Tag: Policy

‘They don’t have enough’ – schools in England are running food banks for families

Posted on by Lucy Backwell
Evgeniya Grande/Shutterstock

Will Baker, University of Bristol

The peak of the cost-of-living crisis may have passed, but millions of families are struggling to buy enough food to feed their children. Experiencing food insecurity can be deeply damaging for children and negatively affects their achievement at school.

My research, alongside other studies, shows that schools are operating their own food banks and providing charitable food aid to families. This shows how the education system – from early years to secondary schools – is increasingly at the front line in responding to child poverty, food insecurity, and destitution. (more…)

Female students for political leadership in Nigeria: mirroring possibilities?

Posted on by Lucy Backwell

By Zibah Nwako and Oluwadamilola Akintewe

Our society exists in such a way that a small unit can be a mirror to the whole. For instance, the family is one of the smallest units of society and the composition of what makes a family is the representation of, to a certain extent, the larger society. In the same vein, we can deduce that leadership and governance across student unions in Nigerian universities, replicate governance at State and Federal levels.

A student union is the apex body of students in a higher institution of learning, created for the purpose of promoting and guarding the interest of its members[1]. The Student Union Government (popularly termed SUG) is the middle body between the university administration and the whole student population. It is also the first point of contact for vital information disseminated from the top administrative hierarchies to the students. (more…)

The Brazilian Education Fracture and COVID-19: A Historical Perspective

Posted on by Lucy Backwell

 Blog Post by André Hedlund, Chevening Alumnus, MSc in Psychology of Education from the School of Education at the University of Bristol.

“Challenging. The Brazilian Educational System is Huge”

This is written on the website of Todos Pela Educação (All for Education), an NGO that provides information about the Brazilian educational scenario in order to help boost quality and access to basic education. 

Brazil has a history of elitism and oppression. Education was used as an evangelisation tool by the Jesuits to convert Indigenous Brazilians in the early colonial years, between the 16th and the 19th centuries. Till this day, many schools are run by religious institutions. In the 19th century, the elite either had the luxury of private tutors or sent their children abroad, particularly Portugal, for their studies while slaves traded in from Africa were not allowed any type of education at all. Black people are still marginalised as a consequence of structural racism. (more…)

Students’ anxiety about the allocations of grades for cancelled high-stakes public examinations

Posted on by Lucy Backwell

Dr Lucy WenhamClaire Lee

Blog by Dr Lucy Wenham, University of Bristol and Claire Lee, University of Bristol

With the imminent release of A-level grades in England on Thursday, 13 August, followed by GCSEs on 20 August, anticipation is mounting. This year will be unlike any other. For the first time, with mass school closures resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic, students have not had the opportunity to sit these high-stakes public examinations. They will instead receive allocated grades, arrived at through a combination of predicted grades, teacher judgments and comparative rankings of their perceived performance in relation to their classmates (Ofqual, 2020). Our research (EBI, 2020) clearly shows that students directly affected are experiencing considerable stress, anxiety and a feeling of helplessness concerning the allocation of these grades – which is unsurprising given that their future educational and employment choices and opportunities are at stake. (more…)