samfreedman1.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/why-are-londons-schools-doing-so-well.html .... 14 Social Mobility and Child Poverty
Regional challenges: a collaborative approach to improving education
Anna Claeys James Kempton Chris Paterson
Regional challenges: a collaborative approach to improving education Anna Claeys James Kempton Chris Paterson
Regional challenges
About the authors Anna Claeys is a researcher at CentreForum focusing on education and social policy. She previously worked in journalism and has a degree in history from King’s College, Cambridge. Chris Paterson is an Associate Director at CentreForum. He specialises in social policy and education, with a particular focus on social mobility. He was a contributor to ‘The Tail – How England’s schools fail one child in five’ and author of the recent publications ‘Character and resilience manifesto’ and ‘Measuring what matters: secondary accountability indicators that benefit all’. He was previously a solicitor at city law firm Slaughter and May. James Kempton is an Associate Director at CentreForum working on social policy and is the author of the CentreForum publication ‘To teach, to learn’ and co-author of ‘Train Too’. A former Council leader, teacher, medical royal college chief executive and management consultant, James has worked extensively on public services reform with a particular focus on education and social mobility policy. Acknowledgments We are very grateful to RM Education for supporting this project. The authors would like to thank the following for their input: Professor David Woods, Professor Merryn Hutchings, Sir Tim Brighouse, Dame Sue John, Dr Vanessa Ogden, Sir Mike Tomlinson, Jon Coles, Professor Chris Husbands, Sir George Berwick, Andy Buck, Anita Kerwin-Nye, Professor Mel Ainscow, Alan Wood, Geoff Whitty, Baroness Sally Morgan, Simon Faull, Hannah Woodhouse, Michael Maragakis, Paul Brennan, Frankie Sulke, Susannah Hill, Michael Moll, Chris Bally, Gordon Boyd, Denise Walker, Sue Shinkfield, Phil Daniels, Beccy Earnshaw, Gill Wyness, Professor Stephen Lee, Russell Eagling, Victoria Pearce, Joe Moxham, Rachel Phillips, and Tom Frostick.
ISBN: 978-1-909274-18-1 Published July 2014 CentreForum This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. For more information visit creativecommons.org
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Regional challenges
:: Contents
Executive summary
4
Recommendations
6
1 – Introduction
7
2 – London Challenge: an overview
14
3 – A changing landscape: children of London Challenge
24
4 – Key considerations for a challenge
40
5 – The case for government support for regional / sub-regional challenges
54
63
Summary of recommendations
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Regional challenges
:: Executive summary Parents rightly pay a lot of attention to choosing the right school for their child but the reality is that where in the country this school is can have a major impact. For example, under new measures, secondary schools in London are currently adding at least half a grade more progress in each subject compared with schools across the lowest performing regions of England. If all schools emulated the results achieved by disadvantaged pupils in London, the life chances of thousands of pupils would improve, driving up social mobility in the process. The fact that London has, in the past few years, gone from the worst to the best performing region shows that this change is possible. Faced with this evidence, government should give greater priority to tackling the unacceptably large variations in pupil outcomes across English regions. While some debate continues as to the precise impact of the interacting factors behind London’s success, the education initiative London Challenge played a defining role and has to be the starting point for considering area-based interventions intended to address regional underperformance. Evidence suggests that there are schools in every region of the country with the capacity to break the link between deprivation and destiny and secure outstanding outcomes for disadvantaged pupils in particular. However, this knowledge is unevenly spread and needs to be moved from where it is to where it is most needed. This was the principle that lay at the heart of London Challenge. This report examines the key features of London Challenge and nine case studies of emerging ‘challenges’ around the country which are seeking to learn from London and replicate its impact today. It uses this analysis to consider how regional challenges could best be implemented in the current educational landscape. The starting point for setting up a challenge is a focus on improving education in a specific area. And so the first key learning to take from London Challenge and the emerging challenges is the importance of starting with a rigorous, contextually specific analysis of the issues that are impacting on that area’s educational underperformance leading to agreement on a manageable number of key goals and interventions. This focus on tightly defining the specific problem and goals should lie at the heart of every challenge. Simply adopting the interventions used by London Challenge is unlikely to produce the same positive outcomes. Those seeking to learn from London Challenge also need to address the following four key elements that help to define a challenge:
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::
Scale - What is the locality in which the area-based approach will be delivered? Single or multiple local authority area?
::
Mandate - What authority does the challenge have to drive change? Where does this come from?
::
External Challenge - What contribution can external players make to defining the problem, reviewing progress and driving change?
::
Approach - Is the initiative conceived of as a narrow school focused improvement programme or is it also more broadly concerned with durable, systemic change?
One of the defining lessons from London is the importance of high-level sponsorship and support from politicians and policymakers. The learning from the emerging challenges, which are predominantly bottom-up initiatives, points to the difficulty of operating a challenge at a region-wide scale in today’s educational landscape without the strong sense of cohesive mandate that only central government can provide. This would not require the same level of top-down involvement government had in London Challenge because greater capacity now exists across the system. What is required is to supplement this bottom-up drive with the necessary political will and impetus to draw things together at scale in a concerted attempt to transform outcomes for pupils right across the country.
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:: Recommendations 1. Government should give greater priority to tackling the unacceptably large variations in pupil outcomes across English regions. 2. Given the turnaround in performance of London schools in recent years, the learning from London Challenge should be the starting point for area-based interventions intended to address regional underperformance. 3. Rather than straightforwardly copying London Challenge, the starting point for developing a challenge should be a detailed audit of need in that particular locality and a highly focused strategy of what needs to change, leading to agreement on a manageable number of key goals and interventions. 4. Those seeking to learn from London Challenge should consider the implications of the following key features seen in London and City Challenge and also in emerging challenges: scale (single local authority area to region-wide); mandate (top-down or bottom-up); the degree of external challenge; whether the approach is narrowly school-focused or aims for a more broad systemic change. 5. Given the gap in performance between London and all other regions and how few emerging challenges are operating at a scale beyond a single local authority area, government should be proactive in facilitating challenges to be set up through a national programme offering both a degree of organisational and financial support.
