Families have a critical role to play in helping ‘unseen children’
The publication, by Ofsted, of Unseen children: access and achievement 20 years on seeks to re-shape the entire English education system so that the spread in regional performance is narrowed and its ‘long tail of underachievement’ is shortened.
For the first time, Ofsted identifies and puts centre-stage, a group of ‘unseen’ children from poor families who are let down by coasting schools. Such schools may achieve satisfactory, or even good, results for the rest of their pupils, but which fail those in receipt of Free School Meals.
The report makes a convincing case that poverty of expectation, from both parents and schools is a greater problem than material poverty in blighting achievement, especially among under-privileged White British communities. It also considers education from birth to the age of 19, although it does not take the jump of extending its thinking to encompass continuing education through the life-course.
The report recognises that underachievement starts from birth and identifies the features of effective nursery and primary schools, among which is a readiness to engage with parents. Where the report is curiously silent, however, is around the potential for educational interventions with parents or with whole-family approaches.
When considering vocational and skill-based training post-16 the report does not pull its punches, suggesting that the further education sector also needs to improve its performance in helping disadvantaged teenagers who did not succeed at school, particularly in English and mathematics. It also suggests that employer engagement in FE and skills requires further strengthening – a message that successive reforms over the past 25 years have promised to deliver.
Ofsted acknowledges though that the sector has simply been responsive to the incentives it has been given by different governments. Its solutions – to dismantle large colleges found to be inadequate and to require post-16 providers to monitor students who had previously been eligible for free school meals – are likely to provide a challenge, not least logistical, to colleges and other providers.
This is an important report which is about far more than the headline-catching proposals for external testing in Key Stage 1 or teams of teachers employed by central government to be sent in to help in areas causing concern. NIACE agrees with the analysis that underachievement needs to be tackled in early years and hopes that the National Inquiry into Family Learning, which we are co-ordinating under Baroness Howarth, will help them take the next steps needed when it reports in the autumn.
NIACE also welcomes the opening-up of a debate about what constitutes success in FE, which goes beyond simply counting qualifications and which could take more account of ‘distance travelled’ and the outcomes for learners.
