News at a glance

30th August 2013, 1:00am

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News at a glance

https://www.tes.com/magazine/archive/news-glance-233

Judge delays release of US teacher ratings

The performance ratings of a group of US schoolteachers will be kept under wraps until a legal battle is resolved. A judge has ruled that the ratings for individual teachers in the Los Angeles Unified School District will remain confidential until an appeal has taken place against a previous ruling that they should be released to a local newspaper. In court, the district argued that “immediate release of the scores will cause irreparable harm to privacy rights, and that harm dramatically outweighs any prejudice or inconvenience that might be caused by a brief delay in public release of the records”.

Minister calls on educators to tackle cyberbullying

Teachers should do more to tackle the “viciousness” and “cruelty” that leads to teenage cyberbullying, England’s education secretary Michael Gove said this week. He argued that although technology companies need to take responsibility for posts on their websites, schools should also address the issue. “It’s certainly the case (that) the internet creates a new arena where bullying can take place but . when it comes to tackling bullying, it’s not just fixing the technology, it’s fixing what’s in people’s hearts,” he said after giving a speech.

Britain is `sleepwalking into social apartheid’

Britain could “sleepwalk” into a “state of social apartheid” if more is not done to tackle child poverty, the chief executive of the National Children’s Bureau has said. Hilary Emery spoke out as the body published a report calling for urgent action on poverty, which results in children falling behind their peers at school. The study found that 3.5 million children are growing up in poverty, 1.5 million more than 40 years ago. “There is a real risk that, as a nation, we are sleepwalking into a world where children grow up in a state of social apartheid, with poor children destined to experience hardship and disadvantage just by accident of birth,” Dr Emery said.

All students fail Liberia university entrance exam

The education minister in Liberia has expressed disbelief after not a single candidate passed the African country’s university entrance exam. Nearly 25,000 school leavers failed the test to enter the University of Liberia, one of two state-run universities. Education minister Etmonia David-Tarpeh told the BBC’s Focus on Africa programme that she intended to meet university officials to discuss the failure rate. “I know there are a lot of weaknesses in the schools but for a whole group of people to take exams and every single one of them to fail, I have my doubts about that,” Ms David-Tarpeh said.

Dig deep to attend first private medical school

The UK’s first private medical school will charge fees of pound;35,000 a year, it has been revealed. The Buckingham Milton Keynes Medical School, a not- for-profit venture by the University of Buckingham and the Milton Keynes Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, will receive no government funding. It hopes to attract students who may otherwise have opted to go abroad to complete their training.

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