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Closing class divide is core mission in schools |
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The Fabian call to narrow the gap in education outcomes would be at the core of the agenda for the new children's department, said Schools Minister Jim Knight.
Closing the class gap in schools results will be a core mission for the new Department of Children, Schools and Families , praising the Fabian Society's life chances work in setting the agenda for government policy.
'Closing the attainment gap is an absolutely core objective of the new DCSF. It is not the only gap – the gender gap remains; there are other gaps. Children's lives are complicated and they are subject to more than one gap. It will be important that we find a solution that closes all of those gaps'.
'There are some positive stories to tell, but there is very much more that we need to do', said Knight, praising the work of the Fabian Society in setting the agenda on education policy.
The Fabian Life Chances Commission called for a new Public Services Target to close the attainment gap in March 2006; this will be part of the Comprehensive Review Settlement in education policy.
'We have made progress and we haven't widened the achievement gap. Some of the gaps around ethnicity have started to narrow: Afro-Caribbean students are improving at twice the rate of the average. The performance gap for Bangladeshis has narrowed sharply'.
International progress shows that when you make steady progress, often the gap widens because the most disadvantaged find it hardest to make progress, he said.
Knight said that personal learning in schools needed to be combined with a much stronger focus on how what happens outside schools influences education outcomes.
'Personalisation needs to extend into less of a preoccupation with standards. You can't do standards without the other Every Child Matters outcomes'.
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