In principle, the introduction of primary specialist schools is welcome, but not to parallel secondary specialist schools’ reported success in adding one-and-a-half grades to GCSE scores (TES, June 22).
If a broad curriculum can be provided in the specialist primaries - a big “if” in the current climate - the initiative should enrich children’s experience. It should also remind us of the amazing potential of children in subjects other than maths and English. It needs to be justified in these terms: as good and challenging in its own right, not as an indirect way of bucking the levelling off of test scores or as investment in the nation’s future economic well-being.
Professor Colin Richards Cumbria
