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At every election we hear a similar refrain from all political parties – education standards are too low and schools are failing children. A frequently cited statistic is the proportion of children who leave primary school in England unable to read, write and add up properly. It is used to justify a range of different policies, from right and left. This includes the removal of school management, the need for a pupil premium, or creation of new schools. I have heard politicians put the number of 11-year-olds failing by this measure as high as 40%. Others, perhaps more reasonably, say it is 20%. But even setting aside this wide statistical variance, what does it actually mean? Illiterate or average? The key word here is “properly”. It is rather a weasel word, tacked on quietly at the end so as not to reduce the impact of the raw “facts” Sometimes it is left off altogether, giving the entirely false impression that up to 40% of 11-year-olds are entirely illiterate and innumerate. So what are the facts? The first place to look is at the results of last year’s Key Stage 2 national tests, or Sats as they are still popularly known. These show that 80% of pupils achieved the expected level in English and 79% in Maths – Level 4. As an aside, this is a big rise from 49% and 45% respectively in 1995 when the Sats began, although some argue this is down to the tests becoming easier and more teaching-to-the-test. So, the 80% attaining Level 4 could be used to support the claim that one in five pupils cannot read, write and add-up “properly”. However, a tougher test would be the proportion of pupils who achieved the expected level in both English and maths. In 2009 this figure in England was 72%. So, one could argue that 28% of children leave primary school unable to read and write and add up properly. But the reality is that this is a huge over-simplification of what the test results actually tell us. A pupil who attains Level 3, but does not reach Level 4, is very far from being unable to read, write or add-up. To gain Level 3 in maths, for example, a pupil must be able to do mental arithmetic with two digit numbers and solve written addition and subtraction problems using three digit numbers. To reach Level 4 they must, amongst many other things, be able to: Use mental arithmetic to solve sums using addition, subtraction, multiplication and division; recognise fractions and percentages; use and make three-dimensional geometric patterns; measure the area of simple shapes, and understand data collection, including terms like average and range, and to be able to interpret frequency diagrams. In other words, to get to Level 4 a child needs to be able to do a whole lot more than simply “add up properly”. Targets The same is true in English. A child who reaches Level 3 but not Level 4 is still able to read a range of texts “independently” and “fluently and accurately”. To get to Level 4 they must, amongst many other things “show understanding of significant ideas, themes, events and characters, beginning to use inference and deduction”. So, as with maths, achieving a Level 4 in English involves much more than the basics. Yet, politicians often cite these statistics as if pupils today are failing even to reach the Victorian schoolroom standards of knowing the alphabet, reciting times tables, and producing copper-plate handwriting. So how did we get to the idea that failure to reach Level 4 amounts to a failure to read and add-up properly? To understand this, you have to go back to the start of the National Curriculum 20 years ago. It introduced the benchmark of “levels” in each subject. The idea was that the average child would be at Level 2 at the age of seven and would move up one level approximately every two years. The key thing here is that the target levels were set at the attainment expected of the average child. In other words, a normal distribution curve would put 50% of 11-year-olds at Level 4, with 25% above that level and 25% below. ‘Political pressure’ Politicians who made a fuss about 25% of students performing below average would sound a bit daft. However, even during the creation of the National Curriculum politicians pushed for the benchmark standards to be raised. Duncan Graham, who ran the first National Curriculum Council, later related how the group that devised the maths curriculum deliberately set the standard “above existing practice” partly as a result of political pressure. While it is commendable that politicians want the school system to aspire to ever-higher standards, surely the benchmark should stay constant? In fact, the bar was quite deliberately raised by former Education Secretary David Blunkett, who said before taking office, that a Labour government would set “clear national targets” for the proportion of pupils reaching the benchmark levels. As he put it: “The national tests offer a benchmark of what should be expected at that age, rather than an average”. From that point onwards Level 4 became the dividing line between success and failure at age 11. Thus the Labour government likes to focus on the growing proportion of pupils who now achieve Level 4, while opposition parties prefer to draw attention to the large minority who fail to attain the benchmark. But can the test results really bear such interpretation? Quite apart from the confused issue of whether Level 4 is an average or a minimum level, there is also the question of consistency in the tests from year to year. As Professor Peter Tymms of Durham University explained to a Commons Committee a couple of years ago, the Sats tests have to change each year and keeping the standard the same is a matter of judgement. If the officials decide that the marks required to achieve a Level 4 should go up or down by even a single mark, the percentage of pupils achieving or missing the benchmark would change by 2% or 3%. As he said then, that is enough to “make national headlines” but in reality the change may be entirely due to errors of measurement. So, as the general election campaign continues, you might want to challenge politicians of all parties to explain exactly what they mean when they claim that 20%, 30% or even 40% of primary school leavers cannot read, write and add-up. And while you are at it, ask them what they mean by the word “properly”. This article is from the BBC News website . © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
