“By schools, for schools” is a mantra deeply ingrained in my
educational psyche and may be familiar to some of you as the tagline for the
Specialist Schools and Academies Trust (SSAT) over the years. It is a phrase that keeps coming back to me
in this time of change, trepidation and hope as education policy shifts once
again and we find ourselves in the midst of an extraordinary power game. Above all else, we can see the fear culture
that has been patiently building in the background coming to the fore and
gripping many of us. We hear of changes
in “powers”, of “orders”, “letters direct from the Secretary of State”, “no
right of appeal”, etc, etc.
Well, well. Strong language. Sure to stir up emotions. All
in the name of ‘raising standards’. All
pretty heart-breaking, really. In the meanwhile, lists of ‘coasting’ schools are
made public (a bit of naming and shaming always helps, does it?) while
leadership teams across the country spend hours of their time trying to work
out if they could be next, devoid of any clear definitions of what would make
them ‘coast’. While the fear spreads,
paralysis sets in and the system-wide spirit of innovation, inquiry and self-improvement
is in danger of gradually fading. Survival becomes the priority, avoiding the
shame of failing your community becomes the goal, the potential of losing your
job a reality.
We are in danger of many schools behaving in that weird way
we often do when we are being observed teaching and having a bit of a wobbly
day because our confidence has taken flight. We over-think, over-plan, trip on
our words, misplace our resources, crow-bar in the things that will tick the
right boxes, produce document after document to justify the efficacy of our
teaching. Above all else, we confuse the
students with our obsessive control on what they are doing, learning or saying. Worst of all, in our hearts we know that at
best it was a mediocre lesson and that they were definitely short-changed. We
stop listening to ourselves and don’t want to hear what others have to say. Imagine if everyone in the school behaved
that way. What a miserable experience of
education for the learners. How dreadful
if most schools were like that.
So, ‘by schools, for schools’ is of course, an apt, handy
and obvious phrase to keep in mind. I’ll
be bold and say that we have moved on enormously from the days of being
isolationist and competitive with the ‘school up the road’ and venture so far
as to say that there is a stronger collegiality that has built up through both
necessity and a deeper understanding of being in this whole business of
education together. For every bad ‘takeover’, there is a story of great
partnership. We know that this has not
always been the case but it is where we have hope. It is our greatest weapon against the fear
that threatens to grip us. Allow me to
reminisce...
In the mid-noughties, I stepped out of school for three years
and worked for SSAT as part of a team that facilitated school improvement
programmes. One of these was commissioned
by the DfE to tackle, wait for it, ‘coasting’ schools. They were defined from their overall results
over a three-year period, their contextual value-added and meeting suggested
targets from RAISE and FFT data. These
schools received a letter. It told them
that they had been identified as being ready to benefit from some support in
order to improve outcomes for their students.
It offered them a modest amount of additional funding, exploratory
conferences, peer-to-peer support, and a network of schools who were there to
share their improvement journeys and solutions.
I spent a lot of time phoning schools to follow up the letter,
convincing them that there wasn’t a catch and that this was all about support
and opportunity, not a telling off. For many, the naming of the
underperformance elephant in the room was a relief. They were ready for change
but hadn’t known where to go, knowing only that their local authority didn’t
think they were good enough and that they were part of a limited and often
static network.
The programme was called ‘Raising Achievement Transforming
Learning’. There were ‘mentor’ schools and headteachers, all of whom had been
asked to contribute because they had done what the programme said on the tin
and the vast majority were still in post. School leaders and teachers mingled,
shared and connected across geographical boundaries and very often with their
‘competitors’ in the same authority. The good and the great of the education
world spoke at conferences and seminars, making research accessible and
practical. The strategies shared, the innovations trialled and undertaken, the
partnerships forged, the sheer creativity that erupted from these connections
were often breathtaking. For most,
results improved, for some, dramatically.
The changes made in many of those schools were not just quick fixes but
bold new directions that invigorated the learning experience for both students
and teachers. Data became a tool for analysis, not merely a measurement, the
curriculum was an exciting place to motivate and capture the imagination of
students. It seemed to work for most of
the schools. The energy was wondrous. A very different approach to school
improvement than the current one, then, in spirit, language and ethos. A lot of
schools even thought it was… (sssshhhh) enjoyable.
Nothing is perfect, even with hindsight, and we live in
times of austerity. It is never useful to idealise or to try to replicate what
has passed. However, my wistful reminiscing has made me smile with optimism. As
much as thoughtfully-worded letters and the promise of a supportive, creative
community inspired those despairing school leaders, it was a domain devised and
created to help ‘by schools for schools’ become a reality for them that made
the difference. We are in a much better
place now, aren’t we? So much peer-to-peer and school-to-school support happens
because that is how we do things now, the exchange of ideas and innovation has
become organic and system-led, our collegiality as a profession is arguably the
best it has ever been, we communicate endlessly in person and using all the
media available to us. We understand our own data and are knowledgeable enough
to critically analyse external measures. We have created a friendly community
with the shared aim of making education the best it can be, there is
innovation, creativity and bold-thinking all around us. We don’t really need to
create networks and opportunities for professional learning in quite the same
way we used to. By schools, for schools. It’s just what we do.
In the unfriendly era of shaming lists, feared letters, the
dread of unwanted ‘takeovers’ from unknown quantities, the pressure to play it
safe, it is this community we have grown that will keep the paralysis of fear
at bay. One of the biggest lessons I learned a decade ago working with those
schools is that sometimes, the hand of friendship needs to be extended to those
who need it most. Often they are the
ones who have already begun to retreat into themselves, ready to do only what
they think will please everyone and make them go away. The successful, thriving
schools, leaders and teachers who are confident and popular, share wonderful
insights, appear to be at the cutting edge of innovative thinking and mingling
in all the right places can be scary, too. If we are going to continue to make schools
the key agents of change and not the ‘fear’ regime of policy makers, we need to
remember those who are already losing sleep, offer our support and have the
humility to remember that yes, “we are all in it together”. Let’s just try to
do it before the letter arrives. Let’s
show them who really has the power to make the difference.
