Last chance to have your say on workload

Teachers have until the end of today to tell the government about their ideas for managing workload. By the time the Workload Challenge closes, more than 50,000 teachers are expected to have completed the survey, which was launched on the TES website a month ago by education secretary Nicky Morgan and has also been supported by deputy prime minister Nick Clegg. According to Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development statistics, teachers in England work nearly 12 hours a week more than the OECD average but spend less time in the classroom. The results of the Workload Challenge will be considered by a panel of education experts, who will put forward recommendations for action. Find the survey at www.tesconnect.comdfe

Wilshaw backs school in uniform row

Headteachers are right to send pupils home for going against uniform policies because it teaches young people to respect rules, the head of Ofsted has said. Too many young people are still leaving school unaware of how to dress or act in the workplace, according to Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw. Speaking to business leaders at a CBI conference in Cambridge, Sir Michael backed Hanson Academy in Bradford, West Yorkshire, which launched a uniform crackdown and sent home 250 pupils in three days for dress violations. The school was teaching students “a lesson in how to be employable”, he argued.

Rethink announced on English and maths retakes

The government is reviewing its policy of requiring all post-16 students who fail to gain a C in GCSE English and maths to retake the exams, it was announced this week. Speaking at the Association of Colleges’ annual conference in Birmingham, skills minister Nick Boles said he had commissioned the Education and Training Foundation to review the best way to accredit maths and English skills. Government figures show that just 7 per cent of people retaking the qualification in post-16 education receive a grade C in maths and only 6.5 per cent do so in English.

Girls’ school head warns of `unforgiving’ system

The exam system is in danger of becoming “unforgiving” with “no wriggle room or place to make amends”, a leading independent-school headteacher will say. Plans to decouple AS-levels from A-levels, leaving universities to judge applicants’ merits solely on their GCSE results, is particularly unhelpful, Alice Phillips will tell the annual conference of the Girls’ Schools Association (GSA) on Monday. Ms Phillips, president of the GSA and headteacher of St Catherine’s School in Bramley, Surrey, will say that exams should be the foundation for the future, not a “last-chance saloon”.

Teaching ranks high in school-leavers’ ambitions

Teaching is the second most popular career aspiration among school-leavers, according to a new poll of young people, with only medicine getting more votes. Many 16-year-olds still do not know what they want to do after they leave school, the research finds, but half the 500 London students polled were confident of getting their ideal job. The poll was carried out by business group London First to mark the Skills London careers fair this weekend. Mark Hilton, director of skills at London First, said: “The research shows London’s young students are not the reality-TV-obsessed, fame-seeking wannabes that they are so often caricatured as.”