April 17, 2010 | Posted in
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Nationwide Building Society is to stop some customers taking out less than
April 10, 2010 | Posted in
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&cat=19&pid=14274&cache=true " alt="UK savings ‘lowest in 40 years’" class="alignleft" />
People in the UK are saving less than at any time in the past 40 years, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS). The household saving ratio in the UK in 2008 was 1.7% of total resources, the lowest recorded since 1970, and well below the 7.6% average for that period. The ONS Social Trends survey reveals that housing, water and fuel now represent the biggest area of spending. In 1970 the highest proportion was spent on food and non-alcoholic drinks. Spending changes The ONS report, an annual account on the state of the nation, shows that housing, water and fuel now represent 21% of domestic household expenditure compared with 15% in 1970. Over the same period, the proportion spent on food and drink has fallen from 21% to 9%. The ONS says this does not necessarily mean the amount of food and non-alcoholic drinks purchased fell, but rather “it implies that expenditure on other goods and services has risen more rapidly”. Other categories showing large falls in the proportion of total spending between 1970 and 2008 were clothing and footwear, from 10% to 5%, and alcoholic drinks and tobacco, from 8% to 3%. But from 1998 to 2008, the proportion of total domestic household expenditure spent on services exceeded that for goods. Expenditure increases The proportion of total domestic household spending on services between 1970 and 2008 increased from 35% to 52%. Conversely, total household expenditure on goods decreased from 66% in 1970 to 46% in 2008. Other categories that showed an increase over the period were: • transport, increasing from 11% to 15% • miscellaneous goods and services – which include personal care, social protection, insurance and financial services – up from 7% to 13% • recreation and culture, from 9% to 11% And people’s perceptions and expectations towards their financial well-being affect their likelihood of saving, according to the ONS. Between 2006 and 2008, people who had not been saving during the past 12 months were more likely to save in the next 12 months if they expected improvements in their financial situation. This article is from the BBC News website . © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
April 8, 2010 | Posted in
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Rangers’ financial plight is being blown out of proportion, according to manager Walter Smith. The club have been unable to purchase a player for 20 months as Lloyds Banking Group tries to control the
April 6, 2010 | Posted in
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&cat=19&pid=13807&cache=true " alt="Turtles die in nets ‘in millions’" class="alignleft" />
Millions of marine turtles have been killed over the past two decades through entrapment in fishing gear, according to a global survey. Described as the first global synthesis of existing data, the study found especially high rates of “bycatch” in the Mediterranean and eastern Pacific. Six of the seven sea turtle types are on the Red List of Threatened Species. Writing in the journal Conservation Letters, researchers advocate much greater use of gear safe for turtles. These include circular hooks rather than the conventional J-shaped hooks on long fishing lines, and hatches that allow the reptiles to escape from trawls. Turtles must come to the surface to breathe. When they are caught in a net or on a fishing hook, they cannot surface, and drown. Lead researcher Bryan Wallace said the state of the world’s turtles was an indicator of the wider health of the oceans. “Sea turtles are sentinel species of how oceans are functioning,” he said. “The impacts that human activities have on them give us an idea as to how those same activities are affecting the oceans on which billions of people around the world depend for their own well-being.” Dr Wallace works in the global marine division of Conservation International and at Duke University in the US. Off target The raw material from the study came from records of bycatch – incidental catches in fishing gear – from different regions of the world. Over the period 1990-2008, records showed that more than 85,000 turtles were snared. However, those records covered a tiny proportion of the world’s total fishing fleets. “Because the reports we reviewed typically covered less than 1% of all fleets, with little or no information from small-scale fisheries around the world, we conservatively estimate that the true total is probably not in tens of thousands, but in the millions of turtles taken as bycatch in the past two decades,” said Dr Wallace. Three types of fishing gear are identified in the survey – long-lines, gillnets and trawls. Modern