2, 3, and 4 (GCSEs) respectively. At the
school level, prior attainment has the strongest correlation of any variable
with attainment at GCSE (see section on prior attainment below).
33

Tackling educational inequality
2.2 PUPIL LEVEL VARIABLES AT THE SCHOOL
LEVEL
All of these risk factors, when aggregated at the school level, impact on
school performance. The more children there are in a school who display
one or more of these characteristics, the more likely it is that the school
will be categorised as underperforming.
Deprivation
There is a strong relationship between the eligibility of the pupil intake
for free school meals and overall school performance. A recent National
Audit Office report found that schools with a high proportion of pupils
eligible for FSM were on average 2.7 times more likely than a school
with a low proportion to be in an Ofsted category. The school level
correlation between deprivation and attainment is shown for London
schools below. The effect of deprivation appears to be stronger at
secondary than primary school.
Figure 25 shows a more detailed school level analysis of the effect of
deprivation in schools on Key Stage 2 attainment. There is a clear and
consistent relationship between the two, with lower shares of pupils
reaching expected standards in more deprived schools compared to less
deprived schools. 28
Figure 25: Key Stage 2 attainment by FSM eligibility, in
London schools, 2005
100
80
% of pupils achieving
level 4+ in English
60
40
R 2 =0.313
20
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
% of pupils eligible for FSM
Source: DfES, ‘Families of Schools’, London Challenge, 2006
34

Tackling educational inequality
Figure 26: 5+ A* to C grade GCSEs in London secondary
schools, by FSM, 2005
100
% of 15 yr olds with 5+ A* to C
grade at GCSE and equivalent
80
60
40
20
R 2 =0.3573
0
0 20 40 60 80 100
Source: DfES, 2006
% of pupils known to be eligible for FSM
Figure 27: Share of pupils with level 4+ by school FSM
band, 2005
English
Maths
Science
100
90
80
%
70
60
50
Up to 5%
5-10%
10-15%
15-20%
20-30%
30-40%
40% +
FSM eligibility band
Source: DfES, National Curriculum Assessments at Key Stage 2 and Key Stage 1 to Key
Stage 2 value added measures for England, 2004/05 (final), June 2006
35

Tackling educational inequality
Special Educational Needs
School level data shows a significant correlation between schools with
high percentages of pupils with SEN and low levels of attainment. The
NAO found that schools with a high proportion of pupils with SEN were
2.3 times more likely to be in an Ofsted category than those with low
shares of pupils with SEN. In April 2006, all the schools under special
measures had lower than average GCSE attainment and higher than
average pupil shares with SEN. Figures 28 and 29 show this relationship
for schools in London. As with FSM, the relationship between SEN and
attainment markedly strengthens from Key Stage 2 to Key Stage 4. The
correlation with Key Stage 4 attainment is only slightly higher for SEN
(which is specifically related to learning difficulties) than for FSM.
36

Tackling educational inequality
Figure 28: Key Stage 2 attainment by SEN, in London
schools, 2005
100
% of pupils achieving
level 4+ in English
80
60
40
R 2 =0.1793
20
0 10 20 30 40 50 60
Source: DfES, 2006
% of pupils with SEN (with and without statements)
Figure 29: 5 good GCSEs by SEN, in London schools, 2005
100
% achieving 5+ A* to C GCSEs
80
60
40
20
R 2 =0.404
0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70
Source: DfES, 2006
% with SEN (with and without statements)
37

Tackling educational inequality
Language (EAL)
As was seen in the discussion of pupil level variables, the correlation
between EAL and attainment is marginal compared to that with deprivation
(measured by free school meals) or special educational needs. This
is borne out by figures 30 and 31 which show a low correlation between
school attainment and share of pupils with EAL for London primary and
secondary schools in 2005.
Figure 30: Key Stage 2 attainment by EAL, in London
schools, 2005
100
% of pupils achieving
level 4+ in English
80
60
40
R 2 =0.0835
20
0 20 40 60 80 100
Source: DfES, 2006
% of pupils with EAL
Figure 31: 5 good GCSEs in London schools, by EAL, 2005
% of 15 year olds achieving
5+ A* to C GCSEs and equivalents
100
80
60
40
20
R 2 =0.0652
0
0 20 40 60 80 100
Source: DfES, 2006
% of pupils with EAL
38

Tackling educational inequality
Prior attainment
Prior attainment has the strongest correlation of any variable to secondary
school performance at GCSE. Analysis by London Challenge, which
divided London secondary schools into bands based on Key Stage 2
attainment, showed a strong correlation between prior attainment and
GCSE results.
Figure 32: 5+ A* to C grade GCSEs including English
and maths in London secondary schools, by prior
attainment, 2005
100
% of pupils achieving 5+ GCSEs
including English and maths
80
60
40
20
R 2 =0.7898
0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Prior attainment 2005
Source: London Challenge
The importance of prior attainment emphasises the vital need to improve
results at an early stage and should point the way to greater policy focus
on the early years of education. 29
2.3 SCHOOL LEVEL VARIABLES
The last two decades have seen a sharp improvement in the quality of
school assessments, helping to provide a much better understanding of
the impact of school level variables.
Despite the findings of Coleman, Chevalier and others, with regard to
the overall dominance of pupil level variables, closer empirical research
and qualitative observations in Ofsted reports show that effectiveness
can still vary considerably between schools, even when controlling for
pupil intake. It is also probable that the relative importance attributed
to school level variables will grow with greater understanding of ‘what
works’. One of the most significant initiatives in this respect is Project
Follow Through:
39

Tackling educational inequality
Project Follow Through
Project Follow Through (FT) remains the world’s largest educational
experiment, running from 1967 to 1995 and costing
approximately $1 billion. FT planned to evaluate whether the
poorest schools in America could be brought up to a level comparable
with mainstream America. 30 The study comprehensively
demonstrated that school level factors – specifically curriculum
and teaching quality – can overcome the educational disadvantages
inherent in deprivation.
The project focused on over 75,000 low income children from
kindergarten to grade 3 (nine years old) and funded 22 very
different educational programmes in 51 school districts with
a disproportionate number of poor children. Standardised test
results were collected from almost 10,000 children as well as from
a control group. 31 The results from the project were suppressed
in the 1970s because they did not support contemporary pedagogical
trends. However, they demonstrated that the use of a
teaching model which used systematic and direct instructional
methods increased both attainment and other qualities such as
confidence, behaviour and self-esteem, and that these effects
were sustained throughout high school. This model, known as
the ‘direct instructional’ model provides a systematic ways of
determining whether children have the prerequisite skills before
a new step in learning is undertaken. It stresses basic skills and
breaks them down into mini components. Children learn to read,
for example, by learning the sounds of the letters before the
letter names. They master each skill before moving onto the next
one and teachers track each student’s progress on daily charts.
They also track behaviour, encouraging good conduct with
praise and largely ignoring bad behaviour. Using this method,
the model was able to achieve a major goal of ‘compensatory’
education: it improved the academic performance of economically
disadvantaged children to (or near to) median national levels
(compared with the expected 20th percentile levels expected of
disadvantaged pupils). 32
Research in the UK also concludes that the quality of schooling does
matter. Two of the most influential English studies on school effectiveness
concluded that schools can have a significant impact on children’s
outcomes, particularly at the primary level. 33 For example, after controlling
for prior attainment and pupil factors, it was found that the school
attended accounted for 9 per cent of the variance in reading attainment
40

Tackling educational inequality
in three years and 11 per cent of the variance in maths attainment. In
secondary education the school accounted for 10 per cent of the variance
in attainment and pupil factors accounted for 33 per cent. The
section below examines the principal school level variables.
Funding
The relative homogeneity of school budgets impedes a conclusive evaluation
of the varying impact of resources at school level. Nonetheless,
given the current government’s high levels of spending on education,
it is important to consider the relationship between resources and
attainment. In essence, the evidence suggests that above a certain
threshold, untargeted spending does not have a significant impact on
pupil outcomes.
The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) tests in
2003 permit an overview of aggregate spending across countries. The
graph below compares scores on the PISA tests with the spending of
nations (adjusted to achieve parity of purchasing power). Countries are
ranked in terms of the average score on the PISA tests, with Finland as
the highest performer, and the height of the bars indicates spending.
Except for the developing countries, which both spend noticeably less
than the others and perform noticeably lower, there is little association
between spending and performance.
Figure 33: Analysis of spending and test performance
12000
Spending per student (US$)
10000
8000
6000
4000
2000
0
Finland
Korea
Japan
Canada
Netherlands
Australia
Belgium
Switzerland
Czech Republic
Sweden
Ireland
France
Iceland
Germany
Austria
Poland
Denmark
Norway
United States
Hungary
Slovak Republic
Spain
Italy
Russian Federation
Portugal
Greece
Turkey
Uruguay
Thailand
Mexico
Brazil
Indonesia
Tunisia
Source: E Hanushek and F Welch (eds.), ’Handbook of the Economics of Education’, vol.2,
2006
41

Tackling educational inequality
However, analysis of aggregate performance data of this kind is subject
to a variety of problems. The PISA data is itself subject to challenge
because of the selective participation or even non participation of some
countries (notably the UK). The data looks at countries on an aggregate
basis, rather than comparing school outcomes, and any relationship
between resources and student achievement might be distorted by other
cultural influences on performance.
A more nuanced picture emerges, specifically in relation to the UK,
from the 2005 DfES/HM Treasury report, ’Child poverty: fair funding for
schools’. The report examined the extent to which deprivation funding
could be used to bridge the gap between disadvantaged pupils and their
peers. The conclusions were compelling:
: While additional educational spending has a positive, if relatively
modest impact on overall pupil attainment, the impact of
the extra spending becomes increasingly important the higher
the level of deprivation.
: Overall, an increase in spending per pupil of £1,000 is associated
with 1.32 extra GCSE points. 34
: For the least deprived third of schools no statistically significant
relationship at all was found between resources and attainment.
However, for the most deprived third of schools, an increase of
£1,000 per pupil resulted in an extra 1.92 points at GCSE.
A second study, carried out for the education department by the Centre
for the Economics of Education (CEE) in 2005, supported these conclusions.
It found that the impact of a marginal increase in spending was
three times as great for maths and four times as great for science when
spent on FSM pupils.
Clearly the benefits from the extra spending will decline as spending
increases. However it is also evident from the research that while there
is little benefit to be expected from further increases in real term spending
on the most affluent third of pupils the benefits from extra spending
on the more deprived pupils have not yet been fully exploited. This
evidence argues for a greater variation of spending budgets between
schools according to the relative deprivation of their pupil intakes.
42

Tackling educational inequality
Teacher Quality
Salaries make up a large proportion of school education expenditure and
research suggests that teachers are the most important school specific
factor in influencing pupil attainment. Indeed, one study suggests that
at least 7.5 per cent of variation in attainment is due to individual
teachers. 35
The importance of teacher quality
Studies in America of the effects of teachers at the classroom level
using the Tennessee Value Added Assessment System (which measures
students’ academic gains over time) have found that teacher
effectiveness is a strong determinant of differences in student learning,
far outweighing the effects of differences in class size. Students who
are assigned to several ineffective teachers in a row have significantly
lower achievement – and gains in achievement – than those who are
assigned to several highly effective teachers in sequence. One study
found that pupils given a good teacher can learn a full grade level more
than students with an ineffective teacher. 36
Similarly, an analysis of nearly 900 Texas school districts found that
combined measures of teachers’ expertise – scores on a licensing
exam, level of qualification and experience – accounted for more of
the inter-district variation in students’ reading and maths achievement
(and attainment gains) in grades 1 to 11 than student socioeconomic
status. An additional, smaller contribution to student achievement was
made by lower pupil-teacher ratios and smaller schools in the elementary
grades. 37
Assessing teacher quality
However, there is little consensus among researchers on what makes a
‘good’ teacher. Factors presumed to be indicative of teachers’ competence
include:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Measures of academic ability
Years of education
Years of teaching experience
Measures of subject matter and teaching knowledge
Certification status
Teaching behaviour in the classroom
Teaching experience is deemed important, but studies generally find
that experience is a strong influence on student attainment only when
43

