The education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, has warned of “massive” inequality in England’s education system, as students brace themselves for this week’s A-level results.
After 14 years of Conservative government, Phillipson said educational inequalities were “baked in”, citing regional disparities in results and attainment gaps between children at state and private schools.
On Thursday, hundreds of thousands of 18-year-olds in England, Wales and Northern Ireland will collect grades that, for many, will decide whether they get into their university of choice.
Experts say England’s north-south attainment gap is likely to persist, while privately educated students are expected to continue to outperform their state-educated peers.
Amid fears that some poorer students are being deterred from progressing into higher education because of financial concerns, Phillipson did not rule out bringing back the maintenance grant for poorer students that was cut by the Conservatives in 2016.
She said the task of reversing the last government’s legacy of educational inequality was “enormous”, but promised reform of the system, with fewer children living in poverty and better support for schools.
Phillipson told the PA news agency: “I want to make sure that all young people, whatever their background, have the chance to get on in life and that’s the mission of the Labour government.
“But my concern, as we approach the first of the results days, is that after 14 years the Conservatives have baked in massive inequality into the education system, including regional disparities and differences between outcomes for children at state and private schools, and I’m determined to turn that around.”
Last year there was an 8 percentage point gap between the proportion of students getting A*-A grades in south-east England and that in the north-east – wider than the five-point gap in 2019 – while pupils in private schools were more than twice as likely to achieve top grades as those in the state sector.
Phillipson highlighted the need for high-quality teaching. “But it’s also what goes on beyond the school gates and that’s where we’ve also seen big failures over the last 14 years,” she said. “And it will take us time to get that right, but I am determined that we bring down the numbers of children living in poverty.
“It’s a moral cause, but it’s also a big driver of some of these disparities that we see and it’s why we need to take action to support schools. This is an enormous task and I don’t shy away from that for one second.”
With thousands of undergraduate places still unfilled a week before results day, Phillipson said university was “a fantastic option” but lots of people still did not think it was for them. “I want to work with universities to ensure that we are widening access, but also we’re making sure that young people have the support that they need to complete their courses,” she said.
Asked whether she would bring back maintenance grants, she said: “I’m acutely aware of the pressures that many students are under at the moment and it concerns me that, when I visit universities and meet with students, I hear that they’re working 30 hours a week in retail jobs in order to meet the cost of housing and other costs.
“I am determined that we reform the system. You’ll appreciate, a month in, we’re looking at how we can make that change happen. But I don’t want young people to be put off applying to university on the basis of financial imperative and sadly I think increasingly we’re seeing young people making decisions based on their finances and that’s a really big challenge.”
Pepe Di’Iasio, the general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders union, said: “It is clear that there is a broad north-south divide in educational outcomes and that this is linked to varying levels of prosperity and disadvantage.
“There must also be a concerted national strategy to lift children out of poverty as this has a material impact on their readiness and capacity to learn.”
Meanwhile, a headteachers’ union has called for the English baccalaureate (EBacc) to be scrapped after new analysis showed that A-level entries in creative arts and technology subjects had plummeted since its introduction in 2011.
The Ebacc is made up of core academic subjects and is used as a school accountability measure. Since its introduction, the Association of School and College Leaders says, entries for performing arts have declined by 73%, music and design and technology by 45% and drama by 43%. Recent Ofqual data showed a continued downward trend.
