Walking into an Educational Crisis

After 14 years of Conservative Government, Sir Keir Starmer and the Labour Party take up the mantle of leadership of the United Kingdom. Whilst for many there is optimism, not least from within the public sector, in many areas, including Education, the new and shiny Labour Government are walking into a crisis. The appointment of an extra 6,500 teacher, whist welcome, is a drop in the ocean to solving a teacher recruitment and retention crisis. With less that 50% of last year's teacher training places being filled, many teachers teaching out of subject and leaving the profession or leaving the Country to teach than ever before, Labour must go beyond the headlines of their manifesto and address the root causes of the crisis.

Vision

I share an ambition with all leaders that the United Kingdom becomes an industrial and technological powerhouse of the world with high rates of economic growth and the lowest rates of unemployment.

At the centre of this vision must be education and unleashing the potential of our young people through a high-quality educational experience that develops knowledge and skills which can be applied in their day to day lives and beyond the staples of any test or examination.

We want to address the inequality of experience and achievement of those from the most disadvantaged backgrounds and those with SEND by sharply focussing on the barriers - such as attendance to school, which is disproportionately affecting those groups of young people.

The English Baccelaureate (Ebacc)

We must address the notion the Ebacc as a suite of qualifications is the only way for a curriculum to be ambitious and thus the only way for young people to be successful. We must provide rigorous and thorough information, advice and guidance to ensure young people and families can make fully informed decisions about their next steps and this should not be pre-determined by a political ideology. The options process is a right of passage which should be focussed on what young people enjoy doing and succeed in as well as what they might want to go on to study in the future.
The current policy is having a negative impact on the wider curriculum and the ability on schools to provide a broad and balanced offer. It is also, undoubtedly contributing to the attendance crisis faced by many schools up and down the Country.

Careers Education

We must address the crisis of a widening skills gap by ensuring LSIP strategies start in school and not in post 16 education and allow schools to work freely and collaboratively with local, regional and national businesses to ensure young people are inspired to the world of work and are able to see and be on pathways to employment.

This and the next generation are going to be multi career employees and the act of asking what job would you like to do when you grow up is archaic. We need to see and promote careers in industries such as construction and hospitality as being as valuable to our economy as the more traditional academic professions. We need to empower leaders in schools to promote and support young people to access these pathways and we have to ensure apprenticeships are not seen as the poor alternative to going to University.

Character Education and Personal Development

We want young people to grow up valuing the ecosystem that they grow up in - have strong moral values and want to contribute to making society better. The ideology behind the Conservative policy of creating National Service for young people is not a bad one but it is based on a compliance model rather than a responsibility one. The culture of being ambitious not only for yourself and your family but for the community around you also must be a key focus in education.

We need to address, head on, the increase in our society of casual racism and homophobia and other hateful words and actions towards those with protected characteristics.

We need to celebrate our diversity, develop empathy and understanding of each other and ultimately eradicate hate crime in our society by ensuring the education young people receive is a greater influencer than what they might see, read or hear.

Services - Working together!

Public services that work with young people - education, health, mental health, social services and others have been underfunded for several years and have been pushed to the brink. As a result of this and other variables, we are not working in collaboration with each other and more often than not are dealing with a lack of understanding and empathy of each other's roles. As a result we are not clear on expectations from each other causing the polar opposite of collaboration and creating a them and us approach! The simple solution - we need greater investment to ensure more people on the ground.

The structure of schools and school improvement

Multi-Academy Trusts (MATs) are highly effective in some areas and in some contexts, as are LA schools, those in a federation or those in a Co-operative Trust. There are others, however, that are not and this is often down to the strength of the leadership in the school or within the group of schools.

The idea that a MAT is the only way, that great Headteachers must become CEOs is, in my humble opinion, a fallacy and not a proven entity.

There needs to be a funding model that supports a mixed economy of schools and a policy from Government that promotes systems leadership - understanding that great schools are not created because of the buildings, they are created by great leadership who in turn create and support great staff - teachers and non-teachers.

So our investment must be in leaders, to make Headteachers and leaders at all levels the best they can be and to be empowered to operate in an environment where peer review, be that in whatever structure schools might be in, is at the heart of school improvement.

The key to this is ensuring Heads and Leaders receive strong professional development to ensure there are robust quality assurance systems in their schools and the rich information that comes from this is used to adapt and innovate to ensure children`s academic and social needs are being met, they are able to flourish and standards remain the highest that they can be.

The regulator - Ofsted

Ofsted very much have a role to play in the self-improving system but rather than judge schools - they should be looking at the quality assurance that is taking place - what it shows, what schools are doing about it and the impact that this is having. The latter can be covered through the 'report card' that Labour have talked about in their manifesto.

There should be no gradings, however, schools should know whether what they are doing is effective or not, why not and where they can go within the region to seek support.

Summary

Educating young people is both an honour and a privilege and in my humble opinion, the very best job in the World! It is however one of the hardest jobs made harder by the challenges of a post pandemic world! If we are truly going to make a difference to the life chances of young people, particularly those from the most disadvantaged background and those with complex SEND needs, we cannot do what we have always done! The last thing we need as a profession is system-wide changes but we do need to raise the profile of the profession by adapting and innovating to ensure staff feel valued and supported and children thrive and achieve well making friends and memories along the way.

Education, education, education!