Inquiry Calls for Reforms and New Entitlements to Raise Outcomes for White Working-Class Pupils

An independent inquiry concluded that England's education system requires once-in-a-generation reforms to serve white working-class children, who remain the lowest-performing large demographic. The year-long review, commissioned last summer by the multi-academy trust Star Academies and supported by the Department for Education, analyzed data on 1.25 million white British pupils receiving free school meals.

The inquiry spoke to thousands of young people and parents plus hundreds of teachers.

Co-chair Baroness Estelle Morris, education secretary from 2001 to 2002, said none of the initiatives introduced in the past 30 years had or sustainably raised performance. She noted a disconnect between the careers many families seek and the academic focus schools often emphasize. The panel issued 24 recommendations.

These include free local public transport for all young people up to age 21, extension of 30 hours of free childcare to all disadvantaged families regardless of parental employment, a national priority on reading fluency at primary level for white working-class children, and a major expansion of local high-quality apprenticeships.

Stephen, now 16, left school at 13 and spent three years out of education. He began a four-week course in Preston run by the charity Spear in January and will start a college barbering course in September.

He said schools needed more practical work because written assignments had not suited him. Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson said generations had been robbed of opportunity. She stated that the communities covered in the report were her own and that for the first time in a long time white working-class children had a government that would fight for them.