The pace of the reforms shows no let-up. Michael Gove’s announcement today about the floor target for secondary schools rising to 50% A*-C will dismay some head teachers. I hope there is recognition in his speech to the NCL of schools with challenging catchments who have worked extremely hard to raise expectations – and standards – in the face of very difficult circumstances. The inspection framework for January may well have reference to floor targets however and inspectors will have to be even more mindful of those when judging achievement grades.
The announcement about the 200 primaries appears to mirror what has happened with poorly performing secondary schools being the junior partners in an effectively forced relationship with a higher performing school, in a joint trust, or federation.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-13781243