By scrapping the Ofsted single headline grade system, the government has started its journey to reform how school and college performance is monitored and assessed. This reform of the accountability system opens the door to ensuring learners are prepared for life and work, including through the prioritisation of essential skills development.

As the world around us evolves at a rapid pace, our education system must adapt to ensure that students are equipped not just with academic knowledge, but with the essential skills they need to succeed. These skills - such as communication, problem-solving, teamwork, and creativity - are crucial for individuals succeeding in life and employment. 

The Essential skills tracker 2024 found that teachers overwhelmingly think that it is important to explicitly teach essential skills to prepare learners for life and work (92%). However teachers think there is a mismatch between what the education system prioritises and what leads to success in employment. 

To effectively build essential skills, schools and colleges must have a clear understanding of how to do so, and be supported to embed essential skills across the school system. This requires clear indicators of best practice and a framework of accountability, which values essential skills. As the Gatsby Benchmarks have demonstrated, benchmarks of quality which are recognised and championed by the government can have a significant impact on school and college behaviour.

Recommendations

In tandem with the curriculum and assessment review, the Department for Education can realise its vision of a broader and more balanced education system through:

1. Include essential skills in report cards: The intended reforms provide an opportunity to ensure that new report cards, the Ofsted inspection framework and handbook explicitly include essential skills. This clarity will guide all stakeholders in understanding the importance of these skills. Additionally, Ofsted inspectors should receive training in essential skills pedagogy, ensuring that they are equipped to assess and promote these skills during inspections.

2. Regional improvement teams should be empowered and tasked to support schools and colleges to embed essential skills into their school improvement strategies. These strategies should encourage schools and colleges to maximise opportunities to build essential skills across the curriculum, models of assessment and beyond.

3. Setting clear expectations in Careers Guidance: Statutory careers guidance should require schools and colleges to benchmark themselves against national standards in essential skills. To make this a success, careers and skills leaders must be given the time and training needed to effectively embed an essential skills strategy within this guidance. This will ensure that essential skills are not an afterthought but a core component of curriculum planning.

The government's recent announcements on reform offer a promising first step to a broader and balanced approach to education in the UK, which provides all learners with high quality opportunities to build their essential skills. By ensuring that the system is set up to prioritise essential skills development, the government can realise its aims for the curriculum and assessment review. We know that higher levels of essential skills are linked to social mobility and that teachers want to teach these skills. The accountability system has a key part to play in supporting young people to access high quality opportunities to develop these essential skills.

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