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:: Chapter 1 – Introduction “As a country, we have to tackle two major barriers to becoming world class. Firstly, the wide variety in regional performance... Secondly, the long tail of underperformance which mainly affects our poorest children.” – Sir Michael Wilshaw, ‘Unseen Children’ speech, June 20131 “London Challenge is a lesson in how to turn around poor pupils’ lives… A decade ago, parents were fleeing inner London to avoid sending their children to local schools. Today, a poor pupil is more likely to perform better in the capital than anywhere else in the country.” – Dr Tristram Hunt MP, Shadow Education Secretary, December 20132 “London Challenge… worked because it gave many London teachers the leadership, authority and support they needed to challenge and learn from each other. It became the mission of every teacher in a London school to improve standards across the city.” – Rt Hon Nick Clegg MP, Deputy Prime Minister, October 20133 Established in 2003 to tackle a perceived crisis, London Challenge set itself an ambitious goal: to completely transform the educational prospects of the capital. The fact that, in little more than a decade, this has come about - and in some style - has ensured that few other education initiatives are so widely (and warmly) discussed. This is somewhat ironic for an initiative that benefited, particularly in its early stages, from flying somewhat beneath the radar. However it is safe to say that this cover is now well and truly blown. As recognition of the revolution in outcomes in the capital has gradually dawned, the importance of London Challenge as a collaborative area-based approach to improving education has come to the fore. While some debate continues as to the precise impact of the interacting factors behind London’s success, multiple evaluations have now demonstrated that the initiative played an integral – and indeed defining – role.4 1 2 3 4
Michael Wilshaw, ‘Unseen Children’ speech at Church House, Westminster, 20 June 2013. Tristram Hunt MP, ‘The London Challenge is a lesson in how to turn around poor pupils’ lives’, The Guardian, 9 December 2013, available at: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/09/ london-challenge-lesson-poor-pupils-labour-policy-schools The Rt Hon Nick Clegg MP, speech on education and outstanding leaders, 24 October 2013, available at: https://www.gov.uk/ government/speeches/nick-cleggs-speech-on-education-and-outstanding-leaders Ofsted, ‘Improvements in London schools 2000–06’, 5 December 2006; T Brighouse and L Fullick (eds.), ‘Education in a Global City: Essays on London’, Institute of Education, 2007; Ofsted, ‘London Challenge’, 10 December 2010; Merryn Hutchings et al, ‘Evaluation of the City Challenge Programme’, Department for Education, 28 June 2012; Merryn Hutchings and Ayo Mansaray, ‘A review of the impact of the London Challenge (2003-8) and the City Challenge (2008-11)’, Research paper for Ofsted’s ‘Access and achievement in education 2013 review’, 20 June 2013.
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This has given rise to increasing interest in replicating London Challenge as a way of addressing the unacceptably large variations in pupil outcomes across English regions. CentreForum’s influential 2013 publication, The Tail, having drawn attention to the glaring regional discrepancies in the failure to achieve basic literacy and numeracy skills by the end of secondary schooling, made an express recommendation on this point. Others have made similar calls (including Sir Michael Wilshaw and Lord Adonis, the latter in the specific context of the North East).5 At the same time, on the ground, numerous localised area-based initiatives are independently springing up around the country that are both directly inspired and informed by London Challenge.6 This context provides the starting point for this report. As multiple commentators have noted, any attempt to ‘export’ area-based initiatives based on London Challenge will require considerable thought.7 What follows marks an attempt to begin to provide this by: 1. Identifying and analysing the key features of London and City Challenge and the other emerging challenges around the country; and 2. Considering – in this light – how regional challenges could best be implemented in the current educational landscape.
The London journey – an overview The relatively recent transformation in pupil outcomes in London is an educational phenomenon with profound implications for driving the UK’s stalled social mobility. The sheer scale of the turnaround is now well documented and has been extensively explored by CentreForum and others (including a recent detailed analysis by the CfBT and the Centre for London).8 A clear overview, however, can be grasped simply from the graphs on the following pages. At a headline pupil level, as late as 2002, outcomes in the capital were worse than in any other region of England. Today, they are not only the best, but comfortably so. Just as revealing as to the wholesale system transformation that London Challenge helped to engender is the turnaround at a school level as highlighted in Figures 2 - 5. Little over a decade ago education (particularly secondary education) in London was in crisis. Today, schools in London are not only the best in the country but, as Prof Chris Husbands puts it, many are simply among the best urban schools in the world.9
5 6 7
8 9
Paul Marshall (ed.), ‘The Tail: how England’s schools fail one in five – and what can be done’, Profile, 2013; Michael Wilshaw, ‘Unseen Children’ speech at Church House, Westminster, 20 June 2013; Lord Adonis et al, ‘North East Independent Economic Review’ Report, North East Local Enterprise Partnership, April 2013. Discussed in detail in Chapter 3. Chris Husbands, ‘Exporting London Challenge is complex and challenging’, IOE London Blog, 31 December 2013, available at: http://ioelondonblog.wordpress.com/2013/10/31/exporting-london-challenge-is-complex-and-challenging/; Sam Freedman, ‘Why are London’s schools doing so well?’, When 140 Characters Isn’t Enough, 26 October 2013, available at: http:// samfreedman1.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/why-are-londons-schools-doing-so-well.html Gill Wyness, ‘London Schooling: lessons from the capital’, CentreForum, November 2011; Ofsted, ‘London Challenge’, 10 December 2010; S Baars et al, ‘Lessons from London schools: investigating the success’, CfBT / Centre for London, June 2014 Chris Husbands, ‘Exporting London Challenge is complex and challenging’, IOE London Blog, 31 December 2013, available at: http://ioelondonblog.wordpress.com/2013/10/31/exporting-london-challenge-is-complex-and-challenging/
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Figure 1 – Percentage of 5 A*-C GCSEs including English and maths London Rest of England 65
60 55 50 20
45 40
15
35
10
30 1997-8
Figure 2 – Percentage of schools below 20 Primary 20
15
15
10
10
5
2001-02
Lond
Outs
2005-06
2008-09
0 the
floor target 2005 2005 and 2013 2013 London Secondary
30
London
25
Outside London
15
5
2005
2005
2013
0
2013
2005
30 25 between Figure 3 – Difference
Figure 4 – London Difference between Outside London percentages of schools Outside London(secondary) judged Good or Outstanding in London and England (2000/2003 and 2013)
25 percentages of schools 20 (primary) judged
Good or Outstanding in London and 20 15 England (2000/2003 and 2013)
Percentage difference between London and England
10
20
5
15
0
10
5 0 2005
Percentage difference between London and England
15
2005 2013
5 0 -5
2000-2003
2013
London
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2013
20 15
2013
10 5 0 -5
Presentation by Merryn Hutchings, London Education Conference, February 2014.
