• Civitas research with parliamentary questions submitted by Tristam Hunt MP have laid bare figures which show academies are abandoning non-compulsory academic subjects for less challenging 'equivalent qualifications' which better boost their league table position. In foreign languages and geography, entries were a third lower than the average for maintained schools. Telegraph


• SATS have too high a margin of error to be used to compare schools, as scores are unreliable for 30% of pupils, teaching unions have claimed. The National Union of Teachers and the Association of Teachers and Lecturers are launching a campaign for the tests to be scrapped in favour of continuous teacher assessment. BBC

• Record numbers of school leavers will miss out on a place at a good university this year. Ucas figures show there are 170,000 more candidates than spaces, following an 11.6% rise in applications; about one in 12 applicants was rejected in 2009. The Chief Executive of Ucas advised that many aspiring applicants would have to wait until later in life to go to university. Times


• The glut of applicants for jobs left one in ten 2009 graduates out of work six months after graduation; figures also laid bare the gulf between the institutions at the top and bottom of the league table. Over 25% of graduates from London Metropolitan and London South Bank University were unemployed six months after graduation whereas only one in 20 Cambridge graduates was still unemployed during the summer. Telegraph


• A recent arts graduate of the University of Manchester argues against the notion that prestigious, research-intensive universities must be protected from cuts at the expense of other teaching-centric universities. Her 20 person seminar groups led by PhD students and six hours of contact time a week was incomparable to those of science students, a predominantly male cohort, who were charged the same tuition fees. Guardian

• Parents of an obese child could be guilty of neglect, claims a controversial article published on the British Medical Journal's site today. Researchers claim that the weight of a child by itself is not a reason for child protection staff to get involved but it may be appropriate to consider the child protection register if the parents consistently fail to change the family's lifestyle and will not engage with outside help. 37% of children in local authority care are overweight or obese, so removing the child from their family may not be effective. Guardian


• About 100 babies die each year because they are born out of hours: babies born at weekends or outside the hours of 9am to 5pm are significantly more likely to die - predominantly due to lack of oxygen - than those born at other times. Most obstetric care at night and on weekends is covered by junior doctors, with consultants on call rather than present. Times


• Dave Hill explores how changes in housing benefit could impact on 15,000 families across the capital. Guardian


• The Guardian visits three teenagers' bedrooms. Guardian

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