The COVID-19 pandemic and the public health restrictions that followed changed the structure and experiences of education for young people in the UK. School closures, home schooling, online learning and exam cancellations were some of the consequences of the public health measures taken. School closures were intermittent between March 2020 and…

The COVID-19 pandemic affected the health of millions of people across the country -- at the time of publication, there have been over 20 million confirmed cases of the virus in England and just over 170,000 deaths within 28 days of a positive test, and the ONS estimate that 71% of the population have contracted the virus. Thinking about young…

Reforms to GCSEs were introduced in 2015. The major changes were a move from modules to a focus on final exams, and a change in the grading system from letters (A*, A…G etc), to numbers (9, 8…1 etc). The aims of the reforms were to improve standards overall by making courses harder and increase differentiation at the top of the grade range. This…

This year has seen exams take place again for the first time since 2019, a move back towards the pre-pandemic norm for schools and colleges across the country. But the cohort of young people taking exams this year have faced years of disruption to their educations, which has continued even when they've been back in the classroom. Mitigations for…

In 2011, the Sutton Trust published "Degrees of Success," which looked at university acceptance rates and how they differ by school type and area, finding state school pupils were considerably less likely to go to top universities than independent or grammar school pupils. "Access to Advantage" returns to the issues raised in…

Secondary schools have managed significant changes in the Key Stage 4 curriculum they offer in response to changes in performance tables and accountability measures from 2010 onwards. In this piece, the authors assess how these changes are starting to affect the educational choices and successes of pupils at the ages of 16 and 18. This is…

Successive governments have promoted academy sponsorship as a way to improve the educational achievement of young people from disadvantaged backgrounds. As the academies programme has developed, policymakers have increasingly seen academy chains, and especially multi-academy trusts (MATs) as the best way of working to improve the performance of…

Successive governments have promoted academy sponsorship as a way to improve the educational achievement of young people from disadvantaged backgrounds. As the academies programme has developed, policymakers have increasingly seen academy chains (especially multi-academy trusts) as the best method for fostering professionalism, value for money and…

Academies were started in 2000 to alter the fortunes of failing schools that disproportionately served students from some of the nation's poorest communities. By helping these schools with the support of philanthropic, educational and business partners, the intention was to improve the lives of young people from the least privileged backgrounds by…