Education News

A high-profile Department for Education (DfE) civil servant has declared that the partial or complete closure of schools will be a “way of life” until a vaccine has become available. According to national schools commissioner Dominic Herrington, the spectacle of entire class or year bubbles being summarily quarantined at home

The shadow Education Secretary, Kate Green, has urged the government to consider deferring the start of a number of university terms until widespread testing is fully available on all campuses. In a letter to the Education Secretary, Gavin Williamson, Green said that testing was the key to keeping students safe

The Health Secretary Matt Hancock is not excluding the prospect of preventing university students from coming home for Christmas in order to contain COVID-19 transmission. When questioned on BBC Radio 4 about whether students would be required to remain in their university towns over Christmas, Hancock replied that he had

The tightening of COVID-19 limitation measures is facing rising resistance from both within and outside parliament. The rebellion appears to be growing as students in Scotland were told not to socialise in local pubs, while undergraduates UK-wide face the prospect of being quarantined on campus over the Christmas holiday. The

There has been a welcome ‘surprise’ upsurge in the number of UK and international students beginning undergraduate studies in British universities this year, according to newly released data. UCAS, the UK’s university admissions regulator, has reported a 4% annual increase in students with a confirmed place in a British university

Glasgow University has seen a “significant” outbreak of COVID-19 that has led to 600 of its students being required to self-quarantine. 124 cases have occurred since the start of freshers’ week. A university spokesman has warned that the true number of cases is very probably higher, pointing to two campus

There has been a four-fold rise in schools sending ‘bubbles’ of children back home due to COVID-19 incidents, new figures for England from the Department for Education (DfE) suggest. As of Thursday 17th September, 4% of schools were only partially open due to confirmed or suspected COVID-19 incidents, as compared

Britain’s largest teaching union has warned that schools in designated lockdown areas may be just weeks away from implementing part-time teaching using a ‘two weeks on, two weeks off’ rota if coronavirus infection rates fail to decrease. The co-leader of the National Education Union, Kevin Courtney, has warned that this

The government has been forced to yield to demands for teachers to be prioritised for coronavirus tests. The decision to proceed with a national prioritisation scheme was made after mounting complaints that demand for tests was outstripping the supply for critical staff, with teaching unions warning that schools may be

Leaders of 30 student unions have issued a strongly worded letter to the Health Secretary Matt Hancock, urging him to stop blaming students’ “reckless behaviour” for the national increase in COVID-19 cases. Calling for the accusation to be retracted, the 30 student union presidents stated: “You must realise that young