Education policy in the UK

Throughout the post-war period there have been many attempts to reform the UK education
system. This article reviews empirical evidence looking at the impact of some key reforms
which were designed to address a number of specific problems in the UK education system,
namely poor and apparently falling standards in schools, the low staying on rate at age 16, the
relatively poor basic skills of the UK population and persistent inequalities in Higher
Education.
A major concern in the 1980s was that the staying on rate in the UK, although rising, was low
by international standards. Furthermore, exam achievement at age 16 had stagnated. This led
to widespread concerns about falling standards in schools. In response the Conservative
governments of the 1980s and 1990s introduced a number of market mechanisms into the UK
education system, including parental choice, parent representation on governing bodies and
linking school funding with student enrolment numbers. Alongside this publicly available test
score information was made available with which parents could compare the performance of
one school with another. These reforms were designed with an explicit aim to improve pupil
achievement. They did, however, raise concerns about increased inequalities in schools. The
empirical evidence on the impact of these reforms is patchy. Certainly staying on rates rose
for all students and the gap in staying on rates between lower and higher socio-economic
group students actually narrowed somewhat after the introduction of these reforms. The
evidence on the impact of the reforms on pupil performance however is more mixed. At best
it suggests only very limited positive effects of choice and competition on pupil achievement.


The second area of concern to policymakers has been the poor basic skills of the UK
population, relative to other countries, particularly amongst younger workers. In response the
government introduced a standardised national curriculum for all students aged 7-16, in an
attempt to ensure that all pupils studied a minimum depth and breadth of curriculum. In the
1990s, a further policy innovation was introduced, called the literacy and numeracy hours.


This prescribed how teachers in primary school should teach at least one hour per day of
literacy and numeracy. Again the evidence of the impact of these reforms is not
comprehensive. An evaluation of the national curriculum has not been possible since it was
introduced nationally. However, there is evidence on the impact of the literacy hour which
suggests that it is a cost effective way of improving reading and English achievement.


A third problem policy area has been the relatively small number of pupils staying on in
education past the age of 16 and thus the low proportion achieving level 2 or 3 qualifications,
compared to other countries. There have been two major policies introduced to raise UK
participation in post compulsory education. 


The first is reform of the vocational qualification
system, particularly the introduction of new employer focused qualifications such as NVQ
and GNVQ, and the revitalisation of apprenticeship in the UK. The second policy was the
introduction of an education maintenance allowance paid to disadvantaged young people age
16-19 to encourage them to stay on in full time education. The empirical evidence of the
impact of these reforms is mixed. Many of the newer vocational qualifications have very little
labour market value, suggesting that they have not been successful in drawing young people
into high quality learning that leads to successful labour market outcomes. On the other hand,
the new modern apprenticeship scheme that results in a level 3 qualification does have strong
labour market value. The evidence on the impact of the education maintenance allowances is
much more positive, indicating that paying a modest allowance does indeed encourage higher
participation in education amongst disadvantaged students.


The final policy area that has been subject to reform in recent decades is higher education.
HE has historically been the preserve of higher socio-economic groups in the UK and,
although HE participation has risen substantially in recent decades, the relative position of
lower socio-economic groups in terms of HE participation is still poor. The policy response
has been to expand HE further, in an attempt to widen access to previously under-represented
groups. However, to finance this expansion tuition fees for HE have been introduced. There
are obvious concerns that this will have acted to depress demand for HE among poorer
students. In fact the empirical evidence suggests that although there remains a large and
widening gap in HE participation between richer and poorer students, this is not necessarily
related to the introduction of tuition fees. Furthermore, there is evidence that the policy of
expanding HE has not led to a collapse in the economic value of HE. Indeed the return to a
degree has remained high throughout the period.


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