Powell: No more ‘dog eat dog’ culture between schools

The education secretary has said she wants to move away from a “dog eat dog” culture of school competition and towards a more supportive system.

Lucy Powell was interviewed by Tes after hosting a summit of school and political leaders this week discussing the government’s plans to boost technical education.

Prime minister Andy Burnham has promised the creation of new technical routes for 14-year-olds to be rolled out from September 2028.

When asked if new funding will be provided for this, Ms Powell said the courses have not been designed yet but would be “fully funded”.

Powell: I am ‘agnostic’ about school structures

Regional mayors, business leaders, headteachers and college principals were among those who attended the summit at No 10 North, in Manchester, on Thursday.

There were only a small number of representatives from the multi-academy trust sector in attendance, including Leora Cruddas, chief executive of the Confederation of School Trusts.

Ms Powell, when she was shadow education secretary, previously argued for all academies and free schools to return to local authority control.

When asked if this was still her view, she said: “To be fair, there was a time when the Conservative government was moving very quickly to full academisation, and we opposed that.”

The Labour government has since adopted a more supportive stance, calling in its latest schools White Paper for all schools to join a trust, albeit without a target date for achieving this.

Ms Powell now describes herself as “fairly agnostic” about school structures.

“It’s about what’s happening in schools and creating a more collaborative and self-supporting peer-to-peer culture, not so dog eat dog as it’s been a bit in the past.”

She added: “I want to concentrate on what’s really happening in schools, and supporting schools to improve, rather than being picked off against each other.”

Many technical qualifications ‘won’t need more facilities’

Ms Powell, who was appointed in July this year as part of Mr Burnham’s new government, has said that technical education routes will “rewire” the school system in a bid to tackle the almost 1 million young people not in education, employment or training (Neet).

There have been concerns in the schools sector about the staffing, resourcing and facilities needed to deliver the government’s plans.

The education secretary said that “some courses and qualifications have different needs when it comes to facilities”, using construction as an example.

“But many other courses are already delivered in schools, related to subjects that are already taught in schools, or don’t require those sorts of facilities. That’s where some of this will be delivered and considered locally,” she added.

Mayors will lead design of new routes

Ms Powell said that regional mayors will help local schools “understand and identify the local labour market, what opportunities there are in their area, and facilitate additional expertise where needed”.

“Mayors will also be the conveners and the facilitators of relevant work-experience placements, as schools frankly have enough on their plate,” she added.

She also acknowledged that “not all schools have those links with local employers”.

“Different things are holding [schools] back at the moment. Sometimes it’s the qualification offer itself. Sometimes it’s...the onus on schools in other areas. It’s very rarely that there’s not a demand,” Ms Powell said.

Accountability ‘still prioritises academic qualifications’

Pepe Di’Iasio, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, who attended the summit, welcomed the education secretary’s emphasis on balancing vocational and academic education.

However, he warned that the routes will operate “within an accountability system which prioritises academic qualifications pre-16, and this doesn’t work well for all young people”.

“We need a range of pathways which better reflect the importance of technical and vocational subjects and give every young person the opportunity to achieve great outcomes,” Mr Di’Iasio said.

Attendee Caroline Barlow, headteacher at Heathfield Community College in Sussex, agreed that the Neet challenge is one that needs addressing.

“There are opportunities that can be seized through the devolution that is being discussed and there are also valuable conversations about more flexible approaches to qualifications,” she told Tes.

Ms Barlow added that there is also an opportunity to “look at what is already being done on employability skills alongside the enrichment frameworks, and see how these can all speak to each other in a clearer way to that end goal”.