Greening pledges education help Bradford and Doncaster

Education Secretary Justine Greening announced Bradford and Doncaster would join Scarborough in becoming “opportunity areas” today.

The areas are an initiative launched by Ms Greening last year in an effort to raise education and skills standards in under-performing districts while also giving young people better careers advice and help to access work experience and apprenticeships through local businesses.

Each opportunity area also receives money to turn one of its existing schools into a “research school” tasked with finding what works best for local children and rolling that out across the district.

Scarborough was in the first wave of opportunity areas launched last year and is now joined by Bradford and Doncaster. York’s Huntington School became a research school last year as part of a separate initiative.

The decision to make Bradford and opportunity area comes after repeated criticism of standards in the city from former chief inspector of schools Sir Michael Wilshaw.

Bradford Council leader Susan Hinchcliffe said the announcement came after the authority made “a strong case to Government for more investment in teaching and learning in Bradford”.

She added: “Education is a top priority for all of us. We are the youngest city in the UK with nearly 25 per cent of our population under the age of 16.

“Situated right in the heart of the north of England, it’s vital for Bradford’s young people to be successful if the North is to be successful.”

The poor performance of Doncaster schools was highlighted last month in a report from Ofsted which showed just 52 per cent of the district’s children attend secondary schools judged to be good or outstanding.

Coun Nuala Fennelly, Doncaster Council’s cabinet member for children, young people and schools, said: “All our young people deserve the very best start in life and we have been working hard, with our partners in Team Doncaster, to try and provide this in the borough.

“The introduction of the £3.5 million research school will be a welcome addition to Doncaster and we believe that it will work well with the current partnership we have established with the Partners in Learning Teaching School Alliance.”

As she announced the new opportunity areas in a speech in London, Ms Greening indicated she will press ahead with controversial grammar school plans in the face of stiff opposition.

A consultation on expanding selective education closed before Christmas and the responses are being analysed by officials.

The policy has divided Conservatives and angered teaching unions. But Ms Greening insisted education reforms cannot be put “on one side because people feel that there are things we shouldn’t be looking at”.

The Cabinet minister said opening up selective, faith and independent schools was an “exciting programme”.

She added: “It is now time to see how we can join up this education system that we have got so that the whole is greater than simply the sum of the parts going forward.”

Ms Greening said the country needed to find ways to “shift social mobility”.