Giving schools specialist status does little if anything to improve their performance, research suggests.

Sports colleges actually got worse compared with other schools, according to the study by Cambridge and Staffordshire university academics.

They did note a ‘modest’ gain of 1.5 percentage points at GCSE level for every £500 extra in funding per pupil.

The government says specialisms drive up standards and that success came from partnerships forged in the community.

The study looked at all state secondary schools in England between 1999 and 2004, taking in the percentage of students getting five or more good GCSEs and data on school expenditure.

About 80% of England’s secondary schools now specialise

More of the story,
click ‘image’