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2000-2003
Lon
Out
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0
0
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Outside London
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5
5
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2011-12 10
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Regional challenges
Figure 5 – Current picture on Ofsted ratings (March 2014) Outstanding
Good
Inadequate
Satisfactory / RI
London
Rest of England
0
20
40
60
80
100
Regional variation and disadvantage A simple focus on overall headline outcomes underplays the true scale of London’s turnaround for its most disadvantaged pupils. Around 1 in 4 pupils in London (more in Inner London) are eligible for free school meals (the prevailing proxy for disadvantage). This compares to around 1 in 7 elsewhere in the country. But it is here that the full extent of the “chasm” in performance between the capital and elsewhere is most evident.11 At primary, less than 1 in 5 Free School Meals (FSM) pupils in London are currently failing to reach the basic expected level of literacy in KS2 tests – crucial in terms of accessing the secondary curriculum – while in Yorkshire and the Humber, for example, it is almost 1 in 3 (see Figure 6). These discrepancies are even more striking when broken down further, with the top ten performing local authority areas all in London. In these, around 85% of all FSM pupils reach the expected literacy level, while in the worst performing local authority area (Wokingham) it is little over 1 in 2 (55%). At secondary in London, half of pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds currently achieve 5 good GCSEs (or equivalent) including English and Maths; elsewhere it is around one in three (see Figure 7). The full degree of this regional variation in school performance and the extent to which London is pulling away is particularly striking when pupil intake is controlled and the impact of ‘value added’ by the school is isolated. The current government has made a clear commitment to putting measures which capture this at the heart of the accountability system (at both primary and secondary level) as a way of reflecting what a school is doing rather than the pupils it has. Figure 8 below is based on CentreForum modelling against 2013 results of the new such measure (Progress 8) that will become the defining headline indicator of secondary school performance from 2016.12 11 12
Sam Freedman, ‘Why are London’s schools doing so well?’, When 140 Characters Isn’t Enough, 26 October 2013, available at: http://samfreedman1.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/why-are-londons-schools-doing-so-well.html Chris Paterson, ‘Measuring What Matters: secondary school accountability indicators that benefit all’, CentreForum, August 2013.
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This measure seeks to capture the progress a school enables its pupils to make from their KS2 starting point in relation to a broad and balanced curriculum of up to 8 subjects. This map illustrates that, when aggregated to a regional level, secondary schools in London are adding at least half a grade more progress in each subject under this measure (and against this curriculum) than in the lowest performing regions (the North East and Yorkshire and the Humber). A clear government priority, therefore, must be to tackle the unacceptably large variations in pupil outcomes across English regions.
Figure 6 – Percentage of primary pupils not achieving Level 4 literacy by region FSM
All 30 25 20 15 10
Yorks & Humber
West Midlands
South West
South East
North West
North East
London
East Midlands
East
0
England
5
Figure 7 – Percentage of FSM pupils achieving 5 A*-C GCSEs including English and maths 50 England East East Midlands London North East North West South East SouthWest West Yorkshire Midlands and the Humber 40 30 20
11
South East
South West
Yorks & Humber
East
East Midlands
North East
North West
England
West Midlands
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London
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Regional challenges
Figure 8 – How the regions measure up: modelling the new Progress 8 measure by region using 2013 data Key Value added by the average school = 0.0
North East -0.3
Figures show - for the schools in each region - the average level of value added relative to this benchmark (presented as a proportion of a grade more or less progress in each subject)
North West -0.1 Yorkshire and the Humber -0.2
East Midlands -0.2 West Midlands -0.1
East 0.0 London +0.3 South East 0.0
South West -0.1
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Changing the narrative – you can do better with ‘kids like these’ The following chapter will look at London Challenge itself in detail. However, perhaps the single overriding theme emerging from our discussions with those involved was that London Challenge sought to change the narrative around what can be expected from children with challenging backgrounds. As Ofsted’s ‘Unseen Children’ has highlighted, this is now a pressing national problem, not least for the smaller proportions of disadvantaged children ‘hidden’ in schools in more affluent areas.13 Powerful forthcoming analysis by the Social Mobility & Child Poverty Commission suggests that this decoupling of deprivation and destiny really has been achieved in many of London’s schools. It reveals that in every part of the country there are schools where the most disadvantaged children outperform the national average for all children.14 However, these schools are very unevenly spread across the country. In London, around 35% of secondary schools achieve better results for their disadvantaged pupils than the national average for all children. The average for the other regions of England is around 9%. This evidence supports the idea that there is a real need to change the narrative around the performance of disadvantaged pupils in other parts of the country. However, it also indicates that in every region there is capacity already in this system to buck the trend and secure outstanding outcomes, but this needs to be spread more widely. This was the very premise that lay at the heart of the theory of change that underpinned London Challenge. Given the turnaround in performance of London schools in recent years, the learning from London Challenge should therefore be the starting point for area-based interventions intended to address regional underperformance.
Structure of the report The remainder of the report will proceed as follows. Chapter 2 will provide an analysis of some of the key elements of London Challenge, particularly as they inform an attempt to learn lessons that can be applied in today’s altered educational landscape. Chapter 3 focuses on the series of independent, area-based initiatives that are beginning to emerge across the country which are influenced and inspired by London Challenge. Chapters 4 and 5 set out some important learning that can inform the use of area-based challenge initiatives to address regional variation and underperformance, both at a local area level and in terms of wider government policy.
Initial recommendations Recommendation 1: Government should give greater priority to tackling the unacceptably large variations in pupil outcomes across English regions. Recommendation 2: Given the turnaround in performance of London schools in recent years, the learning from London Challenge should be the starting point for area-based interventions intended to address regional underperformance. 13 14
Ofsted, ‘Unseen Children: access and achievement 20 years on’, 2013. Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission, ‘Cracking the code: how schools can improve social mobility’, forthcoming.
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:: Chapter 2 – London Challenge: an overview Introduction London Challenge (2003-8) was an ambitious five-year school improvement programme for the capital’s secondary schools, with a vision to make London a world-class leader in education. It continued in 2008 as part of the three-year City Challenge programme (now including primary schools) in London, Greater Manchester and the Black Country.15 It aimed to tackle a perceived crisis in education in the capital centred around London’s poor levels of attainment compared with the rest of England, its specific problems in several boroughs, and major issues in teacher recruitment, retention and morale. Simply put, the capital’s schools – at secondary level in particular – were deeply unattractive to both teachers and many parents. London Challenge was far more than just a school improvement programme. As it declared: “the change we seek is cultural”.16 In particular, it aimed to irrevocably transform the way Londoners thought about their schools and to fundamentally alter the narrative about education and aspiration in London: ::
From ‘you can’t expect more from children from these sorts of backgrounds’, to ‘with our help all children can succeed: deprivation is not destiny’.
