Morethanajob podcast in association with ResearchEd have the pleasure to welcome Simon Antwis to our 50th episode! Simon is a former Headteacher of three schools, having qualified as a biology teacher at the start of his career. Simon is a former school inspector and now a senior education consultant at STEER education.

https://steer.education/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/Young-Peoples-Mental-Health-in-the-UK-STEER-Report-Feb-2022.pdf 

Tell us about life growing up for you and your own experience of education in your school years?

What made you want to come into teaching?

We are going to dig deep into the findings of the mental health report that STEER have published today, and we will make this available for our listeners to view. This was an extensive review gathered from schools for year 7-13 students. Almost 100 UK mainstream secondary schools were included in the sample, with an assessed student population n > 15,000. This has been an extensive report. Can you start by giving us the key headlines of the report, before explore areas in greater depth?

The report shows that the pandemic has an average 25 % adverse effect on student’s self-regulation with girls are particularly affected, with a 33% decline. Why is this? What should schools be doing now to recover this?

The report shows that boys’ self-regulation outside school has actually improved during the pandemic. Why have boys had a better outcome than girls?

This data provides strong evidence that public exams have a direct negative emotional effect on the wellbeing of students. Surely STEER are not advocating the end of exams based upon this data?

Are there any significant differences between state schools & independent schools?