Logistics: Curriculum

(asked on 10th November 2023) - View Source

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will take steps to include reference to (a) warehousing, and (b) logistics in the National Curriculum.


Answered by
Damian Hinds Portrait
Damian Hinds
Minister of State (Education)
This question was answered on 21st November 2023

The Department has no policy on the study of warehousing or logistics. The National Curriculum, which the Department reformed in 2014 to set world-class standards across all subjects, focuses on the key knowledge that schools should teach. In the Schools White Paper, published last year, the Department committed to not make any changes to the National Curriculum for the remainder of this Parliament. This was to embed the major 2014 curriculum reforms and to provide stability for schools and pupils following the pandemic.

The National Curriculum focuses on the key knowledge that should be taught. Within a broad statutory framework, set out in subject specific programmes of study, schools have considerable flexibility to organise the content and delivery of the curriculum to meet the needs of pupils and to take account of new developments, societal changes, or topical issues.

Maintained schools in England are legally required to follow the National Curriculum as a piece of statutory guidance. The National Curriculum is just one element in the education of every child; there is time and space in the school day and in each week, term and year to go beyond the National Curriculum specifications.

In addition to meeting their statutory duties, schools are also free to include other subjects or topics they deem relevant for their pupils, as part of the school’s wider curriculum. Consequently, there is room for schools to incorporate warehousing and logistics in their curriculum should they wish.

Academies and free schools have greater freedom and autonomy in how they operate for areas such as the curriculum, but they are expected to teach a curriculum that is comparable in breadth and ambition to the National Curriculum.

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