Posted by Editors Education Business, In The News, Management Consultants, Managerialism, Teach First Thursday, May 26th, 2011
With UK Education Secretary Gove’s approval rating among teachers on a par with that of Col. Gaddafi among Libyan rebels, it is eyebrow-raising to say the least that he aims to push through reforms that would see teachers from Oz, NZ and other select countries being allowed to teach in the UK without undergoing retraining [...]
Posted by Editors Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, CfBT, In The News, Private Schools, Social Enterprise, Teach First Monday, May 23rd, 2011
We cheered when reading that the UK’s Charity Tribunal is about to pass judgement on the status of the 1200 or so independent fee-paying schools that still believe they warrant some kind of discount for teaching the rich. Of course the schools PR organisation – the ISC – and their supporters are trying their best [...]
Posted by Editors In The News, Teach First, Teach for America, Teach for Australia, Unions Wednesday, April 27th, 2011
More predictable news from the US involving the redundancy of employed teachers to make way for new Teach for America recruits. In what is seen as a very deliberate attempt to undermine the teaching unions, the Kansas City School District have told over half of 200 teachers without tenure that their contracts won’t be renewed. [...]
Posted by Editors Academies, CfBT, Free Schools, In The News, Special Schools, Teach First, Tories Wednesday, April 27th, 2011
We have already written at some length about the new philanthropic organisations that appear to be doing the UK Tories’ dirty work and also the rather creative interpretation of UK charity commission guidelines that permit organisations like Teach First to operate as charities. CfBT Education Trust is another on-message charity. They claim to “provide education [...]
Posted by Editors In The News, McKinsey & Co., Michael Barber, Teach First, Tories Wednesday, March 16th, 2011
The news that three senior McKinsey & Co consultants are in the dock for the US’s most serious insider trading scandal in generations makes us wonder if this consultancy firm is really the right one to lead UK education policy. Prosecutors allege that a billionaire hedge fund founder, Raj Rajaratnam, was given tips about McKinsey [...]
Posted by Editors In The News, McKinsey & Co., Primary Education, Teach First Wednesday, March 9th, 2011
Good to see that the ‘charity’ known as Teach First is hard at work. Now that they’ve got their claws into primary school kids they’re obviously not going to waste any opportunity to spread their message of bringing joy and light into the lives of the poor. The occasion as part of Teach First PR [...]
Posted by Editors Free Schools, In The News, McKinsey & Co., Michael Barber, NUT, Research, Teach First, Tories, Working Conditions Saturday, February 26th, 2011
This was going to be a post about the Tory White Paper. We took a look at it but what really caught our eye was how many times Sir Michael Barber got a mention. In fact, you’d be forgiven for thinking that Barber was Education Secretary given the amount of space devoted to his work [...]
Posted by Editors In The News, Teach First Wednesday, February 9th, 2011
With all the promise on their website of future opportunities with blue-chip companies, you’d be forgiven for thinking there existed some hard evidence to back up Teach First’s promotional message. We looked for such evidence on their website, of course, but did we find any? On TF’s website you can read a lot about career [...]
Posted by Editors In The News, Teach First, Unions Friday, January 28th, 2011
For any who still see Teach First through rose-tinted spectacles, then a Dallas CBS video (see link below) tells a predictable and saddening story. Teachers Face Layoffs While DISD Extending Teach For America Program A familiar tale: – Local and state authorities employ graduate teachers to maintain staff numbers and reduce the wage bill. -Such [...]
Posted by Editors Education Business, In The News, Secondary Education, Teach First Tuesday, January 18th, 2011
We thought we’d look a little closer at exactly how challenging Teach First’s schools really are. That TF teachers are working in schools that need them is made much of in TF’s literature. In the Summary Information Return 2009 Of Aims, Activities and Achievements for Teach First TF declares its “mission is to address educational [...]
