Education news

Oldham's classrooms have been quietly transformed over the past twelve months by a string of small, practical changes that add up to something larger. Mavis Clegg, the headteacher who gave 70 years to local schools, died aged 92 in December, prompting tributes that framed the year's improvements as part of her legacy. While she was remembered, St Agnes Primary began handing out free breakfasts and saw attendance rise immediately; St Paul's in Royton ripped up asphalt to create outdoor teaching...

Results days brought their own records. In August, identical twins from Hulme collected matching A* grades, part of a wider pattern that saw Oldham Sixth Form College post its highest-ever proportion of A and T-Level distinctions. The same week, GCSE pass rates in maths and English edged above national averages for the first time since 2019, with 67 % of entries awarded 9-4.

Behind the headlines, the council has spent £3 million to rescue 150 places at Blue Coat Secondary, preventing a bulge-year squeeze that would have pushed children as far as Tameside. A further £1.2 million is earmarked for special-needs units, including a new 24-place base at North Chadderton which moved from 'requires improvement' to 'good' in January. Transport is also shifting: seven schools earned Modeshift gold for walking-bus and cycling schemes, while the second School Street trial...

The Breakfast Club pilot is funded only until July, and headteachers warn the robots, leased from a Manchester tech firm, cost £3,800 a year each. Parents are still being surveyed on whether they will keep walking once winter returns, and the council admits it has no firm plan to replace the £50 voucher incentive that drew 1,300 responses last summer. Yet the direction feels set: when Professor Brian Cox told 800 pupils at his old Chadderton school that 'science belongs here', he was speaking...

The unanswered question is scale. With birth rates rising in the borough's eastern wards, officers predict an extra 450 primary places needed by 2028. If the breakfast, robot and outdoor-learning fixes stay patchwork, the gap could reopen where Mavis Clegg once closed it.