With GCSEs being graded one to nine from 2017, are these latest reforms the best way to drive up standards? August 25, 2016 Rachel Cunliffe, deputy editor of CapX, says Yes. You cannot raise academic standards simply by changing the metric, but you can signal that the spiral of grade inflation is over. A numerical system that bears little resemblance to familiar A*-G models does just that. More variations across the spectrum will help differentiate between students, while [...]
Seven reasons why it’s the perfect time to ditch the office job and become an artist August 25, 2016 Right now, it's the perfect time to leave behind the day job and pursue a more creative path. The online art market is growing at an unprecedented rate. From sales of Old Masters to poster art, the art sector is moving online with a vengeance. According to a leading trade report for 2016, global online art [...]
School reform’s biggest winners are the poor August 25, 2016 At the height of the last government, an online petition was launched calling for the then education secretary to resign. “Remove the elitist Michael Gove from office” it screamed. “Gove who has experienced private school education and Oxbridge is completely out of touch”. Like so much cyber activism, it was nonsense. For as today’s GCSE results [...]
GCSE results: The biggest winners from education reform have been the poor August 25, 2016 At the height of the last government, an online petition was launched calling for the then education secretary to resign. “Remove the elitist Michael Gove from office” it screamed. “Gove who has experienced private school education and Oxbridge is completely out of touch”. Like so much cyber activism, it was nonsense. For as today’s GCSE results will [...]
Option Zero: Why Britain should embrace unilateral free trade post-Brexit August 25, 2016 Sherlock Holmes said that, when you’ve exhausted all other possibilities, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. In last week’s column I explained why the assumed roads forward for Brexit (the Norwegian, Swiss, Turkish and conventional World Trade Organisation tariff models) all had major stumbling blocks and should be seen as non-starters. This week [...]
GCSE results: Why a laser-like focus on grades is damaging the UK’s economy August 25, 2016 This morning, hundreds of thousands of teenagers will be opening their GCSE results, accompanied by the usual attention on grades and whether As and A*s are up or down. But this relentless focus on just one metric is contributing to a pressing skills crisis that could be profoundly damaging for the UK’s economy. It’s clear [...]
Free movement is gone – but business can still persuade the public of the benefits of migration August 25, 2016 Britain may have a new home secretary and a new PM, but the quarterly immigration figures, out today, look set to tell the same old story. The government remains nowhere near meeting its “tens of thousands” net migration target and new polling shows the public doesn’t think it’s likely to. But business voices hoping Amber [...]
Is Labour’s Owen Smith right that there should be another referendum on the Brexit deal? August 25, 2016 Chris Rumfitt, founder and chief executive of Field Consulting, says Yes. “Brexit means Brexit” declared our new Prime Minister Theresa May upon taking office. The only problem with that statement is that at no point during the referendum campaign did that word Brexit get defined. Single Market membership? European Economic Area membership? Basic World Trade Organisation [...]
Nissan and National Lottery struck gold at the Rio Olympics – here’s proof August 24, 2016 As another Olympics ends and the British public basks in the glory of an unprecedented medal haul, sponsors are reflecting on how their own marketing efforts resonated with the public. Our brand tracking research allows us to explore whether they have managed to benefit both from their association with the event and their sporting ambassadors. [...]
The economy appears to be coping just fine after June’s Brexit vote – but the real test is yet to come August 24, 2016 Two months ago today we were waking up to the frankly astonishing news that 52 per cent of the electorate had voted to leave the European Union. The pound had crashed overnight and the FTSE soon followed suit, losing 200 points on fears of a sharp downturn. In recent weeks we have been treated to [...]