The government is currently undergoing a Curriculum and Assessment Review to refresh the national curriculum, and the Fair Education Alliance (FEA) made a submission responding to the call for evidence. There are nearly 300 organisations in the FEA committed to tackling educational inequity. These members represent the voices of young people, charities and social enterprises, schools, research organisations and think tanks, businesses and foundations, unions, and universities.  

The process 

60 FEA members actively participated in developing our submission. In case you need to stop and think about it: that is a lot of views to incorporate! To aid the process the secretariat team set out clear principles from the beginning: 

1. We add value to the government’s review by presenting the points of consensus (and therefore we shouldn’t be presenting a list of asks specific to a particular organisation). 

2. We ensure the views of education institutions, businesses and non-profit organisations are reviewed by those in other sectors. 

We brought FEA members together in a series of large meetings which were designed to share ideas and provide feedback, and sub-group meetings which were designed to draft the specific response. Naturally, there was disagreement; with members sometimes coming from apparently opposite ends of the spectrum. By creating time and space for members to have dialogue, everyone involved developed their thinking and it provided nuance to our response which ultimately strengthened it. 

Curriculum and Assessment Review profile 

• Chair – Dr Becky Francis CBE 

• Review panel – working with the chair and including Dr Vanessa Ogden OBE, FEA Chair of Trustees. 

• Call for evidence – open 25 September to 22 November. 

• Interim report - due early 2025. This will outline some key themes and initial recommendations to be explored. 

• Full report – due autumn 2025. 

 The Fair Education Alliance submission 

Overall, our submission focused on improving the curriculum and assessment for children and young people from low-income households. We looked at this through the lens of social justice and inclusion. Some of the key themes were: 

1. Reducing the amount of curriculum content 
   Much of the current curriculum structure and content is high quality and worth keeping, but overall, it is too full. This means pupils who are struggling don’t have time to fully master concepts and teachers don’t have the flexibility to reinforce learning through projects or experiences. The amount of content and the way it is assessed also pose barriers for learners with SEN.

2. Developing essential skills for the future 
   Businesses are very clear many young people are leaving the education system without the skills needed for employment. Young people from low-income households have fewer opportunities to develop their essential skills and report lower levels of these skills which contributes to far higher levels of youth unemployment for these young people. While subject knowledge is fundamental, our curriculum should build these essential skills in a structured and sequential way, both through subject teaching and enrichment activities. 

3. Diversifying the curriculum  
   We have a lack of racially and socioeconomically diverse thinkers included across subjects, despite there being many thinkers who could be included. The sources and traditions the curriculum draws on in each subject need to be broader and more diverse, so that children are getting a rich and nuanced perspective on each subject, and so that every child can see themselves represented in the curriculum.

4. Foundational numeracy and literacy 
   We must support every learner to develop foundational numeracy and literacy skills, even if they don’t attain a grade 4 in their English and maths GCSE at age 16.

We really appreciated the time and energy given by the members who got involved, but let’s not end the dialogue here! There will be other opportunities to influence, indeed, the first half of 2025 is looking full of opportunities, as the government develops its work around Ofsted, Skills England and the Children’s Wellbeing Bill alongside the Curriculum and Assessment Review. Let’s all keep connecting around what’s needed to create the system we want to see for all children.  

You can contact Jane at jfernandes@faireducation.org.uk if you want to get involved further.