The new Education secretary’s agenda so far looks uncontroversial, which doesn’t mean it is unimportant

Theresa May has made it clear she wants Social mobility to be a defining theme of her time in office. How it is to be achieved is less obvious. Her original plan hinged on a return to widespread selection in secondary education, but not everyone in her party was convinced – and rightly not, since the evidence shows grammar schools exacerbating social segregation. Thankfully, last June’s election left no Commons majority for rolling them out. So there is a gap in Mrs May’s programme where a flagship education policy used to be. This puts pressure on Damian Hinds, the new education secretary. His first public statement of intent, a speech earlier this week, avoided controversy, which isn’t to say it was uninteresting. Mr Hinds addressed the challenge that rapid technological change poses to schools and the need to create systems so adults can acquire new skills.

These are not original insights, but they are a refreshing break from years of fixation on school management structures. The same is true of Mr Hinds’ focus on what he calls “employability skills” – the social and cognitive capabilities that make school leavers attractive candidates for jobs but do not appear on the academic curriculum. These can be as elementary as a readiness to look a boss in the eye, reliably turning up each morning, responding to criticism constructively, and speaking clearly and politely. Such things can be learned, but not as superficial performance. They are expressions of confidence, resilience and that ill-defined thing known as “character”. Such attributes are hard currency in a competitive jobs market.

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from Education | The Guardian http://ift.tt/2naFoqm