Rush in School Places Degrade Quality of Education

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By the end of September, 2013, it is expected that there will be a dramatic rise in total demand for primary school places across England, in which the quality of children’s education is going to be seriously affected. Though the demand for school places is felt massively, there has not been school is adequate numbers. The BBC News Education reports on this that it is a sheer indicator how poorly performing schools will be expanding more.

Serious Risks to Children’s Learning, Report says

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The report has further stated that the Department for Education cannot fathom the risks to children learning by multiplying growth of school places without plans. On this note, the report puts in emphatically, “The imperative to increase the quantity of school places should not be achieved at the expense of quality.”

The impact of overcrowded school places is assumingly to bring negative impact on learning. There will be more poorly maintained building with overcrowded students, which will bring down educational standards to great extent. Margaret Hodge, the committee chairman warns in this regard, “What is also being lost in all of this is the effect that different ways of providing new places might have on pupils’ learning.”

It is not too difficult to imagine what learning places will turn into especially when libraries and music rooms will be converted into classrooms, or playgrounds to house overcrowded children.

So, What is Impacting the Growing Number of Children?

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The past few years have been witnessing how the number of children entering classes is increasing at alarming rate. But The Department of Education council could not decide where and how the pupil numbers were rising and so could not adequately plan for the increasing demand.

The bad news is children in infant classes had shot up by 50% in the last five years. Yet, a more serious picture was 20% of primary schools became fully occupied by May, 2012. The committee further reports that England’s birth rate had started to rise since 2001. The more depressing news was the funding in schools was gradually declining since the total fund in capital pot was decreasing, which was planned for using in designing of schools buildings.

Though the need for designing and building school is felt immensely, local authorities are required to have discussions with all parties, including free schools and academies. The objective was to resolve any kinds of disparity between supply and demand for the communities. It is expected that discussions will prove hugely successful and there need to be further discussions on how to achieve the best and rightful value for money.

In this regard, David Lewis, the education minister comments, “Margaret Hodge is right and there is severe need to ensure there are enough school places but she has pinned the blame where it belong- at the door of the last government of which she was a member.”

 Thus, it clearly signifies that the department failed to plan properly for the growing population. But amidst all this, the departments also failed to explain the sheer responsibility for this particular failure made by Ed Balls, who had actually ignored the increasing birth rates.

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As a result, government has plans of doubling money for new school places as compared to what the previous government had decided. So, the government announced that it had plans of spending £7.5bn for creating 5, 00, 000 school places by the year 2021. Source