long-line boats trail strings of hooks that can be 40km long, usually in search of high-value species such as tuna and marlin. Gillnets are usually stationary, and use mesh of a set size in an attempt to target certain species of fish. The researchers suggest that several areas of the world account for particularly high levels of bycatch – the Mediterranean Sea and the eastern Pacific Ocean for all types of gear, together with trawling operations off the west coast of Africa. Catches cut Modifying fishing gear can have a dramatic impact on the size of bycatch. Shrimp trawls fitted with turtle excluder devices (TEDs) catch markedly fewer of the reptiles. A grid prevents anything large from entering the back portion of the net, and a hole above the grid allows accidentally snared animals such as turtles to escape. A number of countries now require that shrimp boats must use nets fitted with TEDs. The circular long-line hooks also reduce bycatch of birds such as albatrosses. However, some fleets have resisted adopting selective gear because fishermen believe it will reduce their catch. In many parts of the developing world, the gear is not available. Marine turtles face other significant threats. Debris in the oceans, such as plastic bags, can also cause drowning, while development in coastal regions can affect nesting and reproduction. Some turtles are still targeted for meat, and their shells used for tourist souvenirs. Numbers of adult leatherbacks – the largest species, growing to more than 2m long and capable of journeys that span entire oceans – are thought to have declined by more than 75% between 1982 and 1996. Richard.Black-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk This article is from the BBC News website . © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
April 6, 2010 | Posted in
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Large numbers of people remain in jail because society is too “risk-averse” to allow them to be released on licence, England and Wales’ parole chief says. Sir David Latham told the Guardian that public reaction to cases like that of James Bulger killer Jon Venables would make authorities even more cautious. The Parole Board chairman said the drop in the proportion of life-term inmates who were freed was an “over-reaction”. Society had to decide what level of risk it was ready to accept, he said. His comments come as the Parole Board is due to receive Venables’ case files. Venables, who murdered James Bulger along with Robert Thompson on Merseyside in 1993, is being investigated by police over allegations that he committed serious offences nine years after being freed on licence. He has since been recalled to prison. ‘Bad laws risk’ Sir David, a former appeal court judge, said criticism in 2006 by the then-Home Secretary John Reid about prisoner parole policy had had a significant effect on release rates. Sir David said if Parole Board members felt they would be “pilloried” for making a mistake that was “bound” to have an effect on them. He said the public was “perhaps unrealistic about the level of risk it should be prepared to accept”. “I’m concerned that the society we’re presently living in is becoming too risk-averse,” he said. “Society needs to realise that we can’t create a world which is free of risk. What society has to determine is what level of risk it is prepared to accept.” The alternative, he warned, was that prisoners would continue to be held in jail beyond their minimum term without justification. He added that there was a risk that a case like that of Venables could result in “bad laws” being created. Over the past five years, the proportion of life sentence prisoners who have successfully applied for release has dropped from about 35% to 15%. Sir David said this was an “over-reaction” when re-offending rates had remained stable at between 1% and 2%. He raised the prospect that his interview would be “distorted” by the press but said an open debate on the issue was needed. This article is from the BBC News website . © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
April 1, 2010 | Posted in
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A watershed in university participation has been reached – for the first time a majority of young women in England are going to university. Provisional figures, showing university entrance for 2008-09, show that 51% of young women entered higher education – up from 49% the previous year. The overall figures also show an all-time high of 45% going to university, including 40% of young men. Both Labour and the Conservatives are promising even more university places. Showing the scale of the social change – only about 3% of people were going to university in the early 1950s. Soaring applications This latest record high has been driven by a decade-long surge in the numbers of women going to university. A decade ago, although a slightly different measurement was used, 41% of women were going to university and 37% of men. The figures published by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills show the proportion of people aged between 17 and 30 who were entering higher education in the autumn of 2008. It shows that there has been an increase from 43% to 45% in the overall figure for the previous year – with an increase of 2 percentage points for both women and men. There had been a longstanding target for 50% of young people to go to university, which has never been achieved – not least because of a relatively slower growth in male numbers. ‘Great investment’ However political opposition to reaching this target has faded – with all the major parties pushing for more university places. In the Budget