Education Secretary announces 6 new opportunity areas
Education Secretary Justine Greening expanded the ‘opportunity areas’ programme today by adding Bradford, Doncaster, Fenland & East Cambridgeshire, Hastings, Ipswich and Stoke-on-Trent as areas of focus.
The Government will also partly fund a new £3.5m programme that will see the Education Endowment Foundation establish a research school for each of the 12 opportunity areas. These schools will lead the development and dissemination of evidence-led practice in local schools.
All opportunity areas are social mobility cold spots identified by the Social Mobility Index, published by the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission.
The placings of the new opportunity areas in the Social Mobility Index are:
- Bradford (48)
- Doncaster (24)
- Fenland (6) and East Cambridgeshire (14)
- Hastings (43)
- Ipswich (33)
- Stoke-on-Trent (27)
While three North East Local Authority areas have been identified by the report as being social mobility ‘cold spots’, they are ranked in the bottom 20%. These were identified as Hartlepool (60), Northumberland (63) and Middlesbrough (65).
The North East is the only region other than London (which has 30 of the 65 identified social mobility ‘cold spots’, including all of the top 13) that does not have an opportunity area:
| Region | Number of opportunity areas |
| East Midlands | 1 |
| East of England | 3 |
| London | 0 |
| North East | 0 |
| North West | 2 |
| South East | 1 |
| South West | 1 |
| West Midlands | 1 |
| Yorkshire & The Humber | 3 |
In October, the Education Secretary announced that Blackpool, Derby, Norwich, Oldham, Scarborough, and West Somerset would become opportunity areas, which will see local partnerships formed with early years providers, schools, colleges, universities, businesses, charities and local authorities to ensure all children and young people have the opportunity to reach their full potential.
A key aim of opportunity areas is to build young people’s knowledge and skills and provide them with the best advice and opportunities, including working with organisations such as the Careers and Enterprise Company, the Confederation of British Industry, the Federation of Small Businesses, and the National Citizen Service.
The Education Secretary’s full speech is available to read here.