‘Pay teachers £10k top-up to work in weaker schools’

Secondary students in the North five times more likely to attend underperforming school than those in London, study says

25th June 2021, 12:01am

Catherine Lough

New Schools Network: 'pay Teachers £10k Top-up To Work In Weaker Schools'

Outstanding teachers should be encouraged to work in underperforming schools for a minimum of three years through a £10,000 salary top-up payment, a new report on regional disparities between the quality of schools suggests.

The report - Lost Learning - from think tank Onward and the New Schools Network, published today, highlights the scale of regional disparities that pupils face in attending a “good” or “outstanding” school.

Background: Coastal schools’ poor results ‘are down to demography’

Coastal schools: Hardest hit by GCSE reforms

The research shows that a secondary student living in the North of England is around five times more likely to attend an underperforming school than a student in London.

It highlights a concentration of underperforming areas along the Midlands border, including Wellingborough, Kettering, Derbyshire and Doncaster, and notes that many of these areas were recipients of Opportunity Areas funding.

Call for pay boost to encourage teachers to work in underperforming schools

At primary school level, the proportion of the local areas that the report classes as “education deserts” is twice as high in the South West (6.4 per cent of local areas) and Yorkshire and the Humber (5.7 per cent) compared with London (2.9 per cent).

But it says there is a “clearer regional divide” at secondary level, where 11 out of 12 local authorities in the North East - 92 per cent - have a higher than average share of secondary students attending an underperforming school, followed by the North West with 77 per cent. This compares with just one in seven - 16 per cent - of local authorities in London having an above-average share.

The report also says that “it is notable that the North East emerges from this analysis as one of the best places to go to primary school but the worst place in England to go to secondary school”, and suggests that weak institutional quality at secondary level has “created a cycle of underperformance rather than improvement”.

“This drop-off between performance in the North of England at primary level compared to at secondary level is pronounced, suggesting that it is school quality, rather than demographic characteristics, which is driving underperformance,” the report says.

Students in London are also 8 per cent more likely to progress to sustained education after key stage 4 compared with their peers in the North East, the report finds, adding that “this has profound implications for social mobility and prospective earnings”.

It also notes that “outstanding” schools have a lower proportion of pupils on free school meals. In the most income-deprived areas, “outstanding” schools still have a lower proportion of pupils on FSM.

In areas of deprivation, “underperforming schools take on an average of 6 per cent (at primary) and 4 per cent (at secondary) more disadvantaged pupils than ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’ schools”, the report says.

The report recommends that the government should use multi-academy trusts as the “engine of school improvement” through reintroducing additional funding for MATs to take over underperforming schools.

And it says that in the case of “stuck schools”, the government should “be prepared to close down stubbornly underperforming schools” to fund a new wave of “Phoenix” schools under a free-school model to replace them.

A £10,000 bonus for ‘outstanding’ teachers

It adds that the government should “encourage outstanding teachers to move to an underperforming school for a minimum of three years by introducing a £10,000 salary top-up payment” as well as introducing a “Teacher Premium” to “be allocated per teacher in underperforming schools, to be spent on training and continuous professional development”.

“We recommend that teachers working in an outstanding school who have reached M4 on the main pay scale should be eligible for an automatic bonus of £10,000 per year (roughly equivalent to an additional four months’ salary) if they move to an ‘inadequate’ or ‘requiring improvement’ school for a minimum of three years. To control the cost to the taxpayer, this scheme should be limited to 200 teachers in the first instance,” it says.

It adds that the use of supply teachers and teaching assistants should be reviewed, as well as the amount of time spent in school, with a view to lengthening the school day.

Martyn Oliver, chief executive of Outwood Grange Academies Trust, said: “This report contains the ambitious and bold plans that are necessary for us to not only build back stronger but to level-up our education system. All children, everywhere, deserve an excellent education: it is in everyone’s interest that we succeed in this national priority.”

Katharine Birbalsingh, headmistress of Michaela Community School, said: “A fascinating analysis of how schools enable social mobility, with suggestions on how to make this happen everywhere.”

Jonathan Gullis, Conservative MP for Stoke-on-Trent North, said: “In my constituency, there is only one ‘outstanding’ secondary school and this is reflected in Progress 8 scores being the seventh-lowest in the country.

“If we are to successfully give young people the opportunities they deserve, we must start with providing them with a brilliant education in the place they call home.”