Tory Party Conference: Greening launches £1m social mobility trial

Speaking at the Conservative Party Conference today, Greening said the Department for Education will trial a "new approach" to boost social mobility in six councils across England - top-tier authorities Blackpool, Derby City and Oldham, and local councils in Norwich, Scarborough and West Somerset.

They were identified as "opportunity areas" in a report earlier this year by the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission. 

Schools in the six areas will receive support to give children knowledge and skills, good advice and "great life experiences", Greening said.

The DfE's approach will be tailored to each area's needs, she added, with extra support being offered by high-performing schools.

"For teachers and schools in these areas there will be extra support, partnering them up with the schools and the teachers who have already raised standards and turned around schools elsewhere in the country," Greening said.

The DfE will also work to improve careers guidance.

"We'll focus on better careers advice by getting our Careers & Enterprise Company to really focus on these children in these communities," Greening said.

She added that, alongside Karen Bradley, minister for culture, media and sport, the programme will ensure young people have access to volunteering opportunities from the National Citizen Service (NCS).

The £1m fund is part of a £4m investment fund to be managed by the Careers & Enterprise Company.

Kevan Collins, chief executive of the Education Endowment Foundation, said: "The creation of opportunity areas is an important step in addressing the shameful link between where a young person grows up and their educational achievements.
 
"If all schools are to produce great results for all their pupils, we must look to evidence of what has worked elsewhere to judge how to spend this important new resource.

"It's vital that we learn from the successes of the best-performing schools and enable this to be shared in a supportive and constructive way with those who need more help."

However, Kevin Courtney, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers (NUT), said Greening's words on social mobility "ring hollow" -  the union has calculated that expected cuts to the education budgets in the six selected areas total more than £40m.

"The six areas identified for additional funding and support will themselves, individually, lose phenomenal amounts through the current cuts," he said.

"This extra money will not go far compared with the impacts of the worst funding crisis in decades for all schools and sixth form colleges. It is misleading in the extreme to present this funding as somehow ‘extra'."