Bain Schools Review reports

Review released

The Independent Strategic Review of Education was initiated by the Secretary of State Peter Hain in March 2006, with a remit to "look at how we best meet our duty to encourage and facilitate integrated education, which is a vital building block towards creating the conditions necessary for long-term peace and stability in Northern Ireland". The secretary of state outlined his commitment to integrated education in a speech at the Labour Party Conference later in the year.

• The report recommends that the minimum enrolment for primary schools should be 140 in urban areas and 105 in rural areas. The current minimum number advised is 60 pupils.
• The report advocates the promotion of sharing and collaboration between schools but makes no demand for enforced integration.

It's worth noting at this point that the report is just a report; it has not been adopted as government policy. The Minister, Maria Eagle, has responded, welcoming and accepting major sections of it.

Opinions on the report have begun to emerge from the voluntary and community sector.

"The review is radical and presents all education partners with significant challenges to move beyond the status quo towards a Shared Future", said Michael Wardlow, the Chief Executive Officer of NICIE. "In focusing on the outcomes which a future, shared education service should provide for young people, rather laying down rules for school structures, Sir George allows all of us with an interest in education to use our creativity to imagine new ways of sharing".

The One Small Step campaign has claimed that, if implemented, the review could lead to more sharing in Northern Ireland.

Trevor Ringland, who chairs the group that promotes reconciliation within the community, welcomed the focus on greater sharing between schools serving Catholics and Protestants and other sectors such as integrated and Irish language schools.

He said he hoped the review would lead to the ending of the ‘religious, political and social engineering” that stops children from different backgrounds learning together and becoming friends.

School numbers and sizes

• Our analysis shows that, because of falling pupil numbers and Northern Ireland's many school sectors, there are too many schools in Northern Ireland.
• Schools with enrolments below relevant thresholds should be reviewed and schools that are found to be not educationally sustainable should close, regardless of their economic position or the non-educational services they provide. The Review adopts a similar approach to sixth-form enrolments.
• As a baseline of effectiveness, therefore, and in conjunction with enrolment thresholds, the level of surplus capacity distributed across the schools' estate should not when aggregated exceed 10 per cent so as to cater for a degree of uncertainty in planning and to accommodate choice.

• A full copy of the report can be downloaded directly.

  Review of Education

  PDF, 890KB

  The diversity of school type, the selective system of education, the existence of single sex schools, and the substantially rural nature of Northern Ireland largely explain both the relatively large number of schools that exist and the sizeable proportion of small schools. Although the range of provision is explained, and indeed justified, by the principle of parental choice, the inefficiencies manifest in the system need to be addressed as a matter of urgency.

Integration

We acknowledge that integrated schools make a highly significant and distinctive approach to educating children and young people together. We believe, nonetheless, that all schools, and all the educational interests, need to, and wish to, play their part in the journey towards the goal of A Shared Future - "a peaceful, inclusive, prosperous, stable and fair society firmly founded on the achievement of reconciliation, tolerance and mutual trust".

Irish medium education

The Review has identified a number of important factors that warrant DE to review the current position and to develop a comprehensive and coherent policy for Irish-medium education. These factors are the pattern of growth in the sector, a lack of consensus on aspects of the educational process and on the suitability of the environment for education through Irish, and a radically changing planning context for education.

Equity and Quality

• Equity requires a review of the funding for fee-charging preparatory departments in grammar schools, admission to which is determined by parents' ability to pay.
• There is evidence that the resources of the education system are not being used as effectively as they might be. There are opportunities for improvement, and the incidence of low attainment and the legacy of underachievement within Northern Ireland's overall performance levels require that these opportunities are taken.

Integration with Further education

• Each learner should have a host learning organisation that takes responsibility for overseeing the coherence of the individual's learning programme, and his or her progression within it.
• The provision in schools, colleges of further education and work-based learning should be more complementary and better co-ordinated, with provision by each type of organisation capitalising on its distinctive strengths and capabilities, in terms of its teaching expertise and facilities. Progression routes within each type of provision should be made accessible and clear to their respective users.

Area Provision

• Local areas should comprise coherent sets of nursery, primary and post-primary schools, and, as appropriate, special schools, as well as accessible further education provision, and as far as possible should lie within a single local council's boundaries.