Tackling educational inequality
comparing teachers in the first two years of their career with those
having more than two years experience. 38 It is worth noting that this
evidence of a weak relationship between experience and pupil outcomes
points to a possible misalignment of rewards and teaching effectiveness
in the existing pay scales.
Teacher qualifications appear to be a more critical factor in helping determine
quality. One comprehensive study in the US found that students
in states which demand high levels of qualification from teachers (so
that more than 80 per cent of high school teachers had fully met state
certification and had at least majored in their field) typically scored at
the top of the distribution on national assessments of pupils’ reading and
maths scores, while states with a low proportion of well qualified teachers
fell in the bottom quartile of these assessments. Likewise, an Israeli
programme found that some measures of teachers’ education quality,
such as quality of college education, were positively correlated with
teachers’ quality as measured by student performance. 39
While research in this area is mostly US based, the findings are likely
to be applicable to the UK. Teachers with high quality qualifications
and demonstrable in-depth subject knowledge can be associated with
increases in student achievement.
School Leadership
According to Maurice Smith, head of Ofsted and Chief Inspector of
Schools, the head teacher is the single most important driver of valueadded
in a school. 40 This assertion is supported by numerous Ofsted
reports and individual case studies, one of which is cited below.
This has proved much more difficult to substantiate empirically. A recent
Policy Exchange report found that: “head teachers generally have little
impact on the academic learning and attitudes of pupils during at least
the first five years of their employment.” The same report, however
suggests good heads can make a difference, but only if given the freedom
to do so. In the government’s efforts to ensure uniformity and
stability the bureaucratisation of schools has meant head teachers have
a huge amount of paperwork and red tape to negotiate, stifling their ability
to implement far-reaching changes. In addition, it takes a great deal
of time to lay the foundation of success, with improved results coming
only after seven or more years. 41
Case Study
Park Community School, Hampshire
Park Community School is a good example not only of the power
of outstanding leadership, but also of just how long it takes
44

Tackling educational inequality
to turn around a failing school. Sean Dickinson was appointed
head teacher in 1996 when the school became one of the first
generation of schools to be put on special measures. The school
is situated in Leigh Park, Hampshire, serving one of the largest
public sector housing estates in Europe, an area of relatively high
socioeconomic disadvantage. Over a quarter of pupils are eligible
for free school meals, and two thirds of pupils at the end of Key
Stage 4 are assessed as having some form of special educational
needs. Pupils enter the school “significantly below” the national
average; in 2001, almost a third of Year 7 pupils (aged 11) had
a reading age below eight. 42
When the school received its 2001 Ofsted inspection, it was
removed from the Special Measures category, citing “good
progress made in raising standards”. By its next Ofsted inspection
in 2006 the school was cited as Outstanding for “achievement
and standards”, “monitoring and evaluation” and key aspects of
leadership and management.
Although progress was apparent in the value-added data at an
early stage, it is only in the past three to four years that the
improvements have really translated into absolute attainment
data:
Figure 34: Park Community School — five A*-C at GCSE
and equivalent
80
70
60
50
%
40
30
20
10
0
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
Source: DfES, 2007
The time it took to achieve such impressive attainment rates
reflects not only the inevitable challenges of turning around a
large institution, but also the low attainment levels of “inherited”
45

Tackling educational inequality
cohorts coming through the school and the continued very low
attainment of the new pupil intake.
The most important factors behind the school’s achievements,
according to Ofsted, are outstanding leadership (“successes to
date have hinged principally on the drive of the head teacher”),
alongside effective systems for monitoring and supporting pupils
and a relentless focus on raising standards (the head teacher’s
mantra is “pushing pupils in their learning until they can push
themselves”).
Some argue that an emphasis on leadership could come at the expense
of good management. A school’s performance should not be reliant on
one individual, but should be indicative of a wider system of support,
embodied through organisational structures and teacher quality. What
is needed therefore are good management structures, with greater and
clearer distribution of leadership responsibilities, rather than the current
emphasis on transformational leaders who are, by definition, exceptional.
Overall, Searle and Tymms, who conducted the quantitative analysis for
Policy Exchange, argue that factors such as ethos, culture of learning
and especially staff quality are the critical factors in determining how
a school performs. Probably the most important strategy headteachers
can adopt is to make sure that there is a good and clear management
structure, with good teachers in the classrooms.
Class Sizes
Another high profile debate about school effectiveness has focused on
the issue of class size. Teachers and school staff, with considerable
support from parents, have increasingly argued that class size has a
significant impact on the effectiveness of their work. There is an intuitive
logic to this claim, but empirical research has not led to a consensus
on the issue.
Support for reducing class sizes primarily comes from US studies
– particularly the Student/Teacher Achievement Ratio (STAR) four year
pilot in Tennessee, beginning in 1984, and the Prime Time pilot in Indiana,
beginning in 1981. Analysis of the STAR project concluded that
reductions in class size did benefit pupils’ attainment. 43 Comparatively,
there was little high quality UK specific work in this area at the time,
despite the subsequent 1997 Labour government commitment to reducing
class sizes to 30 or under for 5, 6 and 7 year olds.
Considering the large financial implications of reducing class sizes, it is
important to ascertain exactly how smaller classes might have a signifi-
46

Tackling educational inequality
cant positive impact on pupil attainment. The most consistent outcome
of studies is that small classes are most effective at the earliest year
(age five) or years of schooling – it is a preventative measure rather than
a remedial one. 44 The advantages of small classes have also been found
to be strongest for lowest attaining pupils upon school entry. That said,
there appears to be no single ‘optimum’ class size – this varies according
to subject and prior attainment.
Finally, research suggests that better preparation and improved teacher
training is needed to devise an appropriate model for effective learning
in smaller classes. 45 As one report says: “The benefits of having fewer
children will not necessarily follow. Teachers have to work just as hard
to manage learning effectively.” 46 Instead, the effect of class size is
mediated by the processes involved in learning and teaching, such as
pupil-teacher interaction, within-class groupings, managing behaviour
and attention, and the classroom environment. Researchers have
suggested that appropriate teaching methods will vary — small classes
may be conducive to particular subjects or pupils, but not others. What
is more, despite teachers citing smaller classes as an opportunity to use
more effective teaching styles, evidence suggests that many do not
adapt their teaching pattern when actually faced with smaller classes
in practice. 47
2.4 CONCLUSION
It is understandable that government education reforms have focused in
recent times on school specific and structural factors as these provide
easier levers for politicians to pull. However, the evidence shows that
pupil level variables are still the most important drivers of educational
outcomes. FSM, SEN, prior attainment, and increasingly, gender, are of
particular importance. This argues for new and creative thinking about
ways to address pupil level variables, particularly in relation to the underperformance
of pupils from deprived backgrounds. Reform, then, must
seek to provide more support for disadvantaged children and those who
teach them, whilst simultaneously improving teaching methods.
47

Tackling educational inequality
Endnotes
1 D Gillborn and C Gipps, ‘Recent research on the achievements of ethnic minority pupils’, 1996.
2 E Hanushek, ‘Conclusions and controversies about the effectiveness of school resources’, Economic
Policy Review, March 1998.
3 H Luyten, ‘Stability of school effects in Dutch secondary education: the impact of variance across
subjects and years’, International Journal of Educational Research, vol. 21 (2), 1994; A Chevalier
and P Dolton, ‘The labour market for teachers’, in S Machin and A Vignoles (eds.), ‘What’s the
good of education The economics of education in the UK’, 2005.
4 J Bynner and H Joshi, ‘Equality and opportunity in education: evidence from the 1958 and 1970
birth cohort studies’, Oxford Review of Education, vol. 28 (4), 2002.
5 FSM is acknowledged as being a crude indicator for SES.
6 Y Shavit and H Blossfeld , ‘Persistent inequality. Changing educational attainment in thirteen countries’,
Westview Press, 1993.
7 P Caneiro and J Heckman, ‘Human capital policy’, NBER, 2003; L Dearden et al, ‘The role of credit
constraints in educational choices’, Centre for the Economics of Education (CEE) discussion paper
no. 48, December 2004; A Aakvik ‘Educational attainment and family background’, Blackwell,
2005.
8 OECD, ‘Education at a glance’, 2005; B Sianesi and J Van Reenen, ‘The returns to education: a
review of the macroeconomic literature’, CEE discussion paper no. 6, 2000.
9 J Bynner et al, ‘Revisiting the benefits of higher education’, HEFCE, 2003; J Graham and B Bowling,
‘Young people and crime’, Home Office, 1995; J Bynner, ‘Empowerment and exclusion’, in H Helve
and C Wallace (eds), ‘Youth, citizenship, and empowerment’, Ashgate Press, 2001.
10 A Sullivan,’Cultural capital and educational attainment’, Sociology vol. 35 (4), 2001; J Wilson,
‘Social skills in their proper place’, Discourse vol. 6 (2), 1986.
11 E Flouri and A Buchanan, ‘Early father’s and mother’s involvement and child’s later educational
outcomes’, British Journal of Educational Psychology, vol. 74, 2004; E Flouri, ‘Parental interest in
children’s education, children’s self-esteem and locus of control, and later educational attainment:
twenty six year follow up of the 1970 British Birth Cohort’, British Journal of Educational Psychology,
vol. 76, 2006.
12 L Feinstein and J Symons ‘Attainment in secondary school’, Oxford Economic Papers, Vol. 51,
1999.
13 D Hango, ‘Parental investment in childhood and later adult well-being’, London School of Economics
(LSE), 2005; Centre for Market and Public Organization Research Team, ‘Up to age 7: family
background and child development up to age 7 in the Avon Longitudinal Survey of parents and
children (ALSPAC)’, University of Bristol, 2006.
14 Joseph Rowntree Foundation, ‘Economic segregation in England’, 2005.
15 The Economist, ‘Leave none behind’, 27 April 2006.
16 S-L Pong, ‘Family structure, school context, and eighth-grade math and reading achievement’,
Journal of Marriage and the Family, vol. 59 (3), 1997; S Strand, ‘Pupil progress during Key Stage 1:
a value added analysis of school effects’, British Educational Research Journal, vol. 23 (4), 1997.
17 Joseph Rowntree Foundation, ‘The relationship between poverty, affluence and area’, August
2005.
18 G Lindsay et al, ‘Special educational needs and ethnicity: issues of over- and under-representation’,
Centre for Educational Development, Appraisal and Research/Institute of Education/University of
Warwick, 2006.
19 This does not mean that deprivation is the sole cause or factor associated with SEN. SEN, as
currently defined, encompasses a wide range of needs, including some which have no particular
correlation with deprivation.
20 D Gillborn and H Mirza, ‘Educational inequality: mapping race, class and gender’, Ofsted, 2000.
21 Data is from the 25 LEAs which classified 90 per cent or more of their pupils using the Black African
extended codes.
22 D Wilson, S Burgess, A Briggs, ‘The dynamics of school attainment of England’s ethnic minorities’,
CASE paper 105, 2006.
23 The Prince’s Trust, ‘The way it is’, 2002; A Osler and J Hill, ‘Exclusion from school and racial
equality: an examination of government proposals in light of recent research evidence’, Cambridge
Journal of Education, vol 29 (1), 1999.
48

