There is a case for changing the post-16 curriculum in English schools. Education is devolved, but the Northern Irish, Scottish and Welsh governments might even be interested in considering the question jointly. If a Labour government is elected next year, and launches an expert-led review of the curriculum as promised, it should invite them to contribute. Currently, English secondary school pupils are overexamined, with two sets of qualifications rather than the single school-leaving certificate which is more typical internationally.
Over-16s in England also study a narrower range of subjects than in many other countries. The most popular A-level combinations are Stem (science, technology, engineering and maths) subjects. Given this, Rishi Sunak’s suggestion that English should become compulsory until the age of 18, as part of a broad new qualification called the Advanced British Standard, could be seen as a boost to the humanities.
Coming from Mr Sunak, such a proposal is hard to take as seriously as it deserves. Pupils have been badly let down by the Conservatives. Teacher shortages and other acute problems facing schools, including rising absenteeism and decrepit buildings, mean that reformers will have to be patient. But that does not mean that the shortcomings of the present system should not be thought about.
This goes beyond the limited number of subjects studied by A-level students. The vocational T-level courses introduced by the government in 2020 have flopped. Just 15,000 students were enrolled last year, compared with 280,000 who took the BTec courses that T-levels were meant to replace. T-levels are a curriculum‑narrowing measure rather than a broadening one, as students choose just one option.
Academic specialisation in England is not limited to schools. Unlike in some other higher education systems, including Scotland’s, most students in English universities study just one subject from the start. Concerns about the division this creates have a long history. More than 60 years ago, the cultural critics CP Snow and FR Leavis had a high-profile row about Snow’s view that more bridges were needed between the “two cultures” of art and science.
Last week, Prof Irene Tracey, the vice-chancellor of Oxford University and a neuroscientist, announced a course aimed at bringing humanities and science students together, to address what she called a “great divide”. Prof Tracey is far from unique in believing that a more rounded educational experience would be beneficial. But the prospect of implementing such changes more widely is remote.
It is almost 20 years since Labour opted not to implement the reforms recommended by Sir Mike Tomlinson, the centrepiece of which was the staged replacement of GCSEs, A-levels and other post-16 qualifications with a single diploma. Although we can’t know how such a transformation would have turned out, this was probably a mistake. The Cinderella status of vocational education, which boils down to snobbery, mars the school system now as is did then. Exams requiring too much pointless memorisation of information have proliferated under the Conservatives.
Sweeping changes are out of the question for the next few years. What schools need is support to recover and recruit. The reintroduction of AS-levels (half A-levels), allowing for a wider range of subject choices, would be worth looking at. But given current pressures, gradual progress is the most that can be expected.
