Following a meeting with the School Travel Forum, Bob Russell MP has tabled an Early Day Motion (Number 2111) in the Westminster Parliament supporting Learning Outside the Classroom (LOtC) and the Quality Badge.
Early Day Motion 2111 promotes the crucial role of learning outside the classroom in inspiring young people and supporting their academic attainment.
This motion has been tabled to draw attention to the barriers for schools organising trips which include fears over health and safety, lack of status of learning outside the classroom in Ofsted inspections and bureaucratic rules tying teachers to the classroom, and to the solutions to overcome them.
The motion calls for the Government to do more to promote the role of the Learning Outside the Classroom Quality Badge (LOtC QB). The Quality Badge provides for the first time a national accreditation combining the essential elements of provision – learning and safety – into one easily recognisable and trusted Quality Badge for all types of LOtC provider organisations. The motion also calls for there to be a greater status of outdoor learning in Ofsted inspections.
Early Day Motions are a means by which Members of Parliament can show their support for a topic by signing them. The STF encourages all colleagues and stakeholders to write to their local MP’s asking them to support the EDM, or alternately for them to write to the Minister on this topic.
Copies of suitable letters can be obtained from the STF – click here.
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For more information on Early Day Motions: click here
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The actual wording of EDMs follow a required pattern, this reads:
That this House celebrates the crucial role of learning outside the classroom in inspiring young people and supporting their academic attainment; notes that these experiences are becoming increasingly recognised as an important, irreplaceable part of understanding the real world, as well as being an excellent opportunity for team building and personal development; further notes with regret that in recent years children and young people have increasingly been denied the chance to undertake learning outside the classroom; further notes that there are currently a number of barriers for schools organising trips including fears over health and safety, lack of status of learning outside the classroom in Ofsted inspections and bureaucratic rules tying teachers to the classroom; praises the Learning Outside the Classroom Quality Badge which provides a national accreditation combining the essential elements of provision - learning and safety - into one Quality Badge for all types of Learning Outside the Classroom provider organisations; further notes that the Quality Badge reduces the red tape associated with learning outside the classroom, making it easier for teachers and other education providers to incorporate learning outside the classroom into the everyday; and calls on the Government to ensure that awareness of the Quality Badge is raised among schools across the country and for Ofsted to specifically evaluate the provision of and access to outdoor learning within its new inspection framework.