::
From ‘London is a place teachers leave’, to ‘London is a place every good teacher should aspire to work’. Teachers were encouraged to see their work in terms of ‘London’s children’, not ‘my school’.
Identifying learning from London Challenge is not straightforward, as Prof Chris Husbands has commented: “It was not a single thing: it was a package of policies... We look back on a policy initiative called London Challenge, but it wasn’t like that as it developed. And this makes it difficult to replicate. London Challenge looked different depending where you looked from.”17 However, it is possible to point to core elements with the potential to inform those addressing educational underperformance at a regional or area level today, which are discussed below and summarised in Figure 9 at the end of this chapter. 15 16 17
For a timeline of the development of London and City Challenge, see London Challenge, ‘Lessons Learned from London: Secondary School Improvement Programmes’, 2010, p. 48; Vanessa Ogden, ‘Making Sense of Policy in London Secondary Education: What Can Be Learned from the London Challenge?’, Institute of Education, 2012, pp. 50-52. DfES, ‘Transforming London’s Secondary Schools’, 2003. Chris Husbands, ‘Exporting London Challenge is complex and challenging’, IOE London Blog, 31 December 2013, available at: http://ioelondonblog.wordpress.com/2013/10/31/exporting-london-challenge-is-complex-and-challenging/
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Leadership and management of London Challenge Though some of the people and structures changed over time, a key element of the success of London Challenge was strong, effective leadership combining politicians, civil servants and professional expertise. The political initiative driving London Challenge came from the highest levels of government. At the start, Education Secretary Estelle Morris (a former inner-city teacher herself) was closely involved in its design. Day-to-day political leadership was in the hands of London Schools Minister Stephen Twigg (himself a London MP), supported by Andrew Adonis at the Number 10 Policy Unit and later as Schools Minister from 2005. High-level support facilitated a tough approach in the knowledge that an ‘iron fist’ lay behind the strategy, such as when taking difficult decisions in replacing senior school leadership or academy conversion. A dedicated team of civil servants in the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) led work on the London Challenge throughout. This was headed by Jon Coles, who was very influential in shaping the focus and approach. Civil servants carried out extensive and in-depth, data-driven preliminary research into the precise issues facing London schools and provided coordination and centralised tools and resources. Although based at the Department for Education, the London Challenge team quickly developed a distinctive brand to distinguish their work among those involved in education; this brand and its marketing became a vital tool for the initiative. The professional lead came from Prof Sir Tim Brighouse in the newly created role of London Schools Commissioner (which Brighouse re-titled Chief Advisor), following a successful track record in Birmingham and the Inner London Education Authority. He was a crucial bridge between London’s headteachers and the central team, intentionally placing himself at the Institute of Education so that he was not seen as “in the politicians’ pockets”.18 His inspirational leadership was a combination of unwaveringly high expectations of all children and schools, while simultaneously “dealing with” deficiencies, shortcomings, and failures, as far as possible “with dignity” – a recipe proven successful in Birmingham.19 Other key figures were Sir Mike Tomlinson, who took over following Tim Brighouse’s retirement in 2007, and Prof David Woods, initially as Lead Secondary Advisor and later as Chief Advisor himself. A small team of London Challenge Advisors (mainly current or former London headteachers, working part-time) brought schools a fresh and honest perspective, acting as a ‘critical friend’, providing external challenge and a sense of an external ‘mirror’.20 They met fortnightly as a team to review progress with the schools they were supporting. Advisors were ‘the glue’ holding policymakers, local authorities and schools together, and were key in mobilising available knowledge and resources. During the policy’s later years London Challenge Advisors were increasingly complemented by the work of the London Leadership Strategy. 18 19 20
Tim Brighouse, ‘The London Challenge – a personal view’, in T Brighouse and L Fullick (eds.), ‘Education in a Global City: Essays on London’, Institute of Education, 2007. Tim Brighouse, ‘The London Challenge – a personal view’, in T Brighouse and L Fullick (eds.), ‘Education in a Global City: Essays on London’, Institute of Education, 2007. Vanessa Ogden, ‘Making Sense of Policy in London Secondary Education: What Can Be Learned from the London Challenge?’, Institute of Education, 2012.
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The initial leadership team (Stephen Twigg, Jon Coles and Tim Brighouse) spent much of their time meeting with headteachers, teachers and local authorities, followed up by letters (Brighouse’s handwritten), “to listen, observe, learn, and convey a consistent message” to individual schools.21
Funding The funding allocated to London Challenge undoubtedly contributed to its success, but the sums involved were still small compared with total spending on secondary education in the capital. By 2006, £40m annually was being invested in London Challenge, rising to around £80m after 2008.22 Since the policies involved in London Challenge were so broad and schools and local authorities were also asked to fund some initiatives, it is difficult to estimate overall spending. Money was spent according to need as directed by advisors rather than calculated through a specific formula. Much of the funding went on supply costs for teachers and managers engaged in training programmes.23 From 2008 Hutchings estimates that some 30-40% of the total budget was spent on the Keys to Success (KTS) programme (described below), with a London KTS primary receiving a maximum allocation of around £30k, an ‘intensive’ secondary school around £55-60k, and an ‘improving’ secondary school around £35-40k, per year.24 Hutchings calculated that the total expenditure on a KTS secondary school during City Challenge averaged around £250k.25 Additionally, there is evidence that the combination of high level political support and the effective advocacy within Whitehall by the London Challenge leadership saw many government programmes effectively bent towards London, including initiatives like Teach First and the Building Schools for the Future programme.
