Category: Lee Elliott-Major

The love letter from a university applicant to their chosen subject has for decades been an uncontested element of the university admissions process. The opportunity to sell yourself in under 500 words (officially, under 4,000 characters) is seen as a chance for applicants to express their passion for their chosen study. Otherwise, admissions officers only have A-level grade predictions, teacher references and a few other criteria to go on. Most don’t have time to interview thousands of hopeful candidates.

My own book, The Good Parent Educator, has added to a vast industry offering tips on how best to write the statement. This covers everything from how to stand out from the crowd, to showing off your academic credentials, to avoiding writing that poor opening sentence. Read More

How do you make exams fair? It’s a challenge that has vexed the greatest education minds for centuries. But never have so many people thought so hard about this question than for national school examinations in 2021.

Education Secretary Gavin Williamson last week spoke about putting “fairness into the system” as he unveiled a package of measures for GCSEs and A-levels in England. The measures include advance notice of exam topics, exam aids, and more generous grading (in line with that for 2020). All are justified for pupils who have suffered widespread disruption in the wake of the pandemic. Not least it will provide clarity for teachers about what lies ahead next summer – and for over a million stressed teenagers currently in the midst of their mock exams.

But in my view the biggest question of fairness remains unresolved. How do we recognise the extra learning loss experienced by some pupils, particularly those from the poorest backgrounds? Covid-19 has exposed the stark social class divide that lies outside the school gates. Reduced schooling has left the world an even more unequal place. Read More

By Lee Elliot Major

As we prepare for a long winter of COVID discontent, a more complete picture of the education and employment losses suffered by young people in the first six months of the pandemic is emerging. Disruption to learning in schools and universities has been substantial. To make matters worse, young people are being disproportionately hit with job losses and lower earnings. Read More

Lee Elliot Major, Emily Tyers and Robin Chu

We believe a National Tutoring Service (NTS) could help tackle stark education gaps in the wake of the Covid-19 school closures. The NTS is a proposed coalition of tutoring organisations, universities and schools to mobilise undergraduates and graduates to help improve the achievement of disadvantaged pupils in the core subjects of English and Maths across the UK. The service would have multiple benefits: boosting volunteering among undergraduates, offering employment for graduates, and helping teachers in their efforts to level-up education’s playing field. Read More

Lee Elliot Major is Professor of Social Mobility at the University of Exeter.

A version of this blog was published by the Daily Telegraph.

It’s one of those puzzling aspects of our university system that has always caused controversy. In the UK, unlike any other country in the world, students apply for university degrees not with their actual grades, but with grades predicted by their teachers. Universities give conditional offers on the basis of these predicted grades. Offers, under normal circumstances, are then confirmed when students get their actual A-level grades. Read More