Rise of summer tuition, achievement gap inquiry and boys with special needs

More than a quarter of parents, who are concerned about the 'summer slide', plan to hire tutors for their children over the summer holidays. According to a survey of more than 1,000 parents, commissioned by online tutoring site www.themathsfactor.com, 27% of parents plan to hire tutors for their primary-age children.

Conversely, the survey also suggests that more than a third of parents were unaware that their child's learning may slip back during the long summer break.

However, most parents said that they plan to work with their children on some sort of learning activity during the six week summer break. Suggested activities include reading books (29%), making use of literacy and numeracy apps (14%), Sats revision (8%) and other online courses to keep their children's minds active (7%).

Read more about the summer tutoring survey on BBC News.

The Education Select Committee has launched an inquiry into the underachievement of white working-class children.

This inquiry follows the release of official Department for Education figures that show that by the age of five, only one in three boys from poorer backgrounds are meeting development targets.

Written submissions are requested across several areas including, the extent of white working class pupils' educational underachievement, whether the problem is significantly worse for white working class boys than girls and what role government can play in delivering improved educational outcomes for white working class pupils.

The deadline for written submissions is noon on 30 September.

Read more about the inquiry on Parliament UK.

Nearly one in four state school boys have some type of special education need. This is close to double the number of girls, according to recent figures released by the Department for Education.

Almost one in five pupils in England, across both private and state sectors, are said to have SEN. The government figures show that this accounts for almost 1.5 million children (18.7%), which is a slight decrease from last year's figure of 1.6 million.

The survey revealed a vast difference between boys and girls; 23.3% of boys were judged to have special educational needs, compared with 13.7% of girls.

Campaigners have placed the blame for this on a combination of poor teaching and the incorrect labelling of children.

Read the full report on the Department for Education website.

When it comes to perks of the job, more than half of teachers want financial support for additional training or further study, according to a survey about employee benefits.

Money for training was voted the number one benefit teachers look for when taking up a new job. However, just 14% of teachers stated that they currently received these types of financial and training benefits.

An interesting aspect of the survey showed a dividing line between new and experienced teachers. The majority of teachers (55%) with less than 10 years teaching experience said that financial support to train was a key factor when considering a new post. More than 42% of those surveyed, with more than 10 years experience, agreed with their less experienced colleagues.

The responses come from a recent survey of teachers, commissioned by recruitment consultancy Hays Education. The survey also found that the majority of teachers surveyed (70%) stated that they would like to see education employees receive private healthcare.

Read more about the survey results on the Hays Education website.

The School Direct system for recruiting new teachers could lead to a potential teacher shortage, according to chief executive of university think-tank Million+, Pam Tatlow.

When giving evidence to the Education Select Committee, Tatlow claimed the introduction of the School Direct system of recruitment could lead to as many as 3,000 fewer teachers trained than is needed.

Under the Department for Education's School Direct programme, 9,000 teacher training places were transferred from universities to schools in 2012-13. Schools are expected to recruit trainee teachers who would then start their training in September 2013. At the end of the summer term, it is estimated that just under half of these places (45%) were unfilled, with many specialist shortage subject trainee places unfilled.

Pam Tatlow said: "Rather than expand the programme, School Direct numbers should be reduced in 2014-15 and a national strategy agreed to bring some stability and common-sense back into the system."

Read more about Pam Tatlow's evidence on the Million+ website.

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Now that summer is here, are playing hookie? | Open thread

Summertime is here and it's easy to feel that you're wasting it, bathing under the florescent lights at the office or fidgeting in a classroom seat. It's the time of year when some start to toy with the idea of playing hookie – for a day or afternoon – to hit the beach or pool, watch a sporting event or just enjoy a relaxing drink somewhere.

The trick, however, is to have some fun without burning up a vacation day. If you've dodged work to go play, we want to hear your stories of success and failure. And if you haven't, we want to hear your potential plans.

Technology has only heightened people's ability to appear in the office when they aren't, although you have to do it correctly, as one American recently learned the hard way when he failed to adjust the auto-capitalization function on his phone.

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GCSE and A-Level grading this summer could be as chaotic as last year because quality of marking is still poor, leading school heads warn

Dr Tim Hands, who becomes chairman of the Headmasters and Headmistresses Conference in September - which represents 250 of the country’s top private schools including Eton and Harrow, told a conference in London: “There is an unresolved crisis of instability at the heart of our currency exchange (exam) system.”

His comments coincide with thousands of pupils across the country embark on this summer’s GCSEs and A-levels.

He said that last summer’s fiasco over the marking of GCSE English - where the grade boundaries were changed after one set of pupils had sat the exam - had masked the real crisis facing the exam system.

Research by the HMC had shown that one in four teachers believed at least a quarter of their pupils had been awarded the wrong grade,? In addition, enquiries about remarking paper had soared from 171, 400 in 2010to 204, 600 last year.

It also found that 38 per cent of teachers lacked confidence in the GCSE and 27 per cent in A-levels.

The research findings have been described as “the tip of the iceberg” by Brian Lightman, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders - which represents state schools.

Speaking at a conference organised by the Higher Education Policy Institute think-tank,? Dr Hands, who is headmaster of Magdalen College, Oxford, said: “The timetable for improvement is uncertain and unsatisfactory.”

Education Secretary Michael Gove had earlier in the day confirmed that he is committed to bringing in exam reforms in 2015 although he acknowledged the timetable was “challenging”.

The reforms to both exams will usher in a new era of focusing on the one-off end-of-course examination rather than coursework.

However, Dr Hands said that - unless the major issue of shoddy marking was tackled - “the new qualifications will be built on sand”.

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