After nearly six decades navigating school improvement, debates surrounding academisation, the role of advisers, and the structure of our education system hold few surprises for me. If there is one, it is the endurance of fruitless binary thinking. I am pleased to see the Labour government trying to move past it.
There is no denying that strong academies have made a remarkable impact on many struggling schools. Equally, we must acknowledge that some trusts have failed to deliver on their promises, and some have actually exacerbated challenges.
This dual reality also applies to other individuals and groups involved in school improvement. It is not a simple case of “academies good, maintained schools bad” or “CEOs good, advisers bad”. This is how zealots think, and I believe most of us would rather heal rifts and focus on solutions.
Over the years, I have been drafted in by national governments, trusts and individual schools to provide support. These opportunities have taught me that the most effective interventions are those that balance institutional strength with personalised expertise.
The key to effective school improvement lies in mutual respect and collaboration, pooling resources and insights to address the unique needs of each school.
That’s why I find Labour’s decision to endorse the maintained and academy sectors equally as they strive for greater coherence and fairness encouraging. Of course, it presents challenges – but none that can’t be overcome.
Doing so will require healing another rift: the one between policy and practice. Policy makers will need to show they value the insights of the sector at large, not just their supporters. At the same time, schools and their leaders will need to remain open to external support and new ideas.
The goal is not to impose change but to foster an environment where continuous improvement becomes the norm, and I am hopeful. But hope alone is not enough.
Collaboration will need to be more than an ideal
We operate in a system that has fostered competition for decades, and the culture shift to collaboration will require careful incentivisation. Here’s how.
First, a shared set of values is an essential prerequisite. The vast majority of our education leaders support the basic principle of an excellent education for all. The government must continue to reinforce this approach, and support and celebrate the enormous amount of collaborative activity that is already taking place.
Second, government will significantly foster collaboration by lightening its own footprint across the sector. It should adopt the Pareto principle that 80 per cent of outcomes result from 20 per cent of causes, identify the most impactful activities and focus on those.
For example, schools, trusts, local authorities of all types have adopted the International Quality Standard for Education Advisers. There is clearly an appetite (and therefore a need) to better quality-assure school support and advice, and the system-wide impact could be substantial.
This is particularly relevant given the launch of new local improvement teams. Who will be on these teams, and how will they be trained? RISE teams should therefore be backed by funding for professional programmes for the development and quality assurance of those advising on school improvement.
Third, as driven as they are and agree as they might in principle, school leaders will do the things they are funded to do and judged upon – the simple carrot and stick.
As to a carrot, government should provide financial incentives to academies and maintained schools that form partnerships, align their development strategies and encourage resource pooling beyond their own institutions.
And as to a stick, Ofsted reform must come to include a measure of how well schools are doing at forming or engaging with collaborative networks, both local and national, irrespective of their ‘responsible body’. Are they partaking in shared opportunities to improve their own practice where it needs it or to support others where their own is exemplary?
And finally, government must provide the structures for those networks to form and evolve. For example, mandating membership of self-governing regional and/or sub-regional advisory boards and governance partnerships could be transformational for identifying and addressing local needs.
Collaboration is a high ideal we all share but are somehow failing to deliver systemically. If Labour truly want to put an end to unhealthy competition and foster a more collegiate approach, it will need to be more than an ideal. The system will need to be re-wired for it.
