Weekly round-up: Strike threats over new pay offer

An awful lot has happened in the world of education this week. Catch up on all your must-read Tes content from the past seven days right here:

• Reject ‘insulting’ pay offer, NEU urges members 
  On Monday, the biggest education union, the NEU, urged its members to reject the government’s new pay offer to teachers, calling it ”insulting”. After intensive talks, the Department for Education offered a £1,000 non-consolidated payment for 2022-23 and an average 4.5 per cent rise for 2023-24.
   
• NEU: We don’t want to disrupt exams with strikes 
  After the NEU revealed plans for further strikes on Thursday 27 April and Tuesday 2 May, if its members reject the new pay offer, the union stressed that it does not want any industrial action to disrupt GCSE and A-level exams this summer.
   
• Heads to consider industrial action in response to pay deal 
  The NAHT school leaders’ union has warned that if its members reject the government’s “inadequate” teacher pay offer, “it is clear that industrial action will be necessary”. While the union’s leaders criticised the offer as being too low, they also said they did not believe that “sufficient funding is being made available” to schools to fund it.
   
• Pay offer ‘worst possible’ outcome for schools 
  Headteachers have warned that the new DfE pay offer is the “worst possible” outcome because it could break school budgets while also failing to keep teachers in the profession.
   
• Teacher pay offer: is it affordable for schools?
  The DfE has claimed that schools will be given enough funding to cover its proposed teacher pay deal, but heads’ and teachers’ unions disagree. Tes looks at whether the numbers add up.
   
• Keegan: ‘I know heads care deeply about pupils’ 
  Education secretary Gillian Keegan told headteachers it is “critical” that the pay dispute with teachers is resolved, in an email plea for their support.
   
• 50% PPA time? It’s one of the ideas for workforce reform 
  Increasing teachers’ time for planning, preparation and assessment is one of two big ideas to save a profession in crisis, writes Tes editor Jon Severs.
   
• Sats 2023: League table return ‘wrong’ amid catch-up efforts 
  The return of primary school performance tables for key stage 2 Sats is “wrong” and should be delayed to allow schools to manage the post-Covid recovery of pupils, primary leaders have warned.
   
• Concern over inspections of special schools, MPs told 
  Inspections of special schools are not always being carried out by “specialist” inspectors, a headteachers’ union has told the Commons Education Select Committee.
   
• Seven ways the DfE wants to strengthen MATs 
  The government has set out a plan to improve oversight of multi-academy trusts and help “high-quality” chains to grow in underperforming areas.
   
• AI could cut time-draining teacher tasks, says education secretary 
  Artificial intelligence could transform teachers’ day-to-day lives by reducing workload, Gillian Keegan said.
   
• Schools ‘should be excluded’ as strip-search location 
  Schools should be “specifically excluded” as an appropriate location for a strip search, according to a new report from children’s commissioner Dame Rachel de Souza.