National News
San Francisco teachers strike ends as tentative deal reached with district
Friday 13th February 2026School district says students will return next week after teachers demanded higher wages and more health benefitsSan Francisco teachers who have been on strike over wages and family health benefits have reached a tentative agreement with the school district...
What is the new gender guidance for schools and colleges in England?
Friday 13th February 2026Advice on how to respond to students questioning their birth gender has been updated...
'Locking my phone away at school reduces stress'
Friday 13th February 2026Solihull's Alderbrook School has implemented a smartphone ban and some pupils have welcomed it...
More exam stress at 15 linked to higher risk of depression as young adult – study
Thursday 12th February 2026UK charity warns against excessive academic pressure and suggests reducing the number of high-stakes testsExam stress at age 15 can increase the risk of depression and self-harm into early adulthood, research suggests...
Declines in health and education in poor countries ‘harming earning potential’
Thursday 12th February 2026World Bank says children born today could earn 51% more over lifetime if their country’s human capital improvedDeteriorating health, education and training in many developing countries is dramatically depressing the future earnings of children born today, the World Bank has said...
Coroner says school record gaps pose risk to lives
Thursday 12th February 2026After the death of Georgia Scarff, a coroner says safeguarding record-keeping should be standardised...
'Vast majority' of parents should be told if children question their gender, schools told
Thursday 12th February 2026School leaders welcome the "greater clarity" on how to handle the polarising issue for parents and pupils...
Declining health and education in poor countries harms earning potential, World Bank says
Thursday 12th February 2026Report says children born today could earn 51% more over lifetime if their country’s human capital improvedDeteriorating health, education and training in many developing countries is dramatically depressing the future earnings of children born today, the World Bank has said...
Susie Dent’s tips and tricks to add muscle to a child’s vocabulary
Thursday 12th February 2026To help combat the impact of screen-time creep, the Countdown word supremo has a few suggestionsChildren’s vocabulary shrinking as reading loses out to screen time, says Susie DentChildren’s vocabulary is shrinking as reading loses out to screen time, the Countdown lexicographer Susie Dent has suggested, as she urged families to read, talk and play word games to boost language development...
Children’s vocabulary shrinking as reading loses out to screen time, says Susie Dent
Thursday 12th February 2026Exclusive: Countdown lexicographer urges families to read, talk and play word games to help language developmentSusie Dent’s tips and tricks to add muscle to a child’s vocabularyChildren’s vocabulary is shrinking as reading loses out to screen time, according to the lexicographer Susie Dent, who is urging families to read, talk and play word games to boost language development...
'Vast majority' of parents should be involved if children question their gender, schools told
Thursday 12th February 2026School leaders welcome the "greater clarity" on how to handle the polarising issue for parents and pupils...
Gender guidance for English primary school pupils permits use of different pronouns
Thursday 12th February 2026DfE guidance urges teachers to respond to social transition requests ‘with caution’ and includes Cass report findingsPrimary school-age children who question their gender could be allowed to use different pronouns under long-awaited government guidance on the subject...
New plan to fix 'ageing and fragile' schools exposed by Raac crisis
Wednesday 11th February 2026Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson says the government's 10-year strategy is a "turning point" for schools...
Child dies after 'medical emergency' at school
Wednesday 11th February 2026A letter to parents from Collingwood College says a Year 8 child died in an incident on Monday...
NUS urges ‘loan shark’ Reeves to reverse changes to student debt repayment
Wednesday 11th February 2026Policy announced in autumn budget freezes threshold at which students start repaying university loansProtesters dressed as sharks and in Rachel Reeves face masks gathered outside the Houses of Parliament on Wednesday to express their anger over changes to their student loans and their ballooning debt...
English secondary schools must offer inclusion areas for neurodiverse and Send pupils
Wednesday 11th February 2026Special spaces are a key part of government’s planned overhaul of special educational needs supportSecondary schools in England must provide specially designed areas for neurodiverse children and pupils with special educational needs, ministers have said...
