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You are here: Home / Archives for government

Half a billion views on GOV.UK | Government Digital Service

January 16, 2014 By achuka Leave a Comment

The UK government’s award winning information website gov.uk recently exceeded 500,000,000 views.

You can see daily web traffic on the site site and other information here: https://www.gov.uk/performance/dashboard

via Half a billion views on GOV.UK | Government Digital Service.

Filed Under: Blog, Web/Design Tagged With: design, government, information, web

Free school meals policy by council leaves parents pinching themselves

September 23, 2013 By achuka Leave a Comment

I haven’t found many references in the media to what was immediately apparent to me when the introduction of free school meals was announced last week – the conflict with the government’s other policy of funding a Pupil Premium based on a family’s eligibility to claim a Free School Meal.

But here’s a report on how things are working out in Tower Hamlets, where free school meals have already been introduced, and lo and behold, it’s a problem:

Tower Hamlets has discovered one major problem: that parents whose children are eligible for free school meals no longer have the push to register to receive them, since the meals are free anyway. But free school meal eligibility is also used by central government as a measure to distribute the “pupil premium” – additional payments made directly to schools for each pupil who qualifies.Since the pupil premium is now worth £900 a year – soon to rise to £1,300 a year – parents eligible for free school meals who fail to register will hurt the school that would otherwise have received the extra support.This case – of one government flagship policy colliding with another – needs urgent attention before next years national rollout.”Thats critical, how the new arrangement is brought in by the government has got to be easy for schools to administer, because we dont want to lose that pupil premium funding – it would be stupid if we did,” says Fagan.

via Free school meals policy by council leaves parents pinching themselves | Education | The Guardian.

Filed Under: Blog, Education Tagged With: education, free school meals, FSm, government, Pupil Premium, schools

Government has failed on library closures, says children’s laureate

September 23, 2013 By achuka Leave a Comment

The children’s laureate, Malorie Blackman, has attacked the government for failing to intervene to stop local authorities closing libraries, arguing that they should be ringfenced from spending cuts.

At least 347 libraries shut their doors for the last time in the first two years of the coalition government and, as austerity measures continue to bite, putting pressure on councils to slash funding, campaigners have warned that 400 more could be axed over the next three years.

In many cases the cutbacks have prompted fierce protests and Blackman, appointed children’s laureate in June, has added her voice to the dissent.

via Government has failed on library closures, says children’s laureate | Books | The Guardian.

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: closures, government, laureate, libraries, local authorities

Why This Simple Government Website Was Named the Best Design of the Year

August 7, 2013 By achuka Leave a Comment

Jordan Hatch, the teenage ‘boy wonder’, has been getting a lot of press in recent days for the part he has been playing in developing the impressively straightforward UK govenrment website, gov.uk – The video, produced a short while ago to coincide with the site being named 2013 Best Design of the Year (the first website to ever win the six-years-old title), is definitely worth a watch…

Gizmodo

http://gizmodo.com/5994829/why-this-simple-government-website-was-named-the-best-design-of-the-year

Filed Under: Blog, Web/Design Tagged With: data, design, government, information, we

STOP testing Our Children Into Failure, Says Carnegie Winner

June 19, 2013 By achuka Leave a Comment

In her Carnegie acceptance speech, Sally Gardner speaks about her own experience of school and then turns her attention to current education policy.  “STOP testing our children into failure.”

The link contains a full audiofile of the Medal announcement followed by acceptance speech.

 

http://www.carnegiegreenaway.org.uk/2013awards/media_ceremony.php?file=2

Filed Under: Blog, Books Tagged With: acceptance, Carnegie, dyslexia, education, Gove, government, medal, policy, speech, testing, winner

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