Main work strands The London Challenge: Transforming London’s Secondary Schools (2003) – the initial document outlining the vision for the initiative – set out the specific problems London faced and the objectives, priorities and methods to tackle them. This document divided work into three main areas. The first two focused on problems requiring immediate attention: ‘Transforming Key Areas’ (the five London boroughs needing the most support) and ‘the Keys to Success’ (around 70 schools scattered around the capital in the most challenging circumstances, mostly below the floor target or deemed inadequate by Ofsted). The third work strand was named ‘A Better Deal for London’, a series of city-wide initiatives to improve teaching and learning and to instil pride and raise aspirations across the board. Crucially, the planned timescale of the programme recognised that authentic 21 22 23 24 25
Tim Brighouse, ‘The London Challenge – a personal view’, in Brighouse and Fullick (eds.), ‘Education in a Global City: Essays on London’, Institute of Education, 2007. Ofsted, ‘Improvements in London schools 2000–06’, 5 December 2006; See Merryn Hutchings et al, ‘Evaluation of the City Challenge Programme’, Department for Education, 28 June 2012, which provides further details about the funding of City Challenge. Ofsted, ‘London Challenge’, 10 December 2010, p.8. Merryn Hutchings et al, ‘Evaluation of the City Challenge Programme’, Department for Education, 28 June 2012, p. 53. Merryn Hutchings and Ayo Mansaray, ‘A review of the impact of the London Challenge (2003-8) and the City Challenge (2008-11)’, Research paper for Ofsted’s ‘Access and achievement in education 2013 review’, 20 June 2013, p.8.
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and sustainable change could not be achieved overnight. London Challenge’s approach to school improvement was built on the premise that the London school system had the capacity to improve itself provided knowledge could be moved around more effectively to the schools where it was needed. London Challenge began with a clear focus, identifying eight simple ‘measures of success’ (e.g. ensuring no school had fewer than 25% of pupils achieving 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs by 2006) which could be broken down into ambitious targets for 2004, 2006, and 2008.26 These would be achieved through work around four fields: ::
The London Teacher: according to Brighouse, the most successful and most important priority.27 This work strand promoted professional development, such as ‘Chartered London Teacher’ status, aiming to instil pride and identity in being a successful London teacher. A range of measures were brought in to tackle London’s poor teacher recruitment and retention rates, including changing the pay structure, raising teachers’ salaries, encouraging housing schemes, and supporting ground-breaking initiatives, such as Teach First.
::
The London Leader: funding (including the Leadership Incentive Grant) and training to improve, support, and sometimes remove middle and senior school leadership, largely directed through the National College and the London Leadership Centre.
::
The London School: a minimum of 20 entirely new schools, 30 new academies, and 15 new sixth form colleges was pledged.28 Especially in the five key London boroughs this work strand included new academies, building new schools, increased sixth form provision, and also included interventions in some local authorities and replacing some senior school leaders. For some 127 secondary (and after 2008, 150 primary) schools, it meant involvement in the Keys to Success programme.
::
The London Student: including the ‘London Student Pledge’ to broaden students’ horizons and to increase awareness of and access to the wider city, high prolife celebrations of students’ achievements and improving provision for gifted and talented pupils.
Intersecting these fields of work, the following programmes stand out as vital components of London Challenge, all revolving around the “three factors crucial to [London Challenge’s] success: data, collaboration and subverting the language of failure”.29
26 27 28 29
See DfES, ‘Transforming London’s Secondary Schools’, 2003, pp. 13-15. Tim Brighouse, ‘The London Challenge – a personal view’, in T Brighouse and L Fullick (eds.), ‘Education in a Global City: Essays on London’, Institute of Education, 2007. DfES, ‘Transforming London’s Secondary Schools’, 2003. Gerard Kelly, TES Editorial, ‘Fuelled by optimism, not blame, London Challenge is testament to what can be done’, TES Newspaper, 25 March 2011, available at: http://www.tes.co.uk/article.aspx?storycode=6074463
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Use of data and Families of Schools: Data was used in a way that may seem commonplace today but was hugely innovative at the time; namely, to track the progress made by individual schools, departments and pupils and to draw comparisons across the system. Right from the outset, intensive data analysis underpinned the framing of the problem and the initial approach and vision for London Challenge. It also helped identify institutions with the most immediate needs and provided a means of monitoring improvement; vulnerable schools in particular were encouraged to embed internal performance trackers and data systems to evaluate their progress. Data provided the tool to enable (and at times enforce) a confrontation of the ‘brutal facts’ about school standards (both collectively and individually) while simultaneously exposing comparisons between schools and, consequently, the fact that it did not have to be this way. In this sense it provided a crucial part of the impetus for change, to an extent underpinning and fuelling the driving force of ‘moral purpose’. All secondary schools across London were placed into data sets of around 23 different ‘Families of Schools’ consisting of around two dozen schools, cutting across local authority boundaries, and reflecting similar intakes in terms of prior attainment, socio-economic status and demography. Each school received a Families of Schools booklet containing crucial benchmarking data tracking their results over three years as compared with their Family and London as a whole. In effect, schools were matched with schools ‘like their own’ allowing for a comparison of ‘apples with apples’.30 These were crucial in demonstrating that schools with comparable intakes were performing very differently. Tim Brighouse believes it is “hard to over-estimate” their importance.31 Some Families also engaged further with their networks by facilitating cross-school visits, pooling resources, and conducting joint professional development (CPD) initiatives.
The Keys to Success In 2003, London’s most challenging secondary schools were declared to be the “front line in the attempt to break the link between deprivation and underperformance” – the ‘Keys to Success’”.32 The new terminology for these schools embodied the positive language and ethos adopted by London Challenge, with the intention to moving away from the prevailing culture of naming and shaming and labelling schools as ‘failing’. Participating schools were selected every September at ‘triage’ meetings held between civil servants, and advisors, and others added if their circumstances later changed. Over 70 secondary schools took part in its first wave and were categorised as requiring either ‘intensive support’, ‘intermediate’ or ‘light touch’ support. Participation was mainly determined by floor targets or Ofsted categories, as well as soft intelligence. Schools generally remained in the programme for 2-3 years. By 2010 some 110 schools, 27% of total London secondary schools, had been involved in the programme and six of the 85 early KTS schools had become ‘Outstanding’, in turn now providing support to other schools. 30 31 32
Families uniting schools with the highest proportions of mobile pupils, and EAL pupils, were also set up. Tim Brighouse, ‘The London Challenge – a personal view’, in T Brighouse and L Fullick (eds.), ‘Education in a Global City: Essays on London’, Institute of Education, 2007. DfES, ‘Transforming London’s Secondary Schools’, 2003, p. 7.
