ISC Daily News Summary

We want to reassure ISC schools with overseas pupils that ISC is currently working intensively with the UK Border Agency to resolve areas of concern regarding the points based visa system for overseas pupils.  Meetings with UKBA are ongoing and we will update member associations and schools with progress reports.  A list of ISC's key questions to UKBA can be found in the Member Zone of the ISC website.  To access the questions and for additional information on points based immigration, login to the Member Zone and go to Legal Information > Hot Topics > Immigration > News tab. If you have yet to register for the Member Zone access please register here.  We have also set up a dedicated email address, Tier4@isc.co.uk, if schools wish to alert us to additional concerns.  We may not be able to respond to individual questions but we will make sure that issues of general application will be raised with UKBA.

Scotsman
Comment in the Scotsman by Adam Ingram (MSP Minister for Children and Early Years).
Getting children off to a good start needs more than a quick fix (Scotsman)

Daily Telegraph
A report has revealed the majority of institutions belonging to elite Russell Group show favour to sixth-formers from poor-performing schools. One in five give priority to applicants whose parents missed out on higher education. And 53 per cent of universities take students' "family problems" into account as an admissions tiebreaker. According to the report, Nottingham - which traditionally attracts more applicants than any other university - said students' A-level grades "may be valued more highly" if applicants were refugees or came from the traveller community, poor homes or a family without a history of going to university. The disclosure was made in a Government-backed study published four years after a landmark commission on fair access to university.
Most Russell Group universities discriminate in favour of deprived students (Daily Telegraph)

Financial Times
In the face of declining university endowments, an uncertain climate for philanthropic giving, and dwindling federal research support, the heads of several US colleges are taking voluntary pay cuts, while others - including Harvard University - have frozen faculty salaries.
College heads volunteer for degree of thrift (Financial Times)

Independent, Times
Today's warning from Unicef that poor children may be receiving the worst childcare is backed up by new figures on the quality of nurseries in deprived areas. They show that the number of failing nurseries in the poorest areas of England has almost doubled in the past year. That means that the chances of a youngster from a deprived area going to an "inadequate" nursery is more than twice that of a child living in a wealthy area.
Most UK toddlers 'cared for out of home' (Independent)
Number of failing nurseries doubles in poor areas (Times)

Daily Mail, Sun
Condoms are being offered to schoolchildren as young as 13 in an attempt to cut teenage pregnancies.
Outrage after 13-year-olds get free condoms at school without their parents' knowledge (Daily Mail)
Kids of 13 given secret condoms (Sun)

Daily Telegraph
Parents of children with special needs are being forced to "fight" to make sure they get a decent education, according to a major review. Brian Lamb, chairman of the Special Educational Consortium, which represents around 100 organisations, said many parents lacked confidence in the system. Major concerns include lack of care for pupils with disabilities, poor information for parents and failure to address children's needs in mainstream schools. He said parents of children with dyslexia also had to "struggle to secure appropriate provision".
Parents made to 'fight' for special needs help (Daily Telegraph)

This week's Independent Education Supplement includes an exclusive table of bursaries and scholarships, to enable students to make informed choice about where to study. The supplement also has an interview with the author, public speaker and former school inspector Gervase Phinn. In addition, Hilary Wilce invites readers to write in and help with next week's education quandary: ‘As a teacher, I long for the Government to get off our backs and leave us alone to do our jobs. But I'm wondering what other people would most want to see in education in 2009'. Send your replies to hwilce@btinternet.com (including your postal address).
The Independent -  Latest Education News and Teaching News

Scotsman, Daily Telegraph, Times
Letter - Improve school grounds (Scotsman)
Letter - Amateur teachers (Daily Telegraph)
Letters - Rose curriculum report raises many questions (Times)

Daily Telegraph
A primary school teacher left a class of 25 pupils in tears when she told them Father Christmas does not exist. The supply teacher blurted out: "it's your parents who leave out presents on Christmas Day" when excited youngsters got rowdy as they talked about Christmas. The class of seven-year-olds at Blackshaw Lane Primary School, Royton, near Oldham, Greater Manchester burst into tears and told their parents when they got home.
Primary school teacher tells class that Father Christmas isn't real (Daily Telegraph)