George Michael's first attempt to include English as school subject (8)
I believe the answer is:
geometry
'school subject' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'george michael's first attempt to include english' is the wordplay.
'george' becomes 'geo'.
'michael's first' becomes 'm' (1st letter of 'michael').
'attempt to' becomes 'try' (I've seen this in other clues).
'include' is an insertion indicator.
'english' becomes 'E' (abbreviation as in OED).
'm'+'try'='mtry'
'mtry' placed around 'e' is 'metry'.
'geo'+'metry'='GEOMETRY'
'as' is the link.
(Other definitions for geometry that I've seen before include "Maths dealing with lines, angles etc - Euclid was good at it" , "Mathematics of shapes and lines" , "Maths of lines, curves and shapes" , "school subject" , "Mathematics of points, lines etc." .)