Tory U-Turn provides little comfort to students:
• Education Secretary Michael Gove has come up with a £180m a year replacement for Educational Maintenance Allowance.
• This is nothing to celebrate. It represents a cut of two-thirds from the previous £560m annual budget and will be targeted only at the poorest students.
• It will deprive hundreds of thousands of students from low income families with state support for further education.
• EMA was aimed at students in households earning under £21,000 a year. Nearly 1) 640,000 students benefited last year. 2009-10
• Students in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland will continue to receive the EMA.
• Shadow education secretary, Andy Burnham MP: "I don't think we can dignify today's announcement with the word U-turn. You [the government] have taken a successful policy which improved participation, attendance and achievement in post-16 education, and turned it into a total shambles."
The EMA was given out too readily to too many - a lot who used it for nothing more than pizza, beer and socialising.
ReplyDeleteI'm all for funding education but no-one buys me pizza so an alternative means tested version of EMA is required.
Hello Gideon, thanks for your comment. Are you sure that this is happening to many students. Is this not anecdotal evidence from the coalition who are trying to justify taking EMA away from young people. I am not ocnvinced.
ReplyDeleteI know many sixth form teachers who tell me in no uncertain terms that the EMA has improved both participation and, importantly, attainment in their schools.
ReplyDeleteThis is borne out by research by the Institute for Fiscal Studies so John, unfortunately for young people entering sixth form, you are right!