GENERAL

• Mental health support. The government announced an additional £7m for schools, colleges and universities to train extra mental health leads as part of its contribution to Mental Health Awareness Week, with further money also going to charities to tackle bullying and develop respect.
• Education Commission. The Times hosted an Education Summit as part of the build-up to the launch of its Commission’s Final Report, looking at the exam system and future needs, and highlighting employer evidence about the need to provide young people with the basic skills needed for future employment. 
• Work Review. The PM appointed Matt Warman MP to lead a review of the labour market and the future of work generally, building on the Taylor Review, and to consider how best to support employer needs and skills, create a productive workforce and examine the impact of automation.

SCHOOLS

• Queen’s Speech and Schools. The government announced a new Schools Bill in the Queen’s Speech, intended to encourage more schools to join multi-academy trusts as well as tackle the issues of pupil attendance and unregistered schools.
• School attendance. The Children’s Commissioner for England outlined some of the initial findings from her Attendance Audit, launched after last year’s Big Ask to try to understand more about school absentees, with the full findings due to be published next month. 
• School system. The Local Government Association published a commissioned report into school types using Ofsted inspection grading to compare performance, arguing that schools that stick with their local council are more likely to perform better than academies and that a one-size-fits-all approach is not a necessary guarantor of success

FE/SKILLS

• Defunding qualifications. The government published the list of L3 qualifications, including 38 BTECs, that overlap with the first T levels for which it proposes to withdraw funding for new starters from August 2024, with appeals allowed up to 8 July 2022.
• Digital Skills Training. Google launched a further wave of digital skills training with its Digital Garage scheme which will deliver free in-person digital skills training for individuals and businesses at locations around the country.
• WorldSkills 2022. WorldSkills UK announced the list of 29 young people who will represent the country in the 2022 WorldSklills competition in China.

HIGHER EDUCATION

• Queen’s Speech and HE. WONKHE provided a useful run down of Bills proposed in the Queen’s Speech that could affect higher education including the rollover HE (Freedom of Speech) Bill and Online Safety Bill but also an HE Bill covering recent funding proposals, a Levelling Up Bill, Renters Reform and Social Housing Bills, and a Public Order Bill.
• REF results. The results of the 2021 assessment of UK university research, carried out through the extensive Research Excellence Framework and signalling an important moment for UK research and university ambitions, were published, with 41% of submissions deemed world leading and 43% judged internationally excellent.
• Degree trends. The Office for Students published a new report looking at graduate attainment rates over the last decade and showing a doubling of the proportion awarded a 1stclass honours with nearly 60% unexplained in terms of background factors leaving the OfS pointing to plans to investigate in more detail.