'Alter league tables to reduce informal exclusions' says expert

Speaking at a Commons education committee hearing on alternative provision this week, Philip Nye, researcher for analysts Education Datalab, said the attainment of all pupils that had attended a school should count towards their exam results record.

Currently, only the attainment of pupils who are on roll at a school in January of year 11 count in school league tables.

A study by Education Datalab published in January 2017 found evidence that schools are excluding pupils informally to ensure their exam results do not that count towards their attainment record and harm league table performance. It found a small number of cases where struggling pupils were encouraged to not attend school, effectively being excluded.

Professor David Berridge from the University of Bristol said that "schools will seek ways to remove students with low attainment" so as to improve their position in school league tables.

Nye told the committee: "One of our recommendations was that you can tweak how the league tables work.

"We suggested that you could change how the league tables work and look at all the children that have been on roll with a school at any period of time up to year 11, and allocate their results according to how much time a child spent with one school."

Nye added that such a change could reduce the pressure on schools to exclude struggling pupils.

The results were considered by Nye earlier this year, as these exclusions were going unnoticed. He said that schools had 'managed out' pupils with low attainment.

Earlier this month, children's commissioner for England Anne Longfield also told the education committee, she was concerned that a number of schools are forcing or "encouraging" children with behaviour issues to leave school.

The committee's alternative provision inquiry is to hold a series of hearings in the coming months.