Review of the Papers, Wednesday 5 September

Radical plans to create a network of smaller inner city secondary schools were unveiled by the Conservatives yesterday. The party's policy blueprint for reforming public services suggests stealing an idea already used in the US – whereby high schools with 2,000 or more pupils are split into four different schools, each with a separate identity, thus transforming their examination results.

http://education.independent.co.uk/news/article2927100.ece

 
The impact of media violence on children will be the focus of a wider than expected government review being launched today. It may lead to new voluntary controls over excessive violence and sex on children's television and the internet and in video games.

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/media/story/0,,2162630,00.html

 
Parents whose children are suspended from school because of bad behaviour will be required to keep them indoors or face fines of up to £1,000. Laws coming into force this week will compel parents to put excluded pupils under home detention and prevent them from roaming the streets during the first five days of an exclusion order.

http://education.guardian.co.uk/pupilbehaviour/story/0,,2162622,00.html

Thatcherite reforms to schools and the NHS systematically undermined the role of teachers and medical staff, a Tory review acknowledged yesterday as it unveiled plans to hand power back to professionals.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/guardianpolitics/story/0,,2162455,00.html

Big increases in education spending since 1999 have resulted in only minimal rises in school performance, according to the latest statistics published today.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life-and-style/education/article2388507.ece