Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL), has warned against proposals to extend the school day as part of the nation's catch-up operation, saying it would not help to "grind out more hours from tired children". By Katherine Sellgren and Sean Coughlan, BBC News.

Kevin Courtney, joint general secretary of the National Education Union, has said teachers' contracts will need to be renegotiated if they are required to work longer hours. By Camilla Turner and Sarah Knapton, The Telegraph.

Speaking to Tes, Sir Kevan Collins said he hopes the Treasury will provide extra funding on top of the £1.3 billion already announced to support the national catch-up operation. By Amy Gibbons. Schools Week features a Q&A with the new education recovery commissioner. By Samantha Booth.

Nick Gibb, the school standards minister, told MPs on the Education Select Committee yesterday that he is "open to all ideas" on how to help pupils make up for lost learning time. By Sally Weale, The Guardian.

Schools Week reports the Department for Education (DfE) is considering spending nearly £4 million on "free in-class and catch-up curriculum resources" for teachers. By Samantha Booth.

Researchers have suggested schools in the UK could reopen to all pupils in early March as long as other lockdown measures remain in place. BBC News.

Tim Spector, a professor of genetic epidemiology at King's College London, has questioned whether schools need to remain closed until 8 March, after the university's symptom tracker app found COVID-19 case rates have fallen to a quarter of the peak on 1 January. By Sarah Knapton, The Telegraph.

Dr Alex George, the Government's youth mental health ambassador, has said pupils struggling with anxiety should be allowed to return to school gradually. BBC News.

According to the latest figures from the DfE, the number of children attending state schools during lockdown has risen for the second week in a row. By Zoe Tidman, The Independent.

Findings from a Tes survey suggest 70 per cent of school staff in England have no trust "at all" in the DfE over its handling of the pandemic. By Dave Speck.

Professor Adam Finn, the deputy chairman of the joint committee on vaccination and immunisation, has said children could receive coronavirus vaccines by the end of the year. By Henry Bodkin, The Telegraph.

Richard Sheriff, president of ASCL, has said it is "not helpful" to describe children as the 'COVID generation', arguing: "It is wrong to catastrophise young people at this point." By Nicola Woolcock, The Times.

An article in The Telegraph explores the impact the pandemic has had on the university admission process. By Madeleine Howell.

Addressing MPs on the Education Select Committee yesterday, Nick Gibb suggested poverty - not ethnicity - is the key contributing factor to the educational underachievement of working-class white pupils. By Zoe Tidman, The Independent.

A study from University College London has found that teenagers of well-educated parents are more likely to binge drink and shoplift, compared to those of parents who went straight into work from school. By Oliver Wright, The Times.

The Telegraph reports children under 18 will no longer be held in custody under plans to substitute young offender institutions with a network of "secure schools". By Charles Hymas.

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