Mark Adams

From @tombennett71

Violent pupil behaviour is going ‘under-reported’ by teachers, with some staff even being discouraged from reporting it, warns @NASUWT leader @MattWrack tes.com/magazine/news/…

Huge huge huge money pumped into Ed sector. Huge salaries. Layers of bureaucracy. Outcomes poor. Nobody wants to address that. If we label kids as disordered we don’t need to examine failings in system.

The whole nonsense of inspection needs ripping down. Emperor’s New Clothes. It’s all horseshit - reaching valid/reliable high stakes judgements about a school based on a short visit by strangers who couldn’t do a better job but presume to judge. What a job .. demoralise a community of professionals with zero responsibility for the fallout and then leave, spouting crap about being champions of disadvantaged children. The delusion of it. 😡

No. Really strongly. No. Can you imagine how badly this would be done?

Little Woody. 💙 Our first weekend walk today. We got stopped by lots of people asking about him! Lovely afternoon for a walk. #puppy

In case you missed it: on removals, and why teachers typically remove students too late.

The key question with the new Ofsted reports will be one of validity. We've been told that schools getting "exceptional" will be pretty rare. We would expect schools getting lots of exceptionals to therefore be, well, exceptional! But what does that word mean to us? Different people think of different things when they hear the word "exceptional." The inspection's "validity" is the extent to which its judgment aligns with what people generally think of when they hear the word "exceptional." One thing I imagine most will agree on is "outcomes." Take progress 8 for example. In the previous system, there were schools getting outstanding that had average or worse than average progress 8. In the new system, will that happen? Will we be comfortable with schools that have objectively poor academic outcomes being labelled as exceptional? Of course, results aren't everything. A school with great academic outcomes isn't necessarily a great school. In logical terms, academic outcomes are necessary but not sufficient conditions. They aren't enough, but they are required. For schools that are on a journey of improvement: fantastic - I love you and respect the work you are doing. But can we call you exceptional until those outcomes are genuinely exceptional? In many cases and in my opinion - not yet. Overall, whilst it's "just one metric", I think I'll be disappointed if we start to see schools being labelled as exceptional and worth emulating if the outcomes aren't genuinely exceptional.

@DavidDidau Niche

All kids can do FAR more than we realise. Black, or poor, or special needs or kids who misbehave… They are all let down by a system of excuses that refuses to push kids to their potential. And those of us who do push kids are vilified for it. 🙄

Schools often forget they’re full of strategists. School isn’t plug‑and‑play. A well-designed system can do most of the work, but you can’t check your brain. There are schools where the kids can’t read and behavior is awful, but the crisis is the learned helplessness of adults.

I always get told off for this, but you can spend 5 minutes in any school these days and figure out pretty quickly that there are way too many students with special arrangements like toilet passes, extra time, time out passes etc etc

Putting even more pressure on schools at the moment is a terrible idea. theguardian.com/education/2025…

And chaos and violence will follow

Sounds like England’s current leadership has been attending way too many American education conferences.

My article in today’s ⁦@Telegraph⁩ reflecting on the Government’s Curriculum & Assessment Review published yesterday - “Labour’s dumbed-down curriculum is a betrayal of aspiration”. telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/11/0…

@TPScheme I’ve been trying to login for weeks now without success

There has never been a generation of young people so colonised by mental health propaganda at such a young age.

@C_Hendrick @P_A_Kirschner Love that Paul is ‘bed peace’

@teacherhead @olicav Bonus points to anyone who can name the band