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Acknowledging that one-size-fits-all solutions would not work, each Keys to Success school had a London Challenge Advisor, who provided both external challenge and helped schools to access the specific support they needed. First they worked with the headteacher to identify the school’s specific problems, then after consulting with the local authority and the school, the advisor brokered a bespoke set of solutions to tackle the school’s challenges. This could include support for English and maths, teacher CPD, leadership training, funding, building work or academisation, or building capacity to sustain improvement; in some cases, leadership was removed or schools were closed. Advisors also paid sharp attention to helping schools improve their understanding and use of tracking data.
Transforming Key Areas The five key boroughs targeted – Hackney, Haringey, Islington, Lambeth and Southwark – were those with the highest proportion of pupils (as a percentage of Year 6 pupils) leaving the local authority area for their secondary education. Within these boroughs standards varied hugely. They received extra attention and support from the London Challenge team to address deficiencies in capacity. Transformation was sought in three ways: “building academies and other new schools; developing successful changes already under way (such as interventions in some local authorities); and ensuring that existing schools succeed”.33
The London Leadership Strategy & moving knowledge around the system Commissioned in 2003 by the DfES and operating through the National College for School Leadership, the London Leadership Strategy deployed successful headteachers to support struggling secondary schools and to mentor headteachers. Growing and developing these outstanding practitioners created a pool of consultant leaders (later called local leaders in education, LLEs, and from 2006, national leaders in education, NLEs). This relied on the careful selection and training of headteachers, followed by a bespoke process of brokering and matching partnerships. The London Leadership Strategy developed a variety of CPD programmes. As schools improved, ‘Good to Great’ and ‘Going for Great’ programmes were introduced to improve Good and Outstanding schools. Other programmes were later developed, including to narrow attainment gaps for disadvantaged pupils, to target ‘coasting’ schools, to support data management, behaviour management, and sixth forms, as well as specialist programmes for subject leaders and EAL (English as an Additional Language) support. In 2006 some work started in primary schools, which was further developed after 2008. The concept of teaching schools developed as part of London Challenge, originating in Ravens Wood School (led by headteacher Prof Sir George Berwick), which used ‘coaching triads’ as a model of professional development in response to high staff turnover. By 2004 it was providing training to teachers from 58 schools.34 33 34
DfES, ‘Transforming London’s Secondary Schools’, 2003. Ofsted, ‘London Challenge’, 10 December 2010. See also George Berwick, ‘Engaging in Excellence, Volume II: Moral Capital’, Olevi, 2010.
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The school-to-school work advocated by the London Leadership Strategy sought to create ‘upwards convergence’ by creating self-sustaining, systemic improvement across the board.35 High-performing schools would transfer knowledge to struggling schools, and by the end of the decade the NFER’s evaluation of City Challenge leadership strategies highlighted the “clear evidence” of the positive impact of this school-to-school work, especially through teaching schools and the NLE/LLE system.36 At the same time, the best schools would ‘grow the top’ by developing their knowledge and skills further, thereby increasing the number of Good and Outstanding schools able to provide support to others.37 By the time London Challenge ended the London Leadership Strategy was playing a central role, with over 90% of London’s secondary schools involved in some aspect of its work. The development and increasing workload of the London Leadership Strategy illustrates how London Challenge, building on its ethos of working ‘with’ schools rather than doing this ‘to’ them, shifted over time towards a ‘high-trust, high-accountability’ model which paired professional autonomy and expertise with accountability to government – utilising, strengthening, and sharing practitioner expertise across all boroughs in the city.38 Dr Vanessa Ogden, headteacher at Mulberry School for Girls in Tower Hamlets comments: “There were stark differences between the policy texts of 2003, 2008 and 2010. What commenced as a top-down, centrally driven and government-led approach in 2003 evolved into a practitioner-led strategy for system-wide school improvement. By 2010, headteachers and the London Challenge advisors were the driving force in the policy’s development, with a high degree of autonomy albeit within a framework of high accountability for standards”39
Promoting community engagement in London’s schools London Challenge regarded the engagement of communities, cultural and third sector organisations, businesses, and higher education institutions with London’s education system as integral to the improvement of the capital’s schools. Our research found that wider involvement was critical in changing popular perceptions around London’s schools, and that central to this was a clear ‘London identity’ among those living and working in the capital. Improving access to the city’s wide range of cultural, educational and economic capital proved extremely powerful, for example through providing free bus travel for school-age children or better engagement with the City and nearby higher education institutions (including a Champion for Higher Education Partnership). Local community engagement was seen as vital: in Tower Hamlets local imams worked with the local authority to persuade parents not to take their children away from school during term-time to visit family overseas, and mosques backed the Council in regarding extended absence as truancy.40 35 36 37 38 39 40
For further detail see George Berwick, ‘Engaging in Excellence’, Olevi, 2010. Peter Rudd, Helen Poet, Gill Featherstone et al, ‘Evaluation of City Challenge Leadership Strategies’, NFER, 2011, p. 48. George Berwick, ‘Engaging in Excellence, Volume II: Moral Capital’, Olevi, 2010. Vanessa Ogden, ‘Making Sense of Policy in London Secondary Education: What Can Be Learned from the London Challenge?’, Institute of Education, 2012. Vanessa Ogden, ‘Making Sense of Policy in London Secondary Education: What Can Be Learned from the London Challenge?’, Institute of Education, 2012. Woods, Brown, Husbands, ‘Transforming education: the Tower Hamlets story’, Tower Hamlets Local Authority, 2013, p.4.
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A Business Challenge was instigated in 2003 “to encourage employers and City firms to get behind London schools and ensure that every school is backed by support from a business; and make London’s higher education institutions an integral part of the London Challenge – working in partnership with schools to raise aspiration and opportunity”. 41 As the London Challenge matured, a marketing campaign in 2007-8 helped to build confidence in school improvement, and to persuade sceptics of its successes. The London Challenge team produced t-shirts, mugs, oyster-card holders, and billboard posters, emblazoned with messages such as ‘I went to a London state school and all I got was 8 A*s’. They also produced a diagram of London’s secondary schools as mapped along Tube lines. This aimed to solidify London Challenge’s aim of instilling pride and a common identity among London’s secondary schools.
