Tag Archives: Education and Skills

New report suggests institutions that prioritise student success are likely to have higher retention rates

New research by the Social Market Foundation (SMF) think tank reveals a big increase in students with BTECs entering university from the most disadvantaged areas compared to those who study just A levels.

A new report from the Social Market Foundation has found that the ‘Berlin Wall’ between vocational and academic education is crumbling, with the number of pupils who do not qualify for Free School Meals taking a vocational course increasing threefold over the last decade.

High-stakes exams can provide measures of student quality that may be imprecise and damaging to individuals and the economy in the long-term, as they do not take into account many of the factors unrelated to knowledge, skill, or cognitive ability – such as pollution - which can impact student performance, according to a new report by the University of Warwick’s Centre for Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy (CAGE), published by think tank the Social Market Foundation (SMF).

SMF Director Emran Mian responds to the government’s new Higher Education white paper, Success as a Knowledge Economy.

In a new paper Sir Anthony Seldon argues that teaching at university level is not consistently good enoughand sets out an original plan to improve teaching in British universities without excessive bureaucracy or compromising individual and original teaching styles.

New research from the Social Market Foundation’s Commission on Inequality in Education has found that poorer pupils are more likely to be affected by four teaching factors which contribute to worse educational outcomes.

The Social Market Foundation’s (SMF) Commission on Inequality in Education is an independent, cross-party initiative which is examining the causes and effects of inequality in education at primary and secondary levels in England and Wales. The commission is chaired by Rt Hon Nick Clegg MP.

New research from the Social Market Foundation think tank finds that the government is on course to miss its targets of widening participation in higher education – and has found significant differences between institutions’ intake of pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds.