Greater Manchester’s Mayor Andy Burnham has said that the country needsan immediate national effort to ensure every school-age child, and every 16-18 year-old, has access to a device/data.
Burnham using twitter as his medium said that he will be working with our schools, colleges and businesses to see if we can achieve this in Greater Manchester.
Manchester councillor Julie Reid said that she had had lots of parents contact her already about not having a device and some don’t have WiFi or broadband either
Earlier Michael Gove said Education Secretary Gavin Williamson will address a recalled House of Commons on Wednesday to update MPs on how pupils will be assessed at the end of the year, following further disruption to their learning.
Mr Gove told Sky News: “The Education Secretary has been talking to the exams regulator Ofqual in order that we can find a way of recognising the immense hard work that students across the country have put in this year.
“Obviously we can’t have A-levels, GCSEs or B-techs in the way that we have had them in the past but there are ways of ensuring that we can assess the work that students have done, give them a fair recognition of that and help them onto the next stage of their education.
“The Education Secretary will be saying more about that but it is critically important that parents and students recognise that their work will be recognised at the end of this year – it is not the case that anyone would, or anyone would want to, down tools as it were.
“It is critically important that children maintain their learning and we will be supporting them to do so by making it easier for more and more students to access remote learning.”
Williamson has been criticised for not delivering on a promise made in the middle of last year’s lockdown to provide all children with remote devices