Greater Manchester Challenge and Black Country Challenge From 2008 City Challenge (as the Greater Manchester Challenge and Black Country Challenge, plus an additional three years in London, were collectively known) sought to “crack the associated cycle of disadvantage and educational underachievement”, its objectives being: 42 ::
A sharp drop in underperforming schools, particularly focusing on English and maths
::
More Good and Outstanding schools
::
Significant improvements in educational outcomes for disadvantaged children
City Challenge drew on London’s experience - including the evidence that educational problems could be successfully tackled on an area basis, London Challenge’s breadth and flexibility, and its use of advisors - but it was never intended to be a straight replication of London Challenge.43 Greater Manchester and the Black Country adapted London’s work, developing their own bespoke programme reflecting their specific issues, building on their local identity and needs. The Greater Manchester Challenge brought together ten local authorities and some 1,100 schools, funded by a £50m investment. Its main aims were raising educational achievement for all and narrowing attainment gaps, and focusing on improving the ‘three As’: access, aspiration, and achievement.44 Attendance was a particular focus in Manchester, and they also aimed to have no inadequate schools. Aims were to be achieved by “moving knowledge around” the system, using a sharp analysis of data to identify strengths and weaknesses throughout the system, thereby developing mutual challenge between schools, and facilitated by a team of expert advisors analysing and matching schools.45 Activities included: intervening directly in 200 Keys to Success schools, creating 58 primary and 11 secondary Families of Schools (including designating a school 41 42 43 44 45
DfES, ‘Transforming London’s Secondary Schools’, 2003. DfES, ‘City Challenge for World Class Education, 2007. For further detail see Merryn Hutchings et al, ‘Evaluation of the City Challenge Programme’, Department for Education, 28 June 2012. DCSF, ‘Raising the bar, closing the gap: a vision and operational strategy for the Greater Manchester Challenge’, 2008. Mel Ainscow, ‘Moving knowledge around: strategies for fostering equity within educational systems’, Journal of Educational Change, 2012; Mel Ainscow, ‘Written Evidence submitted to Education Select Committee’, October 2013, available at: http:// www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201314/cmselect/cmeduc/269/269vw02.htm
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as a ‘hub’ of good practice, to be showcased and shared both within and outside the Family), and strengthening relationships with local businesses, universities and colleges, faith groups, academy sponsors, and the media.46 Prof Mel Ainscow was appointed Chief Advisor. The Black Country Challenge covered a much smaller area, with only four local authority areas involved, which possibly disadvantaged the programme; there were, for example, very few Outstanding secondary schools at the outset to contribute to system leadership.47 Work was across school phases, mainly aiming to reduce the number of schools below floor targets, but also to have no schools in Ofsted special measures, and to reduce the number of NEETs. Additionally, they sought to attract teachers to the Black Country, and emphasised widening students’ horizons.48 Families of Schools data was used at both primary and secondary level. An area-wide leadership programme included coaching of less experienced headteachers and a teaching schools programme offering school-to-school support. The Black Country also instigated a Pathways to Achievement programme, through which advisors worked with 30 primary and 30 secondary schools facing challenging circumstances. Prof Sir Geoff Hampton was appointed Chief Advisor, based at the University of Wolverhampton, and the Black Country Challenge was allocated around £28m.
Figure 9 – The key elements of London Challenge a. There was a clear sense (and evidence) of crisis in London’s secondary schools and a determination at the highest levels of government to do whatever was necessary to change it. b. There was both a sense of urgency and of the need for a realistic timescale (of five and later extended to eight years) to deliver change. c. A sense of London identity was important, underpinning the need for a Londonwide solution which overrode other jurisdictions, governance structures and boundaries. d. Relentless and detailed focus on school improvement. Interventions were supported by a theory of school improvement; tailored according to need and circumstances, not a blanket strategy; focused on making schools more outward looking; supported innovation and growing the top, not just dealing with underperformance; and developed by innovating and investing in what worked. It recognised that the school system had the capacity to improve itself, provided knowledge could be moved around the system more effectively. e. There was a then innovative and detailed focus on using data to identify issues both at system level e.g. staff turnover rates, and through Families of Schools to make school leaders face up to their underperformance compared to their peers in similar circumstances. f. It aimed not for just school improvement but irreversible, self-supporting system change across London as a whole. The vision was drawn from a deep analysis of 46 47 48
Mel Ainscow, ‘Moving knowledge around: strategies for fostering equity within educational systems’, Journal of Educational Change, 2012. Merryn Hutchings et al, ‘Evaluation of the City Challenge Programme’, Department for Education, 28 June 2012, p.102. Merryn Hutchings et al, ‘Evaluation of the City Challenge Programme’, Department for Education, 28 June 2012.
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systemic issues such as the teacher shortage. Other system improvement work included the London Teacher, the London Leader, the Student Pledge, capital strategy/Building Schools for the Future (BSF), and engaging with business and the third sector. g. A strong belief that approach and culture mattered. This included winning hearts and minds; focus on moral purpose not blame; the balance of support and challenge; an outward-looking approach in schools, working for ‘our children, not my school’; the use of non-stigmatising language (Keys to Success schools) and identifying and growing talent in the system; being realistic about pace with a determination to change and a readiness to make tough decisions, alongside a recognition that genuine improvement took time. h. External challenge and strong leadership, by a small, credible and highly effective team (Minister, No 10 special advisor, London Schools Commissioner/Chief Advisor, civil servants, and leading education advisors) from outside the London education establishment and the formal local government structure of 32 boroughs and the Corporation of London. They brought vision and agreed goals, authority, skills and experience, coordination and resources to the table, and were able to cut though bureaucratic or organisational barriers. i. The vast majority of the capacity to support schools and coach headteachers was sourced from serving London educationalists. The London Leadership Strategy was developed to provide the infrastructure for this. A small, close-knit team of very experienced Challenge Advisors added to the school intervention capacity across London’s local authorities. This was especially important for delivering the tougher messages over closing schools and replacing headteachers, for providing a fresh perspective and sense of an external ‘mirror’ for schools, and also in defining roles that were primarily about challenge and those that were about supporting headteachers and schools. j. Unlocking the potential of the wider community to support education. London has had huge under-exploited assets and cultural capital (e.g. number of universities, businesses offering Corporate Social Responsibility, and third sector organisations) that were harnessed towards raising attainment and pupil outcomes, made more accessible through free bus travel for school-age children. New initiatives (notably the highly influential Teach First) were stimulated and directed towards London.