Tackling educational inequality
24 K Kiernan, ’The legacy of parental divorce: social, economic and demographic experiences in childhood’,
LSE, 1997.
25 E C Cooksey, ‘Consequences of young mothers’ marital histories for children’s cognitive development’,
Journal of Marriage and the Family, vol. 59 (2), 1997; E M Smith et al, ‘An ecological model
of home, school and community partnerships: implications for research and practice’, Journal of
Educational and Psychological Consultation, vol. 8 (4), 1997.
26 J Ermisch and M Francesconi, ‘Family matters; the impact of family background on educational
achievements’, Economica, vol. 68, no. 270, 2001; D Ginther and R Pollack, ’Family structure and
children’s educational outcomes’, Demography, vol. 41 (4), 2004.
27 B Rogers and J Pryor, ‘Divorce and separation: the outcomes for children’, Joseph Rowntree Foundation,
1998.
28 DfES, ‘Education and social progress: has the social class gap narrowed in primary schools’, July
2005.
29 J Astle, ‘The surest route: early years education and life chances’, CentreForum, 2007.
30 G Adams and S Engelmann, ‘Research on Direct Instruction’, 1996.
31 B Grossen (ed.), ‘Overview: the story behind Project Follow Through’, Effective School Practices,
vol. 15 (1).
32 W Becker and S Engelmann, ‘Summary analyses of five year data on achievement and teaching
progress with 14,000 children in 20 projects. Technical Report 73-2’, unpub., available through
www.eric.ed.gov.
33 A Chevalier, et al, ‘School and teacher effectiveness,’ in S Machin and A Vignoles, ‘What’s the good
of education’ 2005.
34 DfES/Treasury, ‘Child poverty: fair funding in schools’, December 2005. GCSE points are allocated
on a sliding scale such that an A* grade is worth 8 points and a G grade is worth 1 point.
35 S Burgess et al,‘The intricacies of the relationship between pay and performance for teachers: do
teachers respond to performance related pay schemes’, CMPO Working Paper Series, July 2001.
36 E Hanushek cited in L Darling-Hammond, ‘Teacher quality and student achievement: a review of
state policy evidence’, Education policy analysis archives, vol. 8, no.1, 1 January 2000.
37 Darling-Hammond, Linda, ‘Teacher quality and student achievement: a review of state policy
evidence’, Education policy analysis archives, volume 8, no.1, 1 January 2000.
38 S Burgess et al, ‘Intricacies’, 2001.
39 V Lavy, ‘Paying for performance: the effect of teachers’ financial incentives on students’ scholastic
outcomes’, CEPR, 2003.
40 M Smith, ‘The annual report of the chief inspector of schools 2005/6’, OFSTED, 2006.
41 J O’Shaughnessy, (ed.), ‘The leadership effect’, Policy Exchange, 2007.
42 Ofsted inspection report (2001).
43 B Nye et al, ‘Do minorities experience larger lasting benefits from small classes’, Journal of Educational
Research, vol 98 (2), 2004.
44 P Blatchford et al, ‘Are class size differences related to pupils’ educational progress and classroom
processes Findings from the Institute of Education class size study of children aged 5-7 years’,
British Educational Research Journal, vol. 29 (5), October 2003.
45 P Blatchford et al, ‘Class size differences’, 2003; D Pedder, ‘Are small classes better Understanding
relationships between class size, class room processes and pupils’ learning’, Oxford Review of
Education, vol. 32 (2), May 2006.
46 P Blatchford et al, ‘Relationships between class size and teaching: a multimethod analysis of English
infant schools’, American Educational Research Journal, vol 39 (1), Spring 2002.
47 C M Achilles, ‘Let’s put kids first, finally: getting class size right’, Corwin Press, 1999; L Hargreaves
et al, ‘The effect of changes in class size on teacher-pupil interaction’, International Journal of
Educational Research, vol. 29 (8), 1998.
49

Tackling educational inequality
:
3. Support for disadvantaged
pupils
It was established in part 2 that educational outcomes are more heavily
affected by pupil level variables than school effectiveness variables.
Policymakers should give much greater recognition to this fact. The
proposal below for a ‘pupil premium’, which would allocate funding to
pupils directly based on their relative educational disadvantage, seeks to
address this issue. The pupil premium would enable more resources to
flow directly to schools with disadvantaged intakes and would for the
first time give successful schools a clear incentive to admit pupils from
deprived backgrounds.
The introduction of a properly functioning pupil premium system would
in turn pave the way for a further increase in deprivation funding. Such
an increase would allow for targeted interventions designed specifically
to raise attainment among the most disadvantaged children, such as
smaller class sizes in the first years of primary school, extended school
hours (longer school days, Saturday schools and summer programmes),
‘Hard to Serve’ bonuses for teachers and more personalised learning.
The pupil premium would operate much like a ‘weighted’ voucher
scheme – ensuring not only that funding follows the pupil, but that
more funding follows the most disadvantaged pupils. As well as giving
the families of such pupils greater purchasing power, this would also, in
time, narrow the variation in school effectiveness by raising standards in
the most challenging schools – a prerequisite for a properly functioning
choice based education system.
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Tackling educational inequality
3.1 DEPRIVATION FUNDING – THE PUPIL PREMIUM
The Case for More Deprivation Funding
In part 2 it was demonstrated that while additional educational spending
has a modest positive impact on overall pupil attainment, it has a much
greater impact when targeted at disadvantaged pupils (see section 2.3).
Overall, an increase in spending of £1,000 per pupil is associated with
1.92 extra GCSE points for the most deprived third of schools. 1
Costs and Benefits
Hitherto, deprivation funding has been justified by reference to the extra
costs incurred in educating disadvantaged pupils. The most comprehensive
assessment of these costs is contained in a PricewaterhouseCoopers
study. 2 PwC estimated that the average extra cost of schooling pupils
from more deprived backgrounds was £1,780 per pupil per annum. The
report identified the principal costs as those associated with teaching
English as an additional language, the costs of extra learning assistants
for pupils with other needs, and opportunity costs, such as the diversion
of teacher time. Another study identified higher staff turnover as an
additional cost which arises in schools with a high share of deprived
pupils. 3
PwC estimates have become the basis of the current deprivation funding
formula (see box below). However, they are explicitly only intended to
reflect the costs of certain identifiable classroom needs. They are not
directed at the extra benefits, in terms of children’s learning, which
could be derived from additional resource allocation. It is the latter
which should now be considered.
Problems with the current deprivation funding system
The DfES already operates a system of deprivation funding awards, but
the funding is intermediated through local authorities. This has resulted
in a system which is opaque and unnecessarily complex, and where the
money all too often fails to reach its intended beneficiaries.
At present, all education authorities receive a minimum level of funding
for pupils with Additional Educational Needs (AEN), which assumes that
at least 12 per cent of pupils have such needs, based on the formula
set out below.
Additional Educational Need funding
Local authorities receive specific deprivation funding through the
AEN allocation. This is intended to meet costs associated with
social deprivation, together with the costs of supporting children
51

