Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what groups or working parties which her Department hosts or provides secretarial support to are routinely attended by representatives of education trade unions.
Answered by Nick Gibb
It has not proved possible to respond to the hon. Member in the time available before Prorogation.
Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to the Answer of 2 March 2017 to Question 64215, on primary education: standards, what the title of the research referred to in that Answer is.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The research study referred to was, Tymms, P., Merrell, C., Henderson, B., Albone, S. & Jones, P. (2012). Learning Difficulties in the Primary School Years: Predictability from On-Entry Baseline Assessment. Online Educational Research Journal June 2012.
On Thursday 30 March, the Department launched a consultation on primary assessment and the implications for accountability. This consultation covers key issues, including the best starting point to measure the progress that children make in primary school. We welcome contributions to this consultation.
Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to the Answer of 13 March 2017 to Question 66862, whether it is her Department's policy to allow parents to withdraw their children from statutory assessments in Key Stages 1 and 2.
Answered by Nick Gibb
As most parents recognise, assessment is an important part of primary education to help identify how their children are performing in key subjects.
The responsibility for making the final decision about whether it is appropriate to enter an individual pupil for the statutory assessments resides with that pupil’s head teacher, using their professional judgment. As statutory assessments are a fundamental part of our primary education system, it is not the Department’s policy to allow parents to withdraw their children from them.
Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many times she or Ministers of her Department have held meetings or had discussions on the reception baseline assessment with representatives from (a) the Centre of Evaluation and Monitoring, Durham University, (b) Early Excellence, (c) GL Assessment and (d) the National Foundation for Education Research since September 2015.
Answered by Nick Gibb
Details of meetings held by Ministers at the Department for Education with the Centre for Evaluation and Monitoring - Durham University, Early Excellence, GL Assessment or the National Foundation for Education Research to discuss the reception baseline assessment since September 2015 are shown in the table below:
MINISTER | DATE | ORGANISATION | PURPOSE OF MEETING |
Nick Gibb | 2 September 2015 | Early Excellence | Discuss the reception baseline assessment. |
Nick Gibb | 10 May 2016 | Robert Coe, Director of the Centre for Evaluation and Monitoring Durham University. | Seminar on primary assessment with educational experts and departmental officials. |
In meeting educational experts, and in all its work, the Department is mindful of the need to manage appropriately any potential conflict of interest.
Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what the Government's policy is on the Year 3 phonics check resit.
Answered by Nick Gibb
In 2016, 81% of pupils met the expected phonics standard in Year 1 (up from 58% in 2012) with 91% of pupils meeting the expected standard by the end of Year 2. The Government will not be introducing a Year 3 phonics check retake, although we carried out a small-scale pilot to explore the impact of a retake in Year 3.
Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many schools undertook reception baseline assessments in (a) 2015-16 and (b) 2016-17.
Answered by Nick Gibb
(a) For the 2015 to 2016 academic year, 15,241 schools submitted data to the Department for Education in relation to reception baseline assessment.
(b) For the 2016 to 2017, to date, 3,901 schools have submitted data in relation to reception baseline assessment.
Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will outline the process by which the GL Assessment reception baseline for use in the academic year 2016-17 was approved by her Department.
Answered by Nick Gibb
GL Assessment, along with five other approved suppliers, was appointed to provide the reception baseline assessment in 2015-16 as part of an open procurement process. Of these six suppliers, only three achieved sufficient order volumes to proceed to delivery.
When the decision was taken that reception baseline assessment would not be used as the baseline for progress measures in 2016-17, after the comparability study, the volume requirement was removed and schools were free to choose from any approved supplier. GL Assessment, along with three other suppliers from the original procurement, opted to offer a reception baseline scheme.
Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what proportion of pupils changed schools between reception and before taking Key Stage 2 assessments in the academic years (a) 2010-11, (b) 2011-12, (c) 2012-13, (d) 2013-14, (e) 2014-15 and (f) 2015-16.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The closest available published data, the proportion of eligible pupils classified as non-mobile (classified as those who did not move school in the 12 months preceding the census date) at the time of the Key Stage 2 assessment, is published annually on the Performance Tables website at:
https://www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/download-data
In 2015/2016, 92% of pupils in maintained schools were non-mobile at the time of the Key Stage 2 assessment.
The information required to answer this question is not held and compiling it would be a very complex task which would incur disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what guidance is issued to head teachers by her Department on parent withdrawal of a child from statutory assessments.
Answered by Nick Gibb
Guidance for head teachers on the process for considering whether pupils should be entered for end of Key Stage statutory assessments is provided in the ‘2017 Assessment and Reporting Arrangements’ for Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2. This was published by the Standards and Testing Agency in October 2016.
These documents set out the statutory requirements for National Curriculum assessment and reporting for the 2016 to 2017 academic year. They make it clear that the responsibility for making the final decision about whether it is appropriate for an individual pupil to be entered for statutory assessments resides with that pupil’s head teacher. The head teacher should report their decision to the pupil’s parents.
Asked by: Lilian Greenwood (Labour - Nottingham South)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what proportion of pupils in (a) reception, (b) KS1 and (c) KS2 attend an (i) infant, (ii) junior and (iii) a middle school in the current school year.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The number of pupils, with a full age breakdown, in every school, is published in the underlying data of the statistical publication available at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/schools-pupils-and-their-characteristics-january-2016.