Schools will be expected to ensure that the tech they use in classrooms meets a set of minimum standards set by the Department for Education, covering everything from broadband connections to cybercrime defences, the education secretary has announced.
Speaking at the Bett 2022 conference this morning, Nadhim Zahawi also said the government will make sure that every school has access to high-speed broadband by 2025.
Mr Zahawi added that the measures formed part of his ambition to keep up the “momentum” of “technological innovation” and draw further on the lessons learned during the pandemic.
The DfE said the new technology standards, the first of which were published today, should be used ”by everyone involved in the planning and use of technology within schools and colleges”, including senior leadership teams, IT staff, suppliers, technical advisers and teachers.
Tech standards set minimum internet speed in schools
The published standards include targets such as all schools should be using a “full fibre connection for their broadband” in order to make “effective use of online learning tools”.
The DfE standards also set minimum levels of internet speed in different settings.
Primary schools should have a “minimum 100Mbps download speed and a minimum of 30Mbps upload speed”, while secondary and all-through schools should have a “connection with the capacity to deliver 1Gbps download and upload speed”.
Mr Zahawi said the department would ”provide support to help meet these standards for schools that need it”. However, the DfE would not say if and how schools would be held accountable for achieving the standards.
More help to protect schools from cyber crime
Mr Zahawi also said that as part of these standards, the DfE would “issue more concrete help” to keep schools “secure and safe from cyber crime”.
While these plans have not yet been published, Martin Sivorn, chief information security officer and deputy director at the DfE, outlined some of these future schemes at Bett today.
Mr Sivorn said the DfE was keen to “increase cyber resilience within the education sector” and for schools to “not be seen as a soft target for cyber crime”.
He said that there were lots of methods that schools could use to make themselves less vulnerable to cyber attacks and to recover if they do fall victim, but some schools do not have the knowledge to achieve this.
Mr Sivorn said the department was “trying to solve that problem” and was currently working on a service for schools that it expects to be ready in the second half of this year.
This tool will give schools information on where they stand from a security perspective and the steps they need to take, giving “schools the information they need to make the most informed decision for them”.
Mr Sivorn added that the department has been working with the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), which currently provides a series of tools to other government departments, to make tools available to schools.
He said the aim was to “increase resilience in the sector”.
Mr Sivorn said the DfE was also establishing a “coordination service” that schools will be able to call to get advice.
The future role of tech in assessments
Speaking at Bett today, Mr Zahawi said he was keen to explore digital assessment alongside Ofqual and the Standards and Testing Agency.
He said that other countries had been experimenting in this area and “it’s possible we can learn from what they are doing”.
Drawing on the benefits of increasing digital assessments, he said it was “possible” that more digital assessment could bring “significant benefits” to students, teachers and schools.
He added that he wanted to “start carefully considering the potential opportunities in this area”.
In January, exam board AQA announced that it would pilot GCSE tests including adaptive “smart” assessments that adjust in difficulty in response to a student’s progression in the test.
DfE will not dictate what technology to use
While Mr Zahawi said he wanted to see “a new culture of evidence-based use of technology embedded in every school”, he said he will “not start telling schools which...kit to use and when” and the department “will not be interfering in the marketplace”.
“This extends to assistive technology too - making sure that technology improves access to learning as part of targeted support,” he added.
Zahawi stresses the importance of Stem skills
The education secretary also said that the UK is “going to need more and better Stem [science, technology, engineering and maths] skills”.
He said that in order to make this happen, “we need teachers to be totally comfortable and adept with technology and we need children to be tech-literate from a young age”.
“There is a growing hunger in the young to learn about technology and we need to be able to satisfy that,” Mr Zahawi said.
He added that as part of the government’s mission to “level up the UK”, it wants to give everyone the opportunity to improve their Stem skills”.
The National Centre for Computing Education, backed by £84 million of government funding, will help to keep teachers’ subject knowledge up to speed.
Access to high-speed internet by 2025
The DfE said the target of high-speed internet in every school by 2025 is part of a cross-government ambition to roll out gigabit broadband across the UK.
It said £150 million will be used to support schools “most in need” to upgrade their wi-fi connections.
Last September, the DfE announced that more than 1,000 schools that had previously had slow broadband speeds had been connected to “next-generation internet speeds”.
The DfE, in conjunction with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, announced that it would bring gigabit broadband to 884 more schools by March 2022.
Mr Zahawi said the move was “the latest way we are levelling up education across the country.”
As part of the government’s manifesto, it pledged to deliver nationwide gigabit broadband by 2025. However, this target was revised to 2030 in the Levelling Up White Paper last month.
Support is ‘welcome’, says heads’ leader
Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL) said the support for improving digital technology in schools was “welcome”, adding that it was “really important” to use the opportunities offered by technology to “enhance the learning experience of young people”.
“Schools are very keen to make the best possible use of technology for their students, and many already do fantastic work in this direction. Anything which helps will be warmly received,” he said.