Tackling educational inequality
with less severe special educational needs and the costs of
supporting children with English as an additional language (EAL).
There is a separate allocation for more severe special educational
needs. The calculations behind AEN funding are based on a
national formula which assumes that the typical additional costs
for a pupil with AEN are £1,460 per year (the PwC figure of
£1,780 minus certain adjustments).
Source: Pricewaterhouse Coopers, August 2002
The current AEN funding is, according to the education department,
specifically designed to compensate for the costs associated with low
level special educational needs, social deprivation and EAL. 4 However,
the method of allocating funds between local authorities is extremely
opaque. It is largely based on weighted criteria of EAL or ethnicity related
to underachievement, incidence of Working Tax Credit and income
support by locality. But it also includes an Area Cost Adjustment (ACA)
top-up, which takes account of differences in labour costs and business
rates between local authorities. In light of the freedom given to local
authorities to decide their own deprivation funding criteria, the original
DfES criteria are in any case substantially diluted by the time the funding
reaches the schools.
This spending has been ring-fenced for local authorities through the
Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) since September 2006. However, local
authorities have full discretion over how this funding is allocated to
local schools – for which they use their own deprivation funding formulae.
Apart from adding a costly and unnecessary layer of bureaucracy,
this has resulted in a situation where, according to the DfES/Treasury
Review (2005): “local authorities’ decisions on the balance of funding
between schools are not leading to deprivation funding being accurately
or consistently targeted towards schools in deprived areas.”
Local authorities use a wide range of methodologies to allocate deprivation
funding. Although free school meals entitlement remains the most
common method, other measures such as low level SEN, EAL, prior
attainment (permissible as a criterion since 2003/04), and broader measures
of deprivation, such as the index of multiple deprivation and social
security benefits data are also used.
The net result is that deprivation funding is failing to reach its intended
beneficiaries on a consistent basis (see figure 35 below). For example,
a recent analysis has demonstrated that a quarter of the best funded
affluent schools receive as much deprivation funding as the lowest
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Tackling educational inequality
Figure 35: Variation in per pupil budget share for primary
schools (by FSM)
Max
Min
20000
15000
£
10000
5000
Average
0
20-35% FSM
35-50% FSM
>50% FSM
Source: ‘Child poverty: fair funding for schools’, DfES/Treasury, December 2005
funded quarter of deprived schools. 5 Although all local authorities are
required by law to have a formula for allocating social deprivation funding
by school, at least one local authority allocates the social deprivation
component of deprivation funding on the basis of £1 each per school! 6
Lessons from abroad: the Dutch funding model
There are other ways of ensuring that deprivation funding reaches its
intended beneficiaries. In a previous CentreForum pamphlet, details were
set out of the funding model operated successfully in the Netherlands. 7
Under the Dutch system, each pupil acquires an education number on
starting school, which is used to calculate the amount of money the
school receives. The more disadvantaged a pupil’s background, the
higher his or her number. The numbers effectively act as multipliers of
basic per pupil funding.
Table 3: Dutch funding system
Background of child
Education
number
Children of immigrant parents 1.9
Children of Gypsy parents 1.7
Children of Dutch families living on canal boats 1.4
Children from poorly educated or low-skilled Dutch
families
1.25
All other children 1
Source: ‘Report for The Hague Arion Study Visit Theme’, 20-25 February 2005
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Tackling educational inequality
Pupil premium funding criteria
The education numbers and criteria used in the Dutch model are specific
to the Netherlands. Careful thought would have to be given to the criteria
which would be used to allocate a pupil premium in the UK, although
the process itself would generate a healthy debate about the relationship
between deprivation and educational outcomes. A specific recommendation
is beyond the scope of this report, however it is possible to suggest
some broad guidelines.
The UK has the advantage of a specific set of criteria, including FSM,
low level SEN, EAL and prior attainment which are already measured,
widely understood and transparent to schools, local authorities and the
DfES. The analysis in part 2 suggests that FSM and low level SEN have
a broadly similar and quite significant predictive power for pupil attainment,
with correlations to attainment.
English as a foreign language, contrary to widespread perception, has
much lower significance in terms of attainment, even at primary school.
This may reflect the effectiveness with which schools are already using
deprivation funding to deal with the extra costs of teaching English to
EAL pupils. However it certainly argues against using EAL for allocating
the additional funding which is proposed below.
Prior attainment grows in predictive power as the pupil progresses
through the school (for obvious reasons) and, by the secondary stage,
has the strongest correlation to attainment of any of the factors listed. Of
course prior attainment data is arguably a secondary factor as it reflects
a mix of many factors, which it is impossible to untangle, including
deprivation, SEN, EAL and natural ability. However, it is clearly critical
in assessing pupils for remedial learning, which will be one of the key
uses of extra deprivation funding, and so must be an important criterion
for the allocation of deprivation funding at secondary level (the DfES has
just introduced prior attainment as the most important weighted factor in
their allocation of per pupil funding for extended schools programmes).
The raw numbers would suggest that SEN and FSM should be given
broadly the same weightings. However, there is an argument that a high
weighting for SEN would encourage schools to ‘play the system’ by
seeking to classify the maximum number of pupils with SEN (a phenomenon
which some believe is already occurring).
Free school meals has the advantage of being more objective. The one
reservation about allocating a high rating to FSM is the current low
take-up, with only 79 per cent of those eligible actually using their entitlement
(see Table 4). However, the take-up problems associated with
FSM would diminish substantially if there was much more at stake.
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Tackling educational inequality
Table 4: FSM take-up in maintained school sector
Known to be
eligible
England
Taking FSM
Uptake
Maintained Nursery and
Primary schools
16.0% 670,340 13.3% 556,180 83.0%
Maintained Secondary
schools
13.6% 448,680 9.9% 328,750 73.3%
All Special schools 32.5% 29,410 27.7% 25,080 85.3%
Nursery, Primary, and
Secondary schools
14.9% 1,119,020 11.8% 884,930 79.1%
Source: DfES, ’Education and training statistics for the United Kingdom‘, December 2006
Assuming a pupil premium was modelled on the point system currently
used in Holland, this paper proposes that the highest weighting at primary
level be given to FSM, followed by SEN, with an increasing weighting
attached to prior attainment as pupils progress through school. EAL
should be given a weighting in the early years but there is no apparent
justification for using it as a weighting criteria by secondary level.
3.2 DOUBLING DEPRIVATION FUNDING
As set out above, the current AEN funding regime is based solely on the
PwC estimate of the extra costs which can be attributed to the schooling
needs of disadvantaged children. It does not reflect any calculation
of the benefits of extra funding.
In 2005/06 AEN funding amounted to circa £2.5 billion - £1.25 billion
through the basic entitlement payable to all local authorities and £1.25
billion through the AEN top-up to authorities with a higher than average
level of deprived children. The funding assumed typical additional costs
for a pupil with AEN of £1,460 per year, which, as an illustrative example,
corresponds to some 1.7 million pupils in either nursery, primary or
secondary school (24 per cent of the total).
In his 2006 Budget statement, Gordon Brown set out a long-term aspiration
to match per pupil spending in the state sector to that spent on
each child in the private sector. According to HM Treasury figures, this
implies an increase in total spending (revenue and capital) per pupil from
around £5,000 to roughly £8,000 (the private sector figure was based
on the annual average fees paid per pupil in 2005/06). 8 The Institute for
Fiscal Studies has estimated that based on the Treasury’s estimate that
there will be 7.2 million pupils in 2010/11, this would cost an extra £17
billion. 9
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Tackling educational inequality
This is a challenging commitment. It is also potentially wasteful, in light
of the DfES Value for Money unit findings that there is no statistically
significant relationship between resources and attainment for the most
affluent third of schools.
A much more manageable – and effective – commitment would be to
increase the level of deprivation funding, so that the most deprived
pupils in the state sector received the same level of funding as a typical
child in the private sector. This higher level of deprivation funding could
be allocated in a graduated way depending on the individual pupil need
such that the most deprived pupils would qualify for total per capita
funding of around £8,000 per annum.
Based on 2005/06 figures, approximately £2.5 billion would be needed
to lift the majority of pupils currently in notional receipt of deprivation
funding up to private sector levels. 10 Actual funding for deprivation in
England amounted to £2.5 billion in 2005/06. Therefore, the target
would be achieved by roughly doubling the current levels of deprivation
funding.
Use of Funds
Eligible schools should be given freedom to decide how to spend the
extra funding between a range of initiatives which give value for money,
including smaller class sizes, extended hours (including an extended
school day, Saturday schools and summer schools), ‘Hard to Serve’
bonuses for high performing teachers in disadvantaged schools, and
personalised learning schemes. In the case of personalised learning,
the government has recently committed significant new funds, and this
paper is not proposing any extra commitment, but simply the integration
of the current system of personalised learning grants into a reformed
system of deprivation funding. A summary of approximate costings of
these interventions, which are explored in more detail in this chapter, is
given below:
Table 5: Potential commitments for extra deprivation
funding
Smaller class sizes at Primary level £500m
Extended hours – school days £1400m
Extended hours – Saturday schools £610m
Extended hours – summer schools £35m
Hard to Serve Bonuses £350m
Personalised learning grants
n.a.
TOTAL
£3,000m (rounded up)
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Tackling educational inequality
This palette of options is not intended to reconcile with the specific
commitment of £2.5 billion which would correspond to the doubling of
deprivation funding. Under these proposals each school would have a
different amount of discretionary deprivation funding which they would
be authorised to spend on a range of options, including those listed
above. In the choice based education system envisaged, schools will,
over time, have to answer to parents, as well as to the Secretary of
State and the Chief Inspector of Schools, for their performance.
The reforms listed below represent a ‘menu’ of options – with prices
attached – from which schools in receipt of additional deprivation funding
will be encouraged to choose.
3.3 SMALLER CLASS SIZES
It was noted in part 2 that the evidence concerning the impact of class
sizes on pupil attainment is probably only conclusive at the early stages
of primary school.
The average class size at Key Stage 1 and 2 is currently 25.6 and
27.2 respectively. 11 There is some disagreement amongst researchers
about how far classes must be reduced in size to achieve significant
improvements in pupil performance: some argue that the benefits are
most marked in classes of fewer than 15 pupils while others suggest
that a dividend is obtained when classes comprise 20 pupils or fewer. 12
Most school systems in the developed world have reduced average class
sizes in recent years and are under pressure to reduce them further.
Yet, in an echo of British findings, OECD research indicates that acrossthe
board reductions in class size are expensive and unlikely to lead to
substantial gains in learning. 13
This suggests that if the policy is to be implemented effectively it
needs to be specifically targeted on those who are likely to benefit. The
American Federation of Teachers, a strong advocate for reducing class
size to help raise student achievement, especially in high-poverty at risk
schools, suggests that class size reduction is most effective when:
:
:
:
:
classes are between 15 and 19 students and no more than 20
students
particular schools are targeted, especially those with low
achieving and low income students
there is an adequate supply of qualified teachers, and
there is sufficient classroom space
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Tackling educational inequality
Such a targeted approach would fit well with the reform of deprivation
funding outlined above, which would allow supplementary funding to
flow directly to schools with the most disadvantaged intakes.
If all primary schools with above average levels of pupils on FSM were
to reduce class size to 20 at both KS1 and KS2, the annual cost of the
policy would be close to £500 million. 14
3.4 EXTENDED HOURS
Time is an important school resource. Research shows that increases in
quality time have a positive impact on pupil attainment, whether through
longer school days, Saturday schools, summer programmes, or a combination
of all three.
In more affluent communities, and of course in private schools, parents
or schools are able and willing to fund extra hours as a matter of course.
The same is not true of schools in deprived communities. However,
some schools in deprived communities have committed to extended
hours for their pupils, with compelling results.
KIPP schools, one of the most pioneering charter school networks in the
US with proven success rates for children from deprived backgrounds,
use a combination of extended school days (from 07.30 to 17.00),
Saturday and summer schools. This allows students to spend over 60 per
cent more time in school than their peers in traditional state schools:
Case study
KIPP, TEAM Academy, Newark, New Jersey, USA
This KIPP school is attended exclusively by Hispanic and African-
American children between the ages of 10 and 13 (grades 5-8),
72 per cent of whom are on the US equivalent of FSM. The
school’s use of an extended school day, (running from 07.30 to
17.00), Saturday school (from 09.00 to 13.00) and a summer
school means that TEAM students spend nearly 70 per cent
more time in school than the average Newark student. Students
who enter the school 2-3 grades below their grade level on average,
leave almost twice as likely to reach state standards than
their Newark peers, with nearly 90 per cent expected to go on
to college (compared with a Newark public school average of
16 per cent). Nationally, the school’s students move from the
lowest performing 25 per cent in reading and maths, to the top
third in reading and the top 10 per cent in maths. The degree to
which African American students at the school outperform other
African American students in the city/state is shown in figure
36 below.
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Tackling educational inequality
FIGURE 36: ATTAINMENT OF AFRICAN AMERICAN STUDENTS
IN STATE TESTS
Newark
New Jersey
TEAM Academy
100
80
%
60
40
20
0
English Language Arts
Maths
Science
Source: TEAM Schools, ‘2005-2006 Annual Report’, 2006; New Jersey state
test is the Grade Eight Proficiency Test (GEPA) – 13/14 year olds.
Particular Benefits to Disadvantaged Pupils
Studies also highlight the importance of additional teaching time to pupils
with little opportunity for learning outside school. 15 Research conducted
in the United States concluded that after-school programmes favoured
low achieving students more than students who entered programmes
with higher academic attainment. 16
Most obviously, the ‘summer learning loss’ is greatest among low income
children, who are rarely exposed to the same out-of-school opportunities
available to their more affluent peers.
An American study demonstrated that while middle income students
experienced slight gains in reading performance over the summer, low
income students lost nearly two months of reading skills. 17 An analysis
