Published: 8th July 2026
Here’s our official end-of-year school report for 2025/26 – a look back at what First News got up to this year, and what’s coming next.
With the academic year drawing to a close, the First News school report is in. How did we do?
It’s been a landmark year. We celebrated 20 years of placing trusted news into the hands of young people and launched TeachKit: Media & Information Literacy.
First News continues to be the UK’s leading newspaper for young people and is trusted by thousands of teachers to bring the real world into the classroom every week.
We support the development of critical thinking and reading for pleasure across all key stages, bringing breadth, balance, and real-world relevance to the classroom. Our paper and resources contribute to a whole-school reading culture that teachers return to week after week.
Thousands of families received free First News as part of our Summer Reading Scheme. This encourages children to keep reading over the summer holidays.
We launched the First News Press Club this year, giving young readers a voice and a platform to report on the stories that matter to them. Topics included division in sport and social media platforms for kids.
More than 200 junior journalist reports have featured in First News this academic year. We’d love for even more young people to get involved next year!
We sent more than half a million copies of First News to subscribing schools. Each issue is jam-packed with headlines, sport, science and more!
Our printable resources were downloaded by teachers over 30,000 times – keeping young people engaged with the news while boosting reading, comprehension and vocabulary skills.
Pupils also cast more than 160,000 votes on our digital learning platform, Engage Pro, across issues that matter to young people. Pupils weren’t just reading the news, they were responding to it.
Next year we will continue to support teachers with building pupils’ media literacy by expanding TeachKit: MIL to include Level 4 (KS3/4).
Since September 2025, we’ve sent out £15,000 worth of book vouchers to schools to champion reading for pleasure. Next year we aim to send even more!
We will continue our mission of getting First News into more classrooms, homes and hands.
TeachKit: MIL is expanding from September. News-based media literacy resources will be available weekly, giving teachers a fresh, curriculum-linked starting point every single week. They will also be covering Level 4 to ensure more pupils learn essential media literacy skills.
We’re transforming our trusted digital edition of First News into an engaging, interactive news platform which will provide an accessible, personalised news experience for pupils. It will give teachers the tools to support reading, wider-literacy skills, and diverse learning needs.
Next year is shaping up to be our biggest yet. Explore our products to see how your school can benefit from First News.
First News reaches millions of young readers every week, at home and at school. Our age-appropriate news stories and activities spark curiosity, build media and information literacy skills and empower children with the tools to navigate the world.