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:: Chapter 3 – A changing landscape: children of London Challenge Proactive government support for challenge projects ended following the 2010 general election, with City Challenge finishing in the spring of 2011. However, there are a growing number of area-based school improvement strategies that to varying extents appear to take inspiration from London Challenge’s methods and approach.49 Not all have adopted the challenge label, but several have chosen to do so. A number have recruited key personalities involved in the London and City Challenges, notably former Challenge Advisors and practitioners working through the London Leadership Strategy. Some projects have developed very recently; others are further advanced. This chapter will provide an overview of some of the most prominent of these initiatives, drawing out similarities and differences in approach in relation to some important core elements. The following chapter will then distil some key lessons from these emerging challenges when viewed in relation to one another and when seen through the lens provided by the earlier London and City Challenges. This learning, and the related conclusions and recommendations reached, are intended to inform the present and future development of area-based approaches to tackling the problems of regional variation in education across England. Case studies are presented for the following areas / initiatives:
49
::
Great North East Schools Challenge
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Schools Challenge Cymru
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Central South Wales Educational Challenge
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Yorkshire Challenge
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Somerset Challenge
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Liverpool Education Commission / Liverpool Learning Partnership
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Norfolk – A Good School for Every Norfolk Learner
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South Gloucestershire
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Suffolk – Raising the Bar
Based on information available at the time of writing. These projects are not the only ones developing ideas out of the experience of the London and City Challenges, but are some of the more prominent or larger projects currently in existence or in development. Other initiatives are reported to be underway in Medway, Portsmouth, Essex, Thurrock, York, Kent, Bradford, Nottingham, Wigan, Derbyshire and other areas around England.
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The case studies have the following format: Scale: Single/multiple local authorities? Origins and drivers: E.g. Ofsted report, education commission, local headteachers, government; top-down or bottom-up Funding / timeframe Approach: What are the priorities, goals, language? Systemic change, school improvement? Governance structure Delivery team External challenge: Both in terms of external knowledge and external accountability Work strands Wider community involvement
Great North East Schools Challenge Scale: Across 12 local authorities (Durham, Darlington, Gateshead, Hartlepool, Middlesbrough, Newcastle upon Tyne, North Tyneside, Northumberland, Redcar & Cleveland, South Tyneside, Stockton, Sunderland), spanning 2 LEP (Local Enterprise Partnership) areas (North East LEP & Tees Valley LEP). This would aim to cover some 1100 primary and secondary schools. Origins and drivers: a North East Challenge based on the City Challenge model came close to formation in 2009-10, but collapsed following the dismantling of the DfE City Challenge team in 2010. The idea continued to be championed by the regional schools’ network, Schools NorthEast, and was picked up again in Lord Adonis’ North East Economic Review50 (published in April 2013) and subsequently included in the North East Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) six-year North East Strategic Economic Plan. The North East LEP has asked central and local government to participate as a full and active partner its development. Funding / timeframe: The North East LEP has in principle committed an initial £80k for development of the North East Schools Challenge covering the LEP area, and they are seeking government comittment and ongoing funding for it as part of their Growth Deal bid to government. Direct contributions from schools are also under consideration. The timescale is currently under discussion. Approach: The Great North East Schools Challenge’s purpose, building on the recommendations in the Adonis Review, is “to create a driving momentum to address underperformance and raise standards, create many more good and great schools and close attainment gaps by building capacity and catalysing and accelerating the development of a sustainable, self-improving schools-led system”51. While drawing on 50 51
Lord Adonis et al, ‘North East Independent Economic Review’ Report, North East Local Enterprise Partnership, April 2013, p. 26. Lord Adonis et al, ‘North East Independent Economic Review’ Report, North East Local Enterprise Partnership, April 2013, p. 26.
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learning London and City Challenge and initiatives in the USA, it is aiming for: ::
Greater emphasis on the relationship between education and the region’s economic development, including raising aspirations and expectations
::
Focus on ambition and less so on directly intervening in individual schools
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Development to be primarily led bottom-up from schools
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Focus derived from data-based evidence
::
Emphasis on ongoing refinement and evolution of the project with a clear sense about what is working and what is not.
It will be broader than a school improvement initiative, aiming to coordinate improvements at every stage of a young person’s life from “cradle to career”. Governance structure: Currently under discussion. One possible model is both a ‘challenge board’ to govern progress, which will keep a region-wide focus, coordinate activity and monitor progress towards the aims, and an external scrutiny board to provide external challenge and produce public annual reports, potentially including the DfE, Ofsted, North East LEP members, some Outstanding headteachers, or local politicians. Coordinating this bottom-up initiative involving potentially 12 local authorities (LAs) and 2 LEPs with mixed levels of commitment is a challenging task. The ‘missing pieces’ in the alliance of the various partners and interested parties is the involvement of government. The initiative will also need a strong regional lead with a mandate and authority to “pull rank, clash heads and take tough decisions”.52 Delivery team: Currently under discussion. It is likely the challenge will be delivered by an independent body established by an alliance of North East school leaders, LAs, business representatives, universities and FE colleges. This body would employ a small team of advisors (where possible drawn from the region) and a secretariat, to coordinate data and facilitate school to school matchmaking etc. Specific pieces of work will be commissioned or provided in collaboration with other agencies/trusts/teaching schools, such as specific leadership programmes, or aspects of CPD. External challenge: Currently under discussion, but in addition to the proposed external scrutiny board there will also be an element of external challenge from the LEP Board, in relation to aims expressed in the region’s economic plans. Work strands: The Great North East Schools Challenge aims to establish: a central focus on improving the quality of teaching and learning; a clear set of shared aims, driven by a strong understanding of the region’s needs and aspirations; ambitious leadership and challenge; sharp analysis of data on an on-going basis; a smarter alignment and coordination of relationships; and orchestrated deployment of educational expertise.
52
Interviewee involved with Great North East Schools Challenge
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Work strands have not been formally agreed, but ideas under discussion include: ::
an audit of the region’s schools and education indicators to provide a clear picture of current educational performance;
::
an offer of school level support programmes tailored to the most pressing needs at the school;
::
a clear role for local teaching schools and local NLEs/LLEs/SLEs and matchmaking service to spread best practice from school to school;
::
shared data tools to track progress and continually identify areas of concern/ best practice, and a ‘horizon-scanning function’ to look out for good and relevant practice;
::
coordination of ‘collaboration with teeth’ across schools through Families of Schools, teacher enquiry networks and peer-review across LA boundaries;
::
coordination of regional assets and partners.
The most expensive aspect of the London/City Challenge model – the Keys to Success programme – is not deemed viable in the current financial circumstances, so the Challenge would need to find new models of driving improvements in these schools through, for example, the encouragement of new sponsors with the support and backing of the wider school community, and more effective brokering of school to school support. Wider community involvement: with its origins and aims linked directly to improving the economic prosperity of the region, working