of 39 American research studies found that the long term effects
of summer loss over time had a particularly detrimental effect on low
income students and ultimately increased gaps between middle class
and poorer students. 18 This is clearly demonstrated in figure 37 below
which illustrates the cumulative effect of summer learning loss.
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Tackling educational inequality
Figure 37: Impact of summer learning loss on attainment
gap
Middle-income students,
no summer school
Low-income students,
no summer school
Summary of reading
achievement
trajectories
Kindergarten 1st Grade 2nd Grade 3rd Grade 4th Grade
Summer Summer Summer Summer Summer
Source: ‘Summer learning: research and best practices,’ John Hopkins University, 2004
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Tackling educational inequality
Extended School Days – Not Just Extended Schools
DfES analysis of existing extended schools provision in the UK has
confirmed its beneficial impact. According to DfES research, extra
childcare, including breakfast and after school clubs, has improved
concentration, attendance, exam results and truancy levels, while working
with parents led to improved attainment and behaviour. 19
As a result of these and other findings, the DfES has committed to
provide public funding for extended schools initiatives through two separate
funding streams: £432 million of start-up funding is being provided
between 2006 and 2008 to local authorities through a combination of
the School Standards Fund and General Sure Start Grant and another
£250 million is being provided directly to schools over the same period
through the School Standards Grant. 20 Schools are expected to provide
five core services: study support activities (including remedial classes,
Gifted and Talented programmes, extra-curricular programmes such as
sport, music and the arts), high quality affordable childcare, swift and
early referrals for health and social care, community access and parenting
support. The central objective of the extended schools programme is
that by 2010 all primary school children will have access to affordable
childcare from 08.00 to 18.00 all the year round, and all secondary
schools will be open from 08.00 to 18.00 all the year round.
The problem with this current (and planned) extended school provision
is that it mixes a number of objectives, including extra learning, the use
of schools as a community hub and the extension of the various childcare
services that the government is keen to promote, in large part to
encourage parents into the labour market. This explains why the study
support component, which is the one most likely to improve attainment,
is only one of five components of the core service, with no obligation on
schools to make it a priority.
Like current deprivation funding, the extended schools grant will be
mediated by local authorities. Local authorities are allowed to release
funding to schools “in line with their strategic plans”. The result for
many schools, almost a year since the provision was first made available,
is that they have received very little funding.
This paper proposes an extended school day programme that is more
directly focused on the educational needs of those children who would
most benefit. The critical factor is to focus on the hours of instruction
which pupils are given, rather than the hours during which the school
gates are open.
As mentioned above, pupils in KIPP schools spend on average 60 per
cent more time in school than their state school peers over the year.
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Tackling educational inequality
This includes a much longer school day, from 07.30 to 17.00. Bearing
in mind that many schools are already running breakfast clubs and after
school clubs in this country, schools with particularly disadvantaged
intakes should have the freedom to extend the school day by one hour,
or four hours per week, funded out of the additional deprivation funding
proposed. That additional hour per day should, however, be used for
structured tuition.
Schools should be given powers to make the extended school day
compulsory if they wish to do so. Most, if not all, existing extended school
programmes are voluntary, and many have been poorly attended.
To calculate the cost of extended instructional time in the most deprived
schools, a number of assumptions have to be made. In particular, the
policy would have to be applied on a school basis and therefore would
cover non-deprived pupils in schools with above average deprivation
and would not necessarily cover deprived pupils in schools with below
average deprivation.
However if extended hours were applied to all primary schools and
secondary schools with over 20 per cent FSM intake, this would encompass
5,342 primary schools (30 per cent of all primary schools) and 903
secondary schools (26.5 per cent of the total). On the assumption that
pupils are distributed evenly across schools this would translate into an
incremental cost of around £830 million for primary pupils and £600
million for secondary pupils. 21
Saturday Schools and Supplementary Schools
There are currently very few state schools with the financial resources
to provide Saturday schooling, unless they receive special support from
the LEA or the voluntary sector. However, evidence from the growing
supplementary schools movement suggests such provision offers
significant potential benefits.
There are an estimated 5,000 ‘supplementary’, ‘complementary’,
‘community’ or ‘Saturday’ schools in Britain, subsisting on donations,
grants and even sponsorship from foreign governments. 22 They come
in a variety of forms, but in general they offer out-of-school-hours
educational opportunities for children and young people, many of whom
come from ethnic minority communities. 23 They are typically staffed by
volunteers, some of whom may be qualified teachers and professionals,
while others are parents or carers. 24
Research indicates that Saturday schools provide tangible positive
results in the mainstream classroom. A 2001 survey by the National
Foundation for Educational Research found that 84 per cent of pupils
who attended supplementary schools said it helped them with their
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Tackling educational inequality
mainstream work. 25 A comprehensive study by the city of Leicester in
2003 found that supplementary schools led to improvements in discipline,
assessment and examinations. 26 Likewise, a study in Birmingham
showed that of those parents whose children attended supplementary
schools, 93 per cent were actively involved in the mainstream school,
compared to only 17 per cent of parents whose children did not attend
supplementary schools. 27
To encourage the development of supplementary schools, the schools
minister Andrew Adonis announced in January 2007 the creation of a
new national resource centre for supplementary education, ContinYou.
The centre will act as a resource for supplementary schools and offer
help to those establishing new schools.
This paper proposes that the provision of Saturday schooling should be
extended and become another option for mainstream schools in receipt
of deprivation funding. Schools could decide whether to provide the
supplementary schooling themselves or to contract out to existing or
new providers, including supplementary schools.
The provision of Saturday schooling in maintained schools would offer
certain advantages over existing voluntary-based schemes. In particular,
maintained schools have professional staff, a greater ability to enforce
attendance, knowledge of pupil needs and ease of coordination with the
existing curriculum. On the other hand, supplementary schools are often
better able to harness a community spirit, encourage parental involvement
and bring a strong volunteering ethos.
As currently configured, Saturday schools and supplementary schools
are broadly separate from mainstream education. The National Supplementary
Schools Resource Centre estimates that only around 5 per cent
of schools are involving supplementary schools in their extended services.
Provision of a more secure funding stream through the maintained
sector would no doubt increase cooperation between the sectors and
provide support and security to the ‘supplementary’ school movement.
The case study below illustrates the benefits of a coordinatd approach:
Case study
Bristol’s mainstreaming supplementary schools support
project
Bristol faces serious challenges in raising pupil attainment,
particularly among its minority ethnic communities.
Over a number of years a range of supplementary schools have
been set up in Bristol through the mainstreaming supplementary
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Tackling educational inequality
schools support project with the purpose of designing and
delivering interventions to raise attainment amongst Muslim
pupils (the majority of whom are from Pakistani, Bangladeshi
and Somali backgrounds). 28
In 2005 the project ran a series of intensive tutorial and revision
classes for Year 10 and Year 11 pupils for four hours on
Saturday mornings over eight weeks in the summer term. Mainstream
teachers, mainly from the partner secondary schools,
were employed at £100 for each Saturday morning to deliver
a programme of classes covering English, maths, science and
study skills. Students were placed in single sex groups based on
predicted grades supplied by their secondary school. Supplementary
school staff supported the mainstream teachers and where
necessary offered one-to-one support for students and bilingual
assistance.
The project had a significant positive impact on attendees’ GCSE
grades. Table 6 below shows the overall achievement of grades
A*-C of those who attended the classes compared to those in
the target group who did not attend, and to a control group in the
schools. Within the target group, not one student gained fewer
grades than expected, and many showed enormous improvements
over expectations.
TABLE 6: OVERALL ATTAINMENT OF GCSE A* TO C
Number of
grades A*-C
expected
Number of
grades A*-C
achieved
+/- (%)
Somali (16) 53 94.5 +78.3
Other Muslim (30) 114 136 +19.3
Total target group
(46)
Control group 1
Same ethnic group
as participants
(16)
Control group 2
random sample
of children in
mainstream school
(39)
167 230.5 +38.5
51 56 +9.8
173 138 -20.2
Source: Liz Cousins Associates, ‘Developing effective partnerships.
Supplementary schools in Bristol’, November 2005
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Tackling educational inequality
Staff in mainstream schools noted that the behaviour of students
in class was significantly improved as a result of attending the
Saturday classes and that many were taking their studies more
seriously as a result of seeing what they and their peers could
achieve. Staff also reported that parents became more involved
in the schools and more prepared to attend meetings.
Targeted deprivation funding could provide the resources for schools
with disadvantaged intakes to operate Saturday school programmes on
a more consistent, stable and sustainable basis.
Schools would have the option to make Saturday schools compulsory,
but with a range of activities. Pupils below target attainment levels in
literacy and numeracy could be given additional structured learning in
the basics, while pupils at or above these levels would have a greater
range of options.
If Saturday schooling was provided at all secondary schools with over
20 per cent free school meal intake in Years 7-11, with 100 per cent
take-up (i.e. a compulsory programme), the total cost would be £610
million. 29
Summer Schools
The UK currently has a variety of summer school programmes but they
are only loosely coordinated and monitored.
Summer schools were an ingredient of Labour’s education strategy after
the 1997 election. The department of education funded a pilot literacy
summer scheme in 1998 involving 51 schools serving 1,500 pupils.
The target group comprised pupils who were around two years behind
their chronological reading age as they prepared to move to secondary
school. All received 50 hours of tuition. The number and range of pupils
increased year by year and, by the summer of 2000, the number of
summer schools had risen to 2,500 (100,000 children), including 500
geared to meet the needs of the most gifted.
The overall impact of this programme on skills and attainment was
mixed. A 2001 Quality in Study Support report found that students
achieved one A* to C GCSE more on average, half a grade in maths and
English GCSEs and a third of a level in Key Stage 3 maths (compared to
pupils of equal ability without study support). However a 2002 Ofsted
report and 2000 National Foundation for Educational Research evaluation
found that pupil attainment had not risen significantly. The initiative was
brought to an end in February 2002. The Ofsted evaluation suggested
that the teachers pitched the level of work too low, with the result
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Tackling educational inequality
that it may have boosted pupils’ self-esteem, but without really raising
standards.
From the late 1990s the number of nationally coordinated and evaluated
summer school programmes of all kinds has decreased significantly.
Some local authorities still support collaborative programmes between
schools. Tower Hamlets, Birmingham and Norfolk have all run large
schemes. Most programmes tend to work on children’s self-esteem and
attitudes to learning, particularly through sport and creative pursuits.
There is no publicly available data on the total budget allocated to
summer school programmes. Schools can receive funding from a variety
of sources, including the DfES, the National Lottery, the Extended
Schools Initiative, regeneration funds, local authorities and private charitable
donations. The DfES spent £13 million in 1999 (900 schools and
27,000 pupils), rising to £22 million in 2001.
The range and diversity of summer school programmes also makes it
difficult to separate their relative impact. The quality of measurement
and monitoring (where it takes place) is highly variable, and there is no
centralised evaluation. Nonetheless, evidence from the United States,
together with anecdotal evidence from the UK, suggests that properly
structured summer schools do produce benefits, particularly for disadvantaged
children who are more vulnerable to the ‘summer learning
loss’.
Table 7: Teacher turnover and wastage 31 by free school
meals
Relative FSM
Eligibility
Number of
schools
Primary
school
turnover (%)
Wastage (%)
Number of
schools
Secondary
school
turnover
Wastage (%)
Above
average
226 14.99 10.00 78 16.21 7.55
Average 195 15.01 10.46 79 13.34 7.62
Below
average
477 12.40 8.19 189 12.10 7.42
Total 898 13.62 9.13 346 13.31 7.50
Source: DfES, Teacher Turnover, Wastage and Destinations, 2004
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Tackling educational inequality
Summer induction programmes
The government should supplement these largely voluntarist programmes
with a centrally funded summer school programme, specifically designed
to ease the transition from primary to secondary school. This too would
be funded through the new pupil premium.
Schools would be responsible for managing their own summer schools
using existing staff or outside volunteers (including community and voluntary
groups). The main objective of the summer induction programme
would be to welcome pupils, allow them to meet each other and the staff,
acclimatise them to the culture of the new school and set behavioural
norms. Activities would be more focused on team-building exercises
such as sport, drama and music, than on academic learning. This would
make direct measurement of attainment inappropriate and may make
monitoring and evaluation generally more difficult. But while the success
of such programmes would vary depending on the leadership provided
by individual schools, there is enough evidence from schools like KIPP to
justify investment in the initiative.
If 26.5 per cent of secondary schools (i.e. all schools with over 20 per
cent FSM) provided three week summer induction programmes, with 50
per cent attendance rates (it would be difficult to make compulsory) the
estimated cost would be £35 million. 30
3.5 TEACHERS’ PAY – ‘HARD TO SERVE’ BONUSES
The analysis in part 2 highlighted teacher quality as one of the key
drivers of school effectiveness. Yet there is clear evidence that the best
teachers tend to gravitate to less deprived schools.
A recent study by the Centre for Education and Employment Research
at the University of Liverpool found that teacher turnover was higher in
schools with above average eligibility for free school meals than with
below average eligibility (see table 7) – a consequence of the higher
workload and stress involved in teaching children from deprived backgrounds
for whom behavioural problems are more common.
One American study found that African American students were nearly
twice as likely as white students to be assigned to the most ineffective
teachers and half as likely to be assigned to the most effective teachers.
32 Another study showed a significant migration of those teachers
with the highest test scores and the most experience to schools with
higher attaining pupils and fewer ethnic minority pupils.