last week, the government sought to double the Conservatives’ promise of university expansion, by announcing a further 20,000 places for this year. But this increase will still not keep up the soaring demand for university – with admissions authorities reporting a 23% year on year increase in applications. There have been warnings that this will mean tens of thousands of well-qualified applicants will not get a place this autumn. Business Secretary, Lord Mandelson, whose department is responsible for universities, welcomed the continued push towards 50% of young people going into higher education. “This aspiration is important not for the sake of a target, but because Britain’s economy needs skilled graduates to innovate, grow and secure the recovery. A university education also sets students up to succeed across their lifetimes and a British degree is still a great investment for any individual.” This article is from the BBC News website . © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
March 31, 2010 | Posted in
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Money Talk The new tax year sees the start of some very important changes to the state pension system, especially for women. Changes are being made to the qualifying conditions for receiving the state pension, and also the ages at which it comes into payment. Both of these changes come into effect from Tuesday 6 April 2010. Qualifying conditions For those women who reach their state pension age on or after 6 April 2010, the number of qualifying years of national insurance (NI) payments needed for the full basic state pension (BSP) of
March 30, 2010 | Posted in
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Money Talk The new tax year sees the start of some very important changes to the state pension system, especially for women. Changes are being made to the qualifying conditions for receiving the state pension, and also the ages at which it comes into payment. Both of these changes come into effect from Tuesday 6 April 2010. Qualifying conditions For those women who reach their state pension age on or after 6 April 2010, the number of qualifying years of national insurance (NI) payments needed for the full basic state pension (BSP) of
March 30, 2010 | Posted in
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One in six care homes for the elderly is providing unsatisfactory or weak services, a report on standards in Scotland has warned. But the study rated 80% of all care services across the country as good, very good or excellent. The Care Commission studied the quality of care provided by adult and children’s services in Scotland over the year to March 2009. It also judged nursing agencies, foster care and childminders. The Care Commission said they were focusing on services which were performing badly to demand improvements to ensure the required quality of care. This is the first year of graded results for care services, which were gathered from more than 11,000 inspections carried out by the Care Commission. Private sector The ‘Making the Grade’ report, found that one in six care homes for the elderly achieved poor grades, with the services they provide judged as unsatisfactory or weak in at least one area. Just over 3% of care homes achieved these grades in every category they were judged on, including quality of care, staffing and management. Housing support and care-at-home services achieved the best results in adult services, with 48% and 46% respectively achieving grades of very good or excellent. For adult services, the private sector had the highest proportion of services receiving poor grades while the voluntary sector had the highest proportion of services with high grades. In Fife, 40% of adult services, the highest in the country, were judged as very good or excellent, whereas 4.5% of services in Argyll & Bute, the highest proportion, were found to be unsatisfactory or weak. ” It is so important that people who use services and families understand that they can play a major role in insisting on and driving forward improvements in care standards ” Ronnie Hill Care Commission The majority of children’s services achieved good grades, with about 98% judged adequate for their quality of care and support. One in three childminding services scored highly across every category while 25% of children’s day-care services also achieved the top grades. Care Commission director Ronnie Hill said: “The grading system provides people in care and their families with better information and therefore more choice and involvement about the standards of care provided at every care service in Scotland.” He added: “It is so important that people who use services and families understand that they can play a major role in insisting on and driving forward improvements in care standards. “Grading gives everyone ‘at-a-glance’ information about whether a service is performing well or not. “It means that good providers are getting the recognition they deserve and those who need to do better are under intense pressure to improve. “To get good grades, services have to show that the children and adults who use the services have good outcomes, are well cared for, supported and protected.” Examples of good practice singled out in the report included the Highland Hospice, Harmeny School in Edinburgh and Hilton Lodge Nursing Home in East Lothian. The Care Commission has the power to take enforcement action and shut down poorly-performing services. A new regulator, the Social Work Inspection Agency (SWIA), will take on the work currently undertaken by the Care Commission next year.
March 26, 2010 | Posted in
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