{"id":6631,"date":"2016-04-07T05:40:49","date_gmt":"2016-04-07T05:40:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/?p=6631"},"modified":"2016-04-07T05:40:49","modified_gmt":"2016-04-07T05:40:49","slug":"the-national-curriculum-as-a-benchmark","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/2016\/04\/07\/the-national-curriculum-as-a-benchmark\/","title":{"rendered":"The national curriculum as a benchmark"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I <a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/2016\/04\/05\/letter-from-a-civil-servant\/\">wrote<\/a> the other day about the latest DfE rebuttal of the idea that it should do anything to encourage a focus on sustainability in schools. \u00a0However,\u00a0I think this response\u00a0seems to go beyond the usual answer which was all about slimming down the national curriculum in order to free up schools, etc. \u00a0You know ...<\/p>\n<p>For example, I have not seen before the assertion that '<em>the national curriculum is a benchmark<\/em>\u2019 for all schools to measure themselves by. \u00a0Have you?<\/p>\n<p>Two points\u00a0seem to me to follow from this:<\/p>\n<p><strong>A.\u00a0<\/strong>If we are to take the benchmark idea seriously, then this presumably means that all schools have to take the NC (or at least what it says) seriously. \u00a0Thus there is no real difference between academies and maintained schools.<\/p>\n<p><strong>B.\u00a0<\/strong>Looking at these two quotes:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>1. \u201c\u2026\u00a0we have significantly slimmed down national curriculum (sic)\u00a0which focuses on the essential elements.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>2.\u00a0\u201c If autonomous academies or multi trust academies (MATs) wish to deliver the national curriculum in their schools, they can do so confidently. \u00a0However, we also want academies to use their freedoms to innovate and build more stretching and tailored curricula,\u00a0to meet the particular needs of their pupils or their local area\u00a0\u2026\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>It seems to me that\u00a0the second passage implies that an academy cannot now\u00a0just\u00a0\"<em>deliver the national curriculum\u00a0\u2026\u00a0confidently<\/em>\u201d as it only contains <em>essential elements<\/em> and is therefore not sufficiently <em>stretching<\/em>. \u00a0If so, this must apply to all schools. \u00a0As such, just teaching the national curriculum is not enough for anyone. \u00a0So, in curriculum terms, there would seem to be little to differentiate maintained schools, academies and free schools (ie, non-fee-paying independent schools), and\u00a0fee-paying independent schools any more: all are subject to the 2002 Education Act, and all have to teach well beyond the national curriculum.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I wrote the other day about the latest DfE rebuttal of the idea that it should do anything to encourage a focus on sustainability in schools. \u00a0However,\u00a0I think this response\u00a0seems to go beyond the usual answer which was all about...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":237,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6631","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comment","category-news-and-updates"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6631","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/237"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6631"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6631\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6631"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6631"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6631"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}