Although pay is not the primary motivation of teachers, there is good
evidence to suggest that differential pay can affect both recruitment
and retention. A recent American study concluded that districts offering
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Tackling educational inequality
higher starting salaries recruited more teachers from selective higher
education institutions. In particular, the author found that a 1 per cent
increase in teachers’ salaries increased the probability of recruiting
university-educated teachers by approximately 1.59 percentage points. 33
Likewise, a study of New York districts with different starting salaries
found that those offering more money than neighbouring districts were
better able to attract applicants of high quality. 34
Teachers’ pay in the UK is highly regulated and progression linked to
years of service. Teachers in London are entitled to an additional London
allowance (inner and outer), related to the cost of living. But there are no
other adjustments for the type of school or teaching conditions.
However there are precedents for greater differentials in pay according
to the nature of teaching conditions. In Denver, Colorado in 2005, for
example, voters approved a $25 million per annum tax increase to fund
ProComp, a special fund established to reward teachers for a range
of factors beyond seniority. Under ProComp in 2006-7, teachers could
receive a $1,026 bonus for agreeing to work in a school designated as
‘Hard to Serve’ based on measures of pupil poverty, language acquisition,
and other learning needs. Leaders who choose to take the helm of
an underperforming school receive additional bonuses.
A UK ‘Hard to Serve’ bonus scheme could be linked to the relative
deprivation of school intakes. All schools with above-average FSM pupil
intakes would be entitled to pay such bonuses out of their deprivation
funding allocation, at the discretion of the head teacher and governing
body (who will have to weigh not only the overall level of deprivation
funding available, but also the priority to be accorded other claims on
the budget such as smaller class sizes or remedial programmes).
Bonus levels should be allowed to vary by school, up to a nationally
agreed ceiling. If the maximum bonus were capped at 15 per cent of
salary, and all eligible schools choose to apply the scheme with an average
bonus of 10 per cent, the estimated cost of the scheme would be
£352 million.
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Table 8: Breakdown of ‘Hard to Serve’ bonus allocation
Maintained
sector
Nursery
and
primary
Maintained
secondary
Total no. of
Teachers
(1000s)
No. of Hard
to Serve
Teachers
(1000s)
Average
Bonus (£)
Distribution
of Bonus
(£m)
196.9 59.1 2880 170.2
216.7 57.4 3180 182
All sectors 413.6 113.2 3030 352.2
Breakdown of salary estimates as of March
2005
New salaries for teachers
receiving ‘Hard to Serve’
bonus
Maintained
sector
Average
Salary –
Classroom
Teachers
(£)
Average
Salary – All
Teachers
(£)
Average
Salary –
Classroom
Teachers
(£)
Average
Salary – All
Teachers
(£)
Nursery and
primary
28,800 31,700 31680 34870
Maintained
secondary
31,800 33,700 34980 37070
All sectors 30,300 32,700 33330 35970
Source: calcuations based on DfES figures. NB ‘All teachers’ includes Head, Deputy, and
assistant head teachers. There are some data quality concerns regarding mis-recording of
the grade of teachers in the leadership group.
To be properly effective, ‘Hard to Serve’ bonuses need to be specifically
tied to performance targets, or there is a risk that they will simply end
up providing a one-off lift to the earnings of teachers currently working
in more challenging schools, regardless of their quality. They could also
specifically include a retention element (’retention’ bonuses used to be
a fairly widespread component of teacher pay but are no longer part of
the NUT pay package).
‘Hard to Serve’ bonuses could be combined with the more widespread
adoption of performance related pay, as discussed below.
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3.6 PERFORMANCE RELATED PAY AND
PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
During the past 25 years, public sectors around the world have increasingly
followed the private sector in adopting more sophisticated performance
management systems, including a variety of methods of linking pay to
performance. This has been made easier by the improvement in data
management systems, which has made accurate and objective identification
for individual or team performance possible. The primary benefits
of the expansion of performance related pay (PRP) schemes relate to
their value in signalling the objectives of the organisation or unit, and
their power as a motivator for individuals.
The teaching profession in general, and the UK teaching profession in
particular, have been largely immune to this development. There have
been isolated examples of PRP schemes on an individual local authority
basis (such as Kensington and Chelsea, see case study below) but nothing
on a significant scale.
In 2000/01, a nationwide system of teacher appraisal was established.
Approximately 88 per cent of teachers were eligible to apply for the
PRP scheme, and 97 per cent of those who did were awarded additional
payment. In one study, head teachers reported that they did not find it
difficult to assess the five standards that teachers had to meet to receive
their £2000 performance payment (which included pupil performance)
although it was extremely time consuming. In many respects the introduction
of the UK scheme was more akin to a general pay rise for eligible
teachers than to a PRP scheme tied to specific performance targets.
The Case for Performance Related Pay…
Performance related pay can have a valuable role at the school level
provided it is tied to an effective performance management system.
Such a system should set clear school-wide and individual objectives,
the criteria against which performance will be measured, and provide
meaningful support for teachers, including any training to help them
reach the agreed objectives.
The introduction of PRP also creates the opportunity for wider management
and organisational changes. These include effective appraisal
and goal setting, clarification of responsibilities, acquisition of skills,
improved employee-manager dialogue, more team work and increased
flexibility in work performance.
….Adapted to the Teaching Profession
There are many different versions of PRP schemes, some more individually
based, others more collegiate. Compared with other organisations a
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school teaching body is (or should be) highly collegiate. It is very difficult
to attribute performance between individual teachers, given the overlapping
of influences and responsibilities across different school cohorts,
different subjects, and also between pastoral and academic roles. For
example, if a pupil performs well in a history exam, it is unclear the
extent to which this can be attributed to the history teacher, rather than
the English teacher who transformed her writing skills, or the pastoral
leader who turned around her attitude to homework. Although different
schools or LEAs should be left to develop their own PRP schemes, there
is a strong argument in favour of a collegiate (John Lewis-style) model,
where the school staff (not only teachers) are rewarded as a body for
the achievement of certain key objectives for the school. Such a scheme
would send a clear signal to the staff body about the overarching objectives
of the school while providing an extra incentive to achieve them.
An alternative is to apply performance-related pay only to the head
teacher and perhaps also the deputy. This is cheaper and more manageable,
but rewards one or two individuals without due recognition of the
team effort. The third option, a much more individualised PRP system
extending across the school staff, risks creating as many tensions as
it resolves, due to the difficulty of attributing specific achievement, as
discussed to above.
Case study
The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea
Kensington and Chelsea (K&C) introduced a PRP scheme across
the Borough’s 34 schools in 1992. The scheme only applied to
headteachers and deputies and was restricted to a maximum of
5 per cent of annual pay.
The PRP scheme constituted only part of a much broader
performance management model which covered all local authority
employees. In the case of the education department, this
included a strong commitment to teacher training and development,
embodied in the creation of a new Induction Programme
and the establishment of a Professional Development Centre (the
Isaac Newton Centre) open to all teachers in the Borough.
According to John Walker, Group Personnel Manager for the
Borough from 1989 to 2002, the clear commitment to staff
development meant that “K&C became a magnet for teachers.
We did not need to break sweat to attract staff.”
According to Liz Rayment-Pickard, head teacher at one of the
Borough’s top performing primaries: “It made us very focused
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Tackling educational inequality
on what was important. It gave us a sense of enterprise. It was
all about performance and pupil achievement….PRP created a
mechanism for rewarding the heads and deputies in a way which
reflected their true performance rather than just the subjective
views of the governing bodies. It allowed us to have meaningful
dialogue about expectations.”
The increasing availability of high quality data on pupil and
school performance was, according to Rayment-Pickard, critical
to the success of the scheme and led to performance objectives
becoming increasingly focused and effective as the scheme
developed.
According to Walker the modest sums of money involved were
not a problem: “Tangible recognition, however modest, has a
disproportionately positive impact on individual motivation.”
After operating successfully for ten years, the PRP scheme is
now beginning, according to Walker, to “wither on the vine”
for two reasons: first the salaries of many head teachers in the
Borough have begun to hit the top of their pay spine, taking away
the flexibility to provide any performance related increments;
and secondly, the Whitehall imposed Performance Management
model has taken away much of the flexibility for setting performance
objectives.
The dearth of performance related pay schemes in the teaching profession
historically is explained in large part by a lack of designated funding.
The PRP scheme in Kensington & Chelsea was funded at the LEA level.
But few other LEAs have been prepared to make such commitments.
With the imposition of a national performance management system in
2001, it has become extremely difficult for local authorities, let alone
schools, to take separate initiatives.
The United States recently introduced a Teacher Incentive Fund (2001)
which makes $500 million available at the state level to encourage
performance related compensation schemes.
The UK could in due course follow the US example and introduce a
similar national fund, with schools or local authorities able to devise their
own PRP schemes and to make bids to the National Fund on the merits
of the scheme.
But in the first instance, performance related pay can be used to inject
the necessary accountability and discipline into the ‘Hard to Serve’
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bonus scheme outlined above. This paper advocates operating PRP
schemes on a collegiate level, with the head teacher and governing
body responsible for setting school-wide objectives. Payment of ‘Hard
to Serve’ bonuses would be contingent on the school meeting those
performance objectives.
To ensure confidence in the integrity of the process, the agreed performance
objectives would be made available to parents via the school
website. This would encourage schools to set realistic but aspirational
objectives, the existence of which would encourage a more open debate
about the challenges facing the school.
3.7 PERSONALISED LEARNING
The DfES recently took its first tentative steps towards creating a pupilbased
method of deprivation funding through the system for allocating
personalised learning grants. Personalisation grants are intended primarily
for remedial work for children who have fallen behind, particularly
in literacy and numeracy. Given the correlation between attainment and
disadvantage, there is a strong case for linking such assistance to the
system of deprivation funding.
Effective from 2006, personalised learning grants have been delivered
through the School Standards Grant (SSG) and Dedicated Schools Grant
(DSG) as follows:
Table 9: Funding allocation for personalised learning
grant
2006-07 2007-08
SSG (personalisation)
grants
£220m £365m
DSG (personalisation)
primary schools
£100m £230m
DSG (personalisation)
KS3
£120m £335m
Source: www.teachernet.gov.uk
The SSG (personalisation) grants are allocated to local authorities through
a detailed points system (akin to the Dutch system), which is linked to
deprivation and prior attainment. It is allocated on a unit of funding for
certain criteria as shown below:
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Table 10: Funding allocation for School Standards
Grant (personalisation)
2006/07 2007/08
Type of school
Infant, Junior
and Primary
Pupil
unit (£)
FSM
unit
(£)
Low prior
attainment
unit (£)
Pupil
unit (£)
FSM
unit
(£)
Low prior
attainment
unit (£)
3 39 68 5 65 113
Secondary 8 119 106 13 199 176
Middle 6 73 85 11 122 142
Upper and High 8 119 100 13 199 166
Source: www.teachernet.gov.uk
The DSG (personalisation) grants are also linked to deprivation but without
the same pupil tracking. Monies are allocated to each local authority
on the basis of 15 per cent per pupil regardless of need, 35 per cent
based on deprivation (measured by FSM) and 50 per cent based on prior
attainment.
While the funding criteria for personalisation grants are clearer than for
mainstream deprivation funding, they are still confused by the intermediation
and potential dilution which takes place at the local authority
level. According to DfES guidance on DSG grants, LEAs “can choose to
reflect the national distribution of funding but are not obliged to”. 35
In light of the reforms proposed to deprivation funding it would make
sense to fold personalisation grants into a new reformed system of
pupil-based funding, with personalised learning being one of the uses to
which the extra funding could be put. This paper has therefore included
personalised grants in the “use of funds” but has assumed no extra
funding.
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Endnotes
1 DfES/Treasury, ‘Child Poverty’, 2005.
2 PricewaterhouseCoopers, ‘Study of additional educational needs’, August 2002.
3 A Smithers and P Robinson, ‘Teacher turnover, wastage and destinations’, Centre for Education and
Employment Research/DfES, June 2004.
4 DfES/Treasury, December 2005.
5 Michael Trobe, ‘Address to annual conference’, Association of School and College Leaders, March
2007.
6 DfES/Treasury, December 2005.
7 P Marshall et al, ‘Aiming higher: a better future for England’s schools’, CentreForum, 2006.
8 HM Treasury, ‘A strong and strengthening economy: investing in Britain’s future’, March 2006.
9 This calculation by the IFS is based on the assumption that all pupils are currently on £5000 and
does not take into account additional AEN funding deprived pupils may be on. It includes the
existing plans going forward 2007/08 which means current and capital spending per pupil will
rise by £340 and £90 respectively, and also the additional £60 per pupil in 2007/08 from higher
direct payments to schools and a further £150 in capital spending by 2010/11 as announced in the
Budget, bringing the shortfall in total to £2400 per pupil.
10 This figure is based on AEN funding in the DfES 2005/06 Education Funding School Settlement,
which gave funding per pupil with AEN of roughly £5,900. An average of senior and preparatory
day schools’ operating costs was slightly under £7,300 (figures from Haysmacintyre, ‘Independent
Schools Management Survey 2006’, March 2006). If the higher estimate of private sector spending
(£8000 per pupil) is used, the figure rises to £3,57 billion).
11 DFES, 2007.
12 C M Achilles et al, ‘The lasting benefits study (LBS) in grades 4 and 5 (1990-1991)’, paper presented
at the North Carolina Association for research in Education, 1993 (fewer than 15 pupils); G V Glass
and M L Smith, ‘Meta-analysis of research on the relationship of class size and achievement’, 1978;
and American Federation of Teachers, www,aft,org (fewer than 20 pupils); P Blatchford et al, ‘The
effects of class size on attainment and classroom processes in English primary schools (Years 4 to
6) 2000-2003’, Institute of Education, University of London, December 2004.
13 K Forestier, ’Small classes a ”criminal“ waste of cash’, South China Morning Post, 21 Mary 2005.
14 An estimated 12,700 new teachers would be needed at a cost of £39,000 per teacher.
15 M Solomon, ‘One-size education doesn’t fit less affluent children’, The Lexington Herald, 19 December
2006.
16 P Lauer et al, ‘Out-of-school time programs: a meta-analysis of effects for at-risk students’, Review
of Educational Research, vol. 76(2), July 2006.
17 Center for American Progress and Institute for America’s Future, ‘Getting smarter, becoming fairer.
A progressive education agenda for a stronger nation’, August 2005.
18 H Cooper, ‘Summer learning loss: the problem and some solutions’, ERIC clearinghouse on elementary
and early childhood education campaign II, May 2003.
19 J Bastiani, ‘Involving parents: raising achievement’, DfES, May 2003.
20 The Government has also recently announced the provision of a further £217m in 2010-11 so that
disadvantaged children will be able to access 2 hours per week of free after school activities, such
as music, sport and drama.
21 DfES/Treasury, ‘Child Poverty’, 2005. The calculation is based on 4 hours per week for 36 weeks
at £4.50 per pupil hour.
22 M Gould, ‘Supplementary benefits: ministers have praised part-time extra schools…but praise
doesn’t pay the bills, say their organisers’, The Guardian, 3 April 2007.
23 www.continyou.org.uk
24 M2 Presswire, ‘A new national resource for supplementary schools’, 29 January 2007.
25 A Adonis, ‘Supporting role’, Guardian Unlimited, 26 April 2006.
26 P Martin et al, ‘Complementary schools and their communities in Leicester’, Final report for the
ESRC, October 2003.
27 M Gould, ‘Supplementary benefits’, 2007.
28 Liz Cousins Associates for Bristol City Council, ‘Developing effective partnerships. Supplementary
schools in Bristol: their contribution to raising attainment’, November 2005.
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Tackling educational inequality
29 The calculation is based on 4 hours per day for 36 weeks at £4.50 per pupil hour.
30 Calculated by no of pupils in year (592,400) x 0.265 x 0.5 x £6 per hour x 5 hours per day x 15
days.
31 Defined as percentage of teachers leaving the maintained sector.
32 L Darling-Hammond, ‘Teacher quality and student achievement: a review of state policy evidence’,
Education policy analysis archives, vol. 8 (1), 1 January 2000.
33 A Chevalier and P Dolton, ‘The labour market for teachers’, in,S Machin and A Vignoles (eds.),
‘What’s the good of education. The economics of education in the UK’, 2005.
34 E Wragg, ‘Performance pay for teachers: the experiences of heads and teachers’, Routledge,
2004.
35 www.teachernet.gov.uk
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:
4. An end to poor schooling
The measures outlined in part 3 are targeted at the pupil level factors
which currently explain many of the differences in school performance.
Each of them requires additional state funding, made available by a
doubling of deprivation funding, distributed according to a points based
pupil premium system.
However, this will not be sufficient to close the attainment gap. Increased
funding must go hand in hand with higher aspirations and more ambitious
learning agendas – especially for disadvantaged pupils. In return
for providing additional support to poor pupils, the state is entitled to
demand an end to poor schooling.
Part 4 sets out a number of additional reforms designed to substantially
raise the educational prospects of the most disadvantaged pupils. In a
number of cases they present a challenge to existing practices that work
against the needs of more disadvantaged pupils, whether in relation to
teaching practice, the curriculum, or the use of data.
4.1 HIGH STANDARDS AND HIGH ASPIRATIONS
Only a small percentage of maintained primary schools currently achieve
100 per cent level 4 in English and maths. In the private sector 95 per
cent of schools get 90 per cent of their pupils achieving level 4 in KS2
English and 92 per cent achieving level 4 maths. At GCSE only 7 per
cent of maintained schools had 80 per cent of their pupils achieving five
good GCSEs including English and maths. We must raise our sights and
set more aspirational goals. The national 2008 target of 60 per cent of
pupils achieving five good GCSEs excluding English and maths should
be viewed only as a short term political target, heavily discredited by
the dilution of standards discussed in part 1. A more appropriate target
would be that over 60 per cent of pupils should be achieving five good
GCSEs including English and maths.
Even more important is the gap between the overall national target and
the minimum target per school. This is too wide. It should not be acceptable
for any school to produce only 30 per cent of pupils with five good
GCSEs excluding English and maths, yet this is the threshold target for
2008. The minimum per school target should include English and maths
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and should be much closer to the national target. Again, it is necessary
to draw a distinction between a short term ‘political’ target (a minimum
of 30 per cent achieving five good GCSEs, excluding English and maths
– the target for 2008) and a long term national target. To set this long
term target below the requirement that at least half of each school’s
pupils achieve five good GCSEs including English and maths would be
to institutionalise low expectations. Establishing higher aspirations for
all, supported by higher floor targets, is essential if a large number of
vulnerable pupils are not to slip through the net.
Table 11: Summary of current and proposed targets
– Key Stage 2 and Key Stage 4
Key Stage 2
(age 11)
Key Stage 4
(age 16)
Current Target
85 per cent of 11
year olds achieve
level 4+ in English
and maths
60 per cent of 16
year olds achieve
equivalent of five
good GCSEs,
excluding English
and maths
At least 25 per
cent of pupils in all
schools achieve five
good GCSEs, (rising
to 30 per cent by
2008), excluding
English and maths
Proposed
(10 yr) Target
90 per cent of 11
year olds achieve
level 4+ in English
and maths
At least 60 per cent
of 16 year olds
achieve five good
GCSEs, including
English and maths
At least 50 per
cent of pupils in
all schools should
achieve five good
GCSEs including
English & Maths
Source: Current targets from DfES PSAs, agreed in the HM Treasury 2004 Spending
Review
Restoring credibility to national standards – creating
an independent educational standards authority
Confidence in national education standards is low. The apparent dilution
of examination standards, most notably at GCSE level, has fostered
widespread mistrust. But the root cause of unease is the suspicion that
those who set the standards face a conflict of interest. Standards are
the responsibility of the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA),
which is officially “a non-departmental public body, sponsored by the
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Tackling educational inequality
DfES”, established under the 1997 Education Act. It is governed by
a board whose members are appointed by the Secretary of State for
Children, Schools and Families.
The setting and upholding of educational standards should be (and be
seen to be) above politics, so that there can be no dilution of standards
for political ends. The QCA appears to recognise the ambiguous nature
of its relationship with the education department in the wording of its
most recent annual report: “QCA is funded by the DfES and accountable
to Ministers, but we are required to be independent in our advice
to government and in our regulation of awarding bodies….We have a
Memorandum of Understanding with the DfES which describes our working
relationship.” The critical phrase here is “accountable to Ministers”.
If the QCA, or any standards body, is to have full public confidence it
has to be seen as accountable to Parliament and not to Ministers, with
the full parliamentary scrutiny that implies.
In the past the QCA has found itself in a position of having to lead on
the implementation of different government reform packages once a
political decision has been taken, irrespective of the impact this may
have on standards. A good example was the Curriculum 2000 reforms
where there was specific and repeated advice that the 50/50 mark split
between AS and A2 level exams would lead to an inflation of standards
but where the decision was taken nonetheless to proceed.
There are also conflicts of interest built in to the multi functional structure
of the QCA. The National Assessment Agency (NAA), for example,
a division of the QCA, is responsible for the delivery of the National
Curriculum tests, in which function it is regulated by the QCA. This
practice gives complainants nowhere to lodge an appeal. This was most
clearly illustrated in 2005 when there were major delivery failures in the
administration of the tests by the NAA, which were investigated and
reported on by the QCA.
Responsibility for developing and delivering the National Curriculum, and
for the administration of tests, can continue to reside with the education
department. However, the responsibility for the setting and regulation
of standards, as well as all dealings with awarding bodies should be
handed to a new, fully independent, Educational Standards Authority
(ESA). The new body would have overall responsibility for the setting
and maintaining of national educational standards, the regulation of the
public examinations system, and the design of the national qualifications
framework, effectively combining the current responsibilities of
the Qualifications and Skills and Quality Assurance divisions within
the existing QCA. The new ESA would be specifically and exclusively
charged with maintaining the continuity of standards over time.
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A useful parallel is with the International Baccalaureate Organisation
(IBO), founded in 1968 and based in Switzerland, which currently works
with 1,962 schools in 124 countries around the world. The IB diploma
enjoys global recognition and respect despite the fact that the IBO has
no ‘home market’. One of the vital ingredients of its success has been
the fact that it has maintained steady standards for over thirty years.
Such a commitment should be explicitly written in to the mandate of a
new independent standards body in the UK.
4.2 CURRICULUM and TEACHING PRACTICE
Primary Education – ‘A Stitch in Time’
A substantial body of research demonstrates the importance of developing
children’s cognitive and non-cognitive skills at the earliest possible
age, particularly for disadvantaged children. This has been recognised
by the government, as demonstrated by support for initiatives like the
Literacy Hour and Every Child a Reader.
However the rigour of assessment applied to primary schools still lags
behind secondary schools, with the result that best practice is not being
identified and disseminated fast enough. This particularly applies to
synthetic phonics.
Synthetic phonics
The Rose Review (2006) concluded unambiguously that phonics was the
preferred method for the teaching of reading and writing in UK schools. 1
There is also evidence which suggests that phonics has particular
benefits for disadvantaged children. 2
Despite the conclusions of the Rose Review, the Government has
chosen not to impose the phonics method centrally but to ‘encourage’
its adoption through the requirement upon local authorities to provide
phonics training, and most recently by the delivery of phonics packs to
each primary school. Given that most teachers have been trained to use
a ‘mixed method’ of teaching literacy, this voluntarist approach to the
spread of phonics is likely to produce only slow progress.
This paper does not advocate the mandatory imposition of phonics,
but scrutiny of synthetic phonics clearly needs to be pushed further,
particularly in relation to disadvantaged children. One simple way of
doing this is to improve the comprehensiveness and level of detail of
Key Stage 1 tests. These tests have a very important diagnostic role for
children at a vital stage of their primary education. They are currently
focused heavily on comprehension and interpretation, without separately
evaluating children’s capability in the building blocks of literacy. The test
should include more diagnostic components, which would allow better
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evaluation of the teaching methods behind them and promote the spread
of best practice. In particular, the test should include a ‘word reading’
component which fully tests the sound-symbol correspondences that
the pupils ought to know, and a more structured test of spelling with a
stronger focus on encoding than on the recollection of high frequency
words.
National curriculum – greater flexibility at Key Stage 3
Pupils have greatly contrasting educational needs at Key Stage 3,
reflecting the different rates at which they develop, both in academic
and behavioural terms.
The National Curriculum does make some allowance for this. Schools
have some flexibility to vary the curriculum according to the needs of
their pupils. In its guidelines to schools on the application of the National
Curriculum, the QCA specifically makes the point that the core subjects
of English, maths and science need to be given priority in Key Stage
3 to ensure that they are “secure”. Schools are encouraged to organise
‘catch-up classes’ for pupils who have not achieved level 4, such
as literacy ‘progress units’ in English and the ‘Springboard 7’ maths
programme, as well as booster classes (often outside school hours).
However, the continued poor levels of attainment in English and maths
in a significant minority of schools suggest that many pupils are still
receiving insufficient support, or time, for the core subjects.
A major problem is that ‘breadth’ remains a mantra for the QCA and the
education department. The opening paragraph of the QCA guidance to
schools on the Key Stage 3 National Curriculum reminds schools of their
legal obligation to “provide for all pupils a balanced and broadly based
curriculum”. 3
The Key Stage 3 curriculum includes the twelve statutory subjects of
English, maths, science, design and technology, ICT, history, geography,
modern languages, art and design, music, physical education and
citizenship, as well as religious education, sex and relationship education
and careers education. Although schools are given some flexibility as
to the weightings they should give each subject in the timetable, the
requirement to cover the curriculum successfully, in all subjects, limits
the amount of time that can be allocated for remedial work in English
and maths.
The QCA “starting point” guidance on the allocation of time between
subjects at Key Stage 3 proposes 12 per cent of a typical teaching week
each for English and maths. Guidance for Key Stage 2, where English
and maths are a much more explicit priority, is 21 to 32 per cent for
English and 18 to 21 per cent for maths.
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This paper is not proposing that the emphasis on English and maths in the
Key Stage 3 curriculum needs be raised in all schools. Different school
intakes have very different needs. However schools should explicitly
have the freedom to allocate whatever share of the timetable is required
to ensure that their pupils reach basic standards in English and maths.
Academies have this freedom. Although the funding agreement for a
typical Academy would still contain the “broad and balanced” mantra, in
practice the only subjects which have to be taught by statutory requirement
to all pupils in years 7 to 11 are the “core” subjects (currently
defined as English, maths and science) plus the school specialism.
For some pupils at Key Stage 3, “breadth” is an unaffordable luxury.
Until the basics of English and maths are mastered (as measured by
attainment at level 4 and level 5), “depth” in core subjects should be
given greater priority than “breadth”. The legal framework and QCA
guidance should be changed accordingly.
Teaching Social Norms
One of the biggest challenges in the education of disadvantaged children
is the behaviour of a growing number of pupils, who, in the words
of one sociologist, are isolated from “the tacit norms of the dominant
culture”. 4
Behavioural issues are a particular concern among boys at secondary
school (and most notably at Key Stage 3). There is also a strong body
of evidence that behavioural problems vary by ethnic group and are
especially acute for Black Caribbean boys. The evidence from the most
successful schools suggests that strong behaviour management is critical
to improving the attainment of disadvantaged pupils. Indeed many
educationalists regard good behaviour management as a precondition
for attainment. In schools with a high percentage of deprived pupils,
therefore, behaviour management takes on a much higher importance
than in other schools and requires different strategies.
According to Abigail Thernstrom, a leading US educationalist: “In the
last five years, in searching for superb inner city education, I made a
discovery: almost all excellent schools teaching highly disadvantaged
kids look very much alike – and quite different from most regular public
schools. In addition to an academically superb programme, they demand
that their students learn how to speak Standard English. They also insist
that kids show up on time, properly dressed; that they sit up straight
at their desks, chairs pulled in, workbooks organised; that they never
waste a minute in which they could be learning and always finish their
homework; that they look at the people to whom they are talking, listen
to teachers with respect, treat classmates with equal civility and shake
hands with visitors to the school.”
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Good behavioural policies are not something that can be imposed by fiat.
They depend much more on the rapid dissemination of best practice,
such as that employed in KIPP and other high performing schools in the
US:
Case study
KIPP Schools – behaviour management
KIPP schools are one of the most successful families of schools
in the US Charter movement. Founded by two teachers in 1994,
as a 5th grade (10-11 year olds) public school programme in
inner city Houston, Texas, it has since developed into “a national
network of free, open enrolment, college preparatory public
schools in under-resourced communities throughout the United
States”. As of 2006, there are 52 KIPP schools with more than
12,000 pupils enrolled. The pupil population is overwhelmingly
from low income and African American or Hispanic/Latino(a)
backgrounds.
One of the most distinctive aspects of the KIPP programme is
the approach to behaviour management. The schools focus on
building a whole school culture via a two- or three- week summer
school prior to starting (and continued in subsequent summer
schools). During school, pupils are expected to follow a strict
code of behaviour (known as SLANT), with a system of immediate
rewards, as well as penalties for those who do not comply.
‘SLANT’ represents the slogan ‘Sit up straight, Listen, Answer
and ask questions, Nod your head if you understand, and Track
(concentrate on) the speaker’. It is the method used to help KIPP
pupils to focus and learn.
‘Paycheques’
At the core of the KIPP approach to behaviour management is
a system of rules and consequences. Each pupil starts with a
‘paycheque’ and can earn or lose points to add or subtract from
this amount, according to their attainment and behaviour. This
paycheque is used to buy school items (e.g. books, snacks,
and clothes) or earn end of year trips, with the rewards varying
between schools. There are a number of benefits said to
derive from such a scheme. One is that there is a consistency to
the implementation of school discipline – rather than relying on
individual teachers’ expectations or interpretations of behaviour,
pupils know what to expect and what the parameters of acceptable
behaviour are. Another is that parents are regularly kept
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Tackling educational inequality
up to date with their child’s behaviour, as they are required to
sign and return the paycheque each week. Finally, it enables a
clear cut off point – if rules are consistently not followed and/or
their paycheque drops below an agreed level, more serious disciplinary
action is incurred such as in-school suspension, written
apologies, or detention.
Research shows that these steps allow teachers and pupils to
make much better use of instruction time and enable pupils
to accelerate their learning. 5 Independent evaluations of the
programme have been overwhelmingly positive. Examination
results for KIPP schools show significant increases in levels of
attainment from entry to graduation and most outperform their
district averages. Overall, nearly 80 per cent of KIPP graduates
nationwide have gone on to enrol in four year colleges,
compared to averages of less than 20 per cent for students of
similar backgrounds.
There needs to be greater formal recognition of the particular
challenges that face schools with disadvantaged intakes.
Anything which helps the school establish a separate and rival
culture to the ‘street culture’ to which pupils are exposed outside
the school gates should be encouraged, including the following:
:
:
:
Specific focus on behaviour could be made part of
a summer schools programme in the transition year
before secondary school;
Extended schools could include components that target
behaviour, including teaching good behaviour;
There is good evidence as to the effectiveness of
school uniform in cementing school culture and there
is a strong case for allowing schools to use deprivation
funding to provide funding for parents who struggle to
meet the costs of a uniform. 6
4.3 HEAD TEACHERS – OPENING UP THE
PROFESSION
According to the General Teaching Council, up to 37 per cent of heads
are due to retire in the next five years. This would matter less if there
were lots of would be heads waiting for promotion. According to a
survey by the National College for School Leadership (NCSL), however,
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Tackling educational inequality
43 per cent of deputy heads do not wish to progress to headship and 70
per cent of middle teachers do not aspire to headship. In a recent survey
of deputy head teachers in the Borough of Bromley, only a quarter of
assistant heads were interested in moving up to headship. 7
The main reasons cited for this include the increase in paperwork and
bureaucracy, the pressure to constantly raise performance, the multiplication
of reporting lines and the proliferation of bodies to which the
head teacher is accountable, as well as a perceived reduction in pupil
contact.
The government has not neglected the importance of head teachers nor
been complacent about the shortage, but its approach has been heavily
top-down, focused on training, ‘professionalisation’ and standardisation.
The NCSL was created in 2001 to establish a steady flow of good
candidates for the headship role. The Specialist Schools and Academies
Trust (SSAT) provides training for prospective head teachers. In 2008
the National Professional Qualification for Headship (NPQH), which is
currently voluntary, will be made compulsory.
Review of Head Teacher Role
Another way of tackling the problem that would obviate the need for
intensive training and retraining is to review the role of head teachers
and to open up the profession.
The role of the head teacher has broadened enormously in recent years
to include new responsibilities in relation to financial and data management,
regulatory reporting and wider ‘stakeholder’ management. It is
time the roles of head teacher and deputy head were reviewed in the
same spirit as the ‘remodelling’ of the teaching profession in 2002-03. It
may well be that the traditional model of headship, where responsibility
is highly concentrated in a single individual, is no longer the best way
of meeting today’s much greater demands. One solution would be to
split the roles between educational responsibilities (such as teaching,
staff management, curriculum, pastoral care) and executive management.
Such a partition of roles may be more important in secondary
schools than in primary schools where, because of their smaller size, one
individual is more likely to be able to oversee all aspects of school life.
Opening Up the Profession
The head teacher profession is essentially closed to non-teachers. Any
applicant is required to have significant leadership experience, usually
implying a role in a school’s leadership team; therefore, applicants
would have to have Qualified Teacher Status. From 2008 they will also
be required to have the NPHQ qualification. This may be understandable
in the light of the traditional role of the head teacher, and the
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Tackling educational inequality
important teaching component of their work. However, it is possible
today, if a school elects to split the headship role, to envisage executive
management roles that do not require significant teaching experience.
It is time we experimented with bringing successful business executives
into schools, to see whether they can add real value to school
management.
4.4 GETTING SMARTER WITH DATA
During the past ten years, many sectors of society and the economy
have experienced a ‘data revolution’, often with transformative effects.
Such a revolution could also bring enormous benefits to education.
Many will be understandably nervous about such a prospect. Hitherto,
the issue of data management in schools has been synonymous with
a culture of government intervention and target setting, with all the
bureaucratic paraphernalia it has spawned.
But it need not be this way. At its best, a data revolution in schools
would empower head teachers to set objectives, equip teachers to better
understand and evaluate their pupils, inform parents about the performance
(in both absolute and relative terms) of their children’s school and
instruct school governors so that they can better hold head teachers to
account. Crucially, it should also speed the transfer of best practice and
dissemination of innovative new ideas.
To take an optimistic view, the rollout of education’s data revolution is
proceeding in phases, with phase 1 involving the creation of a standardised
nationwide system of testing and assessment and phase 2, perhaps
heralded by the Gilbert Review (2007) leading to a much more individualised
use of the data. 8 Phase 1, with its crude emphasis on ‘average’
and ‘floor’ attainment levels, has done little to help disadvantaged pupils.
Phase 2, by contrast, could provide significant opportunities for more
targeted teaching strategies to the benefit of both the most gifted and
the most disadvantaged pupils.
As phase 2 begins, however, there is still much that could be improved
about the existing framework for data management. The following
sections details seven proposals, under the headings of assessment,
transparency, accountability and proficiency.
Assessment in Primary Schools
Foundation Stage profiling
Many teachers complain about the excessive amount of data they are
required to generate and manage. One area where this is indisputably the
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Tackling educational inequality
case is at the Foundation Stage for five year olds, where, following the
abolition of level 1 tests, nursery and primary teachers are required to
produce a profile of each pupil. The profiling is intended to be assembled
by observation rather than by systematic testing, with the result that
much of it is qualitative, largely unformatted and difficult to compare,
store and use.
Foundation Stage teachers are currently required to record children’s
progress with cameras, tape recorders and written reports. 9 But, according
to a recent Ofsted Report, only a third of year one teachers (for
whose benefit the reports are compiled) claim to take any account of the
information these contain, with some saying they liked to “start from
scratch”.
Foundation Stage profiling should be transformed into a simple diagnostic
test of literacy and numeracy, supplemented by an ‘exception check list’
indicating the gaps in the child’s basic skill levels. This would provide a
better assessment of pupils’ learning needs, creating the proper foundation
for subsequent teaching strategies and personalised learning.
Key Stage 1 Tests
Now that the government has, rightly, decided to encourage the use of
synthetic phonics, the literacy component of Key Stage 1 tests should be
enhanced to provide more detailed assessment of pupils’ phonic awareness.
In particular, the tests should include more diagnostic components,
such as ‘word reading’ (word recognition decoding) which fully tests
the sound-symbol correspondences that the pupils ought to know, and a
more structured test of spelling with a stronger focus on encoding than
on the recollection of high frequency words.
Beyond threshold targeting
One of the unintended consequences of the government regime of national
targets is that schools are tempted to focus on borderline children - those
close to the ‘threshold target’ - at the expense of those who are well
below (or comfortably above) the national ’benchmark’. This is a problem
at all Key Stages but it is particularly notorious at Key Stage 4, where
significant teaching resources are often deployed to help pupils who are
borderline grades C-D, at the expense of underachieving pupils.
This could be solved by moving to a points based system, in which all
improvements in attainment, whether from grade F to E, D to C or B to
A, earned the school equal points. Such data – the ‘average pupil point’
data – is already published on a per school basis by the DfES. It should,
in future, become the primary measurement of school performance.
The Gilbert Review proposes the introduction of a school level aspirational
target in order to ensure there are no ‘stuck’ pupils, thereby putting
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pressure on schools to identify pupils not making progress between Key
Stage 1 and Key Stage 2 or Key Stage 2 and Key Stage 3. In a data rich
environment, this is valuable information that should certainly be made
available to Ofsted on a per school basis and inform its assessment.
Transparency
Awareness of the impact of pupil level factors on school performance
needs to be heightened and could be greatly improved by the release of
more relevant data. In particular:
Pupil intake data
Curiously, despite the availability of pupil attainment data at Key Stage 2
for those leaving primary school, there is no such data available for pupil
intakes at secondary school. With secondary schools increasingly able
to exercise selection powers (often to the detriment of disadvantaged
pupils), public availability of this data will enable a more informed public
debate about the impact of selection and the unevenness of the playing
field between different secondary schools. It will also improve understanding
of value added by school, given that the existing measures of
value added are incomprehensible to most parents.
FSM data
It is current practice to publish special educational needs data on a per
school basis but not to make the same disclosure about FSM eligibility.
There is no obvious logic to this. The evidence in part 2 showed that
FSM eligibility is almost as important to school attainment as SEN. Not
only do parents have the right to know about the relative deprivation
of the school intake but this extra transparency would help inform and
energise the national debate about pupil and school disadvantage.
Accountability
Equipping school governors
The quality and quantity of data now available should greatly enhance
the ability of governors to analyse the performance of schools and to
hold the head teacher and staff to account.
The most comprehensive performance assessment document is the
Performance and Assessment (PANDA) report, made available to the
head teacher every autumn by Ofsted. Each PANDA report contains basic
information about the school, including the context in which it works,
a summary of key performance data broken down by Key Stages, and
comparisons with similar schools. The report is confidential and Ofsted
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do not publish or pass it to anyone except the DfES and the relevant
LEA. PANDA has now been replaced with ‘RAISEonline’ which enables
schools to further analyse the information at an individual pupil level.
PANDA/RAISE reports should radically improve the quality of school
performance analysis and could become a key educational tool. However,
their use to date is inconsistent. Many head teachers do not release
the data to their governing bodies and many governors would not know
how to interpret the data if it were put before them. Data should be
kept as simple as possible, and guidance should be offered, within the
report, as to how statistically significant the data is. Furthermore, school
governors should be given basic training in how such data should be
interpreted.
Proficiency
The best schools have already begun to use data management to assist
them with individualised learning. If there is a single characteristic
common to all ‘high poverty, high performance’ schools, it is their effective
use of pupil tracking and monitoring and evaluation. Exceptional
schools have already understood and reaped the benefits that can be
derived from outstanding data management.
Unfortunately, however, the quality of data management in many
schools falls well below this level. Given the central importance of pupil
tracking to personalised learning and to improved attainment, the quality
of schools’ data should be given enhanced recognition in Ofsted
inspections. A simple, public, ‘Michelin’ style ranking of schools’ data
proficiency from one to five stars would make sure that schools gave
data management the priority it deserves. The ‘kitemark’ would have
to be displayed on the school’s website so that it becomes part of the
parents’ evaluation of the school.
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Endnotes
1 J Rose, ‘Independent review of the teaching of early reading’, DfES, March 2006.
2 Scottish Executive Education Department, February 2005.
3 DfES/QCA, ‘Key Stage 3 national strategy: designing the curriculum’, February 2002.
4 A Thernstrom ‘Close the gap by teaching social skills’, The Philadelphia Inquirer, 27 June 2004.
5 J David et al, ‘Bay Area KIPP Schools: A study of early implementation first year report 2004-05’,
SRI International, March 2006.
6 Ofsted, ‘Achievement of Black Caribbean pupils: good practice in secondary schools’, April 2002.
7 T Hayes, ‘Rising stars and sitting tenants’, 2005.
8 C Gilbert, ‘2020 Vision: report of the teaching and learning in 2020 review group’, December
2006.
9 Ofsted, ‘The Foundation Stage’, March 2007.
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