School leaders are putting plans in place to safeguard vulnerable pupils and those preparing for key assessments as they warn that strike action will “inevitably” lead to class mergers, online learning and some school closures. By Matilda Martin and Callum Mason, Tes.

Internal data from the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT), seen by Schools Week, suggests that one in seven school leaders may have been denied the chance to vote in the union’s ballot on industrial action because of disruption caused by postal strikes. The NAHT announced this week that it is considering re-balloting its 25,500 eligible members. By Freddie Whittaker.

Writing in Tes, Sam Freedman describes the move to industrial action as 'the logical result of a sector stretched to almost breaking point'. Mr Freedman warns that, should the strikes be called off, the result would be "an even worse recruitment and retention problem than we already have". Sam Freedman is a senior fellow at the Institute for Government and a former senior policy adviser at the Department for Education.

The Welsh Government has offered teachers and school heads a one-off payment, similar to that offered to health workers last week, as four separate days of strikes by National Education Union (NEU) members are set to take place. Senior union officials reportedly said the proposals were not enough to meet pay demands. By David Deans and Bethan Lewis, BBC News.

Schools Week features advice from policy experts on how the pay dispute between the Government and unions could be resolved, with options such as paying teachers the same pay but for fewer hours being considered. By Freddie Whittaker.

ITV News considers the question 'what are your rights as a parent?' if the planned industrial action goes ahead. Please note, (free) ITV login required to view the broadcast item.

The Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) has recorded a fall in the number of first-class degrees awarded in England for the first time since it was founded in 1993. The drop comes after universities in England pledged last summer to reverse degree inflation, following the introduction of policies to mitigate the impact of disruption caused by the pandemic. The Telegraph.

Amanda Spielman, the chief inspector of Ofsted, has suggested that children of primary school age 'should not have smartphones or unlimited internet access'. In a discussion about access to online pornography and adult content, Ms Spielman said much could be done to “really limit” the material young children are exposed to and that it is the role of “schools, parents and society to make sure that children can steer past all of these undesirable influences”. By Nicola Woolcock, The Times.

The Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL) is calling for a 'radical overhaul' of the school inspection system in England, to include the scrapping of ratings such as “good” or “requires improvement”. The union has criticised the ratings as a “woefully blunt” measure of a school’s performance. By Sally Weale, The Guardian.

As part of Schools Week's series of expert opinions regarding the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on education, Daisy Christodoulou, director of education at No More Marking, calls for the regulation of AI and says "it is perfectly acceptable to ban students from using AI for written assessments".

In a separate item in Schools Week focusing on the controversial AI platform ChatGPT, Priya Lakhani, founder and CEO of CENTURY Tech, argues that while it could be used by some students to cheat on their homework, "the reality is that this technology won’t be catastrophic to current models of education delivery" due to "severe limitations to what it can do".

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