School phone policies in England a ‘huge drain’ on staff resources – study
Tuesday 10th February 2026Teachers and admin teams spend 100 hours a week enforcing rules, Birmingham University research findsSmartphone policies in English secondary schools are a “huge drain” on resources, with staff spending on average more than 100 hours a week enforcing restrictions, according to research...
Spanish is clearly now the world’s coolest language. So why do we push children to learn French? | Gary Nunn
Tuesday 10th February 2026As Bad Bunny showed at the Super Bowl, español is the coming thing...
'A hug, a quick kiss': How to reconnect after having children
Tuesday 10th February 2026Relationships often change after children. Here are ways to help get your partnership back on track...
Local police aid ICE by tapping school cameras amid Trump’s immigration crackdown
Tuesday 10th February 2026Local police assisted federal immigration agents by repeatedly searching school cameras that record license plate numbers, data showPolice departments across the US are quietly leveraging school district security cameras to assist Donald Trump’s mass immigration enforcement campaign, an investigation by the 74 reveals...
How these schools are improving behaviour and attendance
Tuesday 10th February 2026The government says schools needing "intensive support" will receive "one-to-one sessions"...
'We are just parents, not a couple': How to reconnect after having kids
Tuesday 10th February 2026Relationships often change after children. Here are ways to help get your partnership back on track...
Number of home-schooled children attending 'social' learning sessions rises
Tuesday 10th February 2026Deb Hadden runs drop-off sessions, where children can play and learn with each other...
Spanish is clearly now the world’s coolest language. So why do we push British children to learn French? | Gary Nunn
Tuesday 10th February 2026As Bad Bunny showed at the Super Bowl, español is the coming thing...
San Francisco teachers begin first strike in nearly 50 years
Monday 9th February 2026Thousands walk out after talks with district failed to reach agreement on wages, healthcare and resources for students with special needsAbout 6,000 public schoolteachers in San Francisco went on strike on Monday, the first public schoolteachers strike in the city in nearly 50 years...
Children with special needs in England will keep current support, minister says
Monday 9th February 2026Georgia Gould reassures parents that no child will be asked to leave school or have levels of assistance removedChildren with special needs will not lose their places at special schools or current levels of assistance, an education minister has told parents anxious that the government would strip away their child’s support...
State school sees 62 pupils with Oxbridge offers
Monday 9th February 2026More than a quarter of students at The London Academy of Excellence are offered places at Oxford and Cambridge universities...
Attack 'ended my teaching career': The toll of rising pupil violence
Monday 9th February 2026Former head teacher Michelle Stone was attacked by a student at a Hampshire special school...
Schools that cultivate the mind but neglect spiritual education leave children unanchored in a challenging world | Kat Eghdamian
Sunday 8th February 2026Young people are hungering for meaning. A lack of spiritual education in childhood can reverberate across a lifetimeMaking sense of it is a column about spirituality and how it can be used to navigate everyday lifeAs a parent, I want nothing more than for my children to grow into healthy, happy, purposeful human beings...
The Guardian view on student loans: a graduate levy by stealth is no way to fund the NHS | Editorial
Sunday 8th February 2026By freezing thresholds, Labour is quietly loading the cost of public services on to young graduates, while insisting it has not raised taxes at allThe personal finance expert Martin Lewis upbraided the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, for freezing the threshold at which millions of graduates repay their loans, saying that this was treating student debts like tax...
Pentagon to cut ties with Harvard over ‘wokesters’, ending training, programs and fellowships
Saturday 7th February 2026Move by Pete Hegseth marks latest escalation by Trump administration against the Ivy League schoolThe US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, has said the Pentagon is ending all military training, fellowships and certificate programs with Harvard University, marking the Trump administration’s latest escalation against the Ivy League school...
Inspections impact on head teachers to be monitored
Friday 6th February 2026Teachers, Ofsted and unions will study how new report cards affect school leaders' wellbeing...
Inspections impact on headteachers to be monitored
Friday 6th February 2026Teachers, Ofsted and unions will study how new report cards affect school leaders' wellbeing...
Bad and getting worse: for students like me, the loan system is the disaster that never ends | Rohan Sathyamoorthy
Friday 6th February 2026The current situation in England and Wales is akin to generational warfare – Martin Lewis is right when he takes ministers to taskAs someone who receives close to the maximum student loan from the government each year, I try my best not to think too hard about the crushing financial burden I am going to carry into my postgrad years...
Increase school funding to meet need for special education, MPs urge
Friday 6th February 2026A cross-party group calls on the government to "align funding to need", as ministers consider SEND reforms...
Parents back 20mph speed limit plans near schools
Thursday 5th February 2026Surrey County Council puts forward proposals to reduce the speed limit near schools...
One in six autistic pupils in UK have not attended school at all since September
Wednesday 4th February 2026Data comes as government prepares to publish plans to overhaul Send system in EnglandOne in six autistic pupils have not been to school at all since the start of this academic year, according to a new survey which found that mental health issues were often behind high levels of school absence...
‘If I think about what this means, I want to cry’: what happens when a city loses its university?
Wednesday 4th February 2026When Essex University’s Southend campus opened, it was a message of hope for a ‘left behind’ UK seaside town...
Private school to close after 'misconduct' concerns raised
Wednesday 4th February 2026The Scottish Charity Regulator said Fernhill School in Rutherglen had not submitted accounts for years...
Ban on phones in schools backed by House of Lords
Wednesday 4th February 2026The move comes just weeks after peers supported legislation to ban under-16s in the UK from social media...
Fewer schools and 'cashless' meals in education reform plans
Wednesday 4th February 2026The Department of Education plans will be presented to MLAs for approval...
The Guardian view on inclusive schools: ministers should recognise that class size matters | Editorial
Tuesday 3rd February 2026Less crowded classrooms would make interacting with teachers easier, benefiting pupils including those with SendThere is no single, ideal class size – just as there is no one model of the perfect teacher...
School to accept girls for first time in 500-year history
Tuesday 3rd February 2026Magdalen College School says the move will "enrich" its community for "generations to come"...
Harvey Willgoose’s family says ‘too many red flags’ missed before school stabbing
Tuesday 3rd February 2026Caroline Willgoose, whose 15-year-old son was killed by another pupil, says murder was ‘senseless and avoidable’ The family of a 15-year-old boy who was stabbed to death at school by another pupil has said her son’s murder was “senseless and avoidable” and that a report ordered by the school showed too many “red flags” were missed...
California faces teacher strikes across state for better pay and work conditions
Monday 2nd February 2026Action could begin next week in some of state’s largest districts including San Diego, San Francisco and LACalifornia is facing the prospect of massive teacher strikes across the state as conflicts over working conditions, pay and special education staffing reach a boiling point...
London schools face cuts to staff and budgets as pupil numbers fall
Monday 2nd February 2026Demand for year 7 pupils is expected to fall by 7.6% over the next four years, with similar numbers expected in primary schoolsSchools in London could lose £45m in funding over the next four years as pupil numbers continue to fall, with secondary schools facing cuts to staff and curriculum as their budgets dwindle, a report has warned...
‘They are not manufactured’: how Brit school stars took over the Grammys
Monday 2nd February 2026Croydon school’s principal says success of Olivia Dean and Lola Young is a ‘brilliant celebration’ of free arts educationAs the Grammy winners took to the stage in Los Angeles on Sunday night, one common thread emerged: many had once walked the halls of a comprehensive school in Croydon, south London...
Schools 'struggling' for pupils as birth rate falls
Monday 2nd February 2026Birth rates have dropped from 2,000 a year to around 1,400 in the last decade, a council says...
Graduates in England and Wales: share your views on student loan repayments
Monday 2nd February 2026We’d like to hear from graduates about how they’re faring with paying back student loans...
Disabled children’s legal rights are ‘red lines’ in Send overhaul, ministers warned
Monday 2nd February 2026Exclusive: Charities and experts fear changes to special needs education in England may weaken legal protectionsUK politics live – latest updatesMinisters have been warned that any dilution of legal rights for disabled children and their families would cross “red lines”, as the government prepares substantial changes to special education needs and disabilities (Send) provision in England...
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