Weekly round-up: New strike guidance and the 32.5-hour week

Catch up on all your must-read Tes content from the past seven days right here:

• Strikes: Consider catch-up sessions, DfE advises schools 
  Schools could offer catch-up lessons or extra revision sessions for exam students amid teacher strike action this term, the Department for Education has advised.
   
• Strikes: NEU teachers to help exam groups on site ‘in extremis’ 
  Teachers who agree “in extremis” to attend school on strike days to supervise exam-year students should leave afterwards but be paid in full, according to new guidance from the NEU teaching union.
   
• Heads to vote over strike action 
  Members of the Association of School and College Leaders will be balloted on strike action over the school funding crisis, the erosion of teacher and leader pay and conditions, and staff shortages.
   
• Teacher strikes Q&A: everything you need to know
  With more teacher strikes set to take place in England, questions will be swirling around schools. Here’s what everyone should know.
   
• Not enough teachers for ‘maths to 18’ plan, Sunak admits 
  Prime minister Rishi Sunak has acknowledged that more maths teachers will need to be trained and recruited in order to fulfil his goal of all children studying maths up to age 18.
   
• Experts advising Sunak on maths-to-18 plan named
  The experts who will sit on an advisory group set up to help Rishi Sunak achieve his maths-18 plan have been named, and the group does not include any leaders representing primary or secondary schools.
   
• Ofsted crisis: ‘Olive branch’ not enough to salvage trust
  Headteachers’ leaders have welcomed Ofsted plans to improve inspections but warned “a great deal” more change will be needed to restore the confidence of the profession in the inspectorate.
   
• Keegan backs one-word Ofsted grades 
  Education secretary Gillian Keegan has voiced her support for Ofsted continuing with one-word judgements of schools amid calls from teachers for the system to be abolished.
   
• Why schools must reflect on their self-evaluation culture 
  Amid calls to abolish Ofsted, head of English Yvonne Williams questions whether this would be enough to remove the inspection-related stress that teachers face.
   
• Trust body urges DfE to delay 32.5-hour school week plan 
  The Confederation of School Trusts, the sector body for academy trusts, has called for the government’s plan for a minimum 32.5-hour school week to be “delayed or reconsidered”, adding its voice to growing demands for more clarity on the policy.
   
• Ditch or delay 32.5-hour rule, heads tell Gibb 
  Headteachers’ union leaders have called on schools minister Nick Gibb to drop or delay the expectation that schools stay open for at least 32.5 hours a week from this September.
   
• Just 23 per cent of teachers would ‘certainly’ train to teach again 
  Only a minority of teachers would “certainly” retrain for the profession if given the option to go back in time and choose their career path again, research shows.
   
• GCSEs 2023: Grading fears amid high exam student absence
  Fears have been raised over the plan to return GCSE grade standards to pre-pandemic levels after new Tes analysis revealed that exam student absence is still 75 per cent higher than before the Covid lockdowns.
   
• Revealed: the schools least visited by ministers
  Nearly half of the English schools visited by education ministers since the start of last year were in London, and just two were rated below “good” by Ofsted, Tes can reveal..