About

Policy, explained from the back bench.

The back bench is where you end up when the announcement is read out and nobody explains what it means. The BackBench covers education policy for the two groups it lands on hardest: the students who have to follow it and the parents who have to make sense of it.

Two readers, two versions

A student reading about the two-exam board policy wants to know whether one bad morning in February still sinks the year. A parent reading about the same policy wants to know what the 75% attendance rule now costs them. Those are different articles. Most coverage writes one of them and leaves the other reader to work it out.

So each post covers both, in one file, and publishes as two pages. The post you land on is the student version, which is the default voice of this site. Where a policy also lands on the people paying for it, there is a parents’ guide covering the same facts and different questions. Those are collected on For Parents, and every post links across to its counterpart.

The tracker

The policy tracker lists what we’re following and where each item stands: in effect, in committee, stalled, dead. It’s the thing worth checking before an argument about what the rules currently are.

Corrections

Policy summaries here are written from primary sources, and primary sources get amended. If something is wrong or has gone stale, say so and it’ll be fixed with a note on the post.

The BackBench is independent and not affiliated with any government body, board, or school. Nothing here is admissions or legal advice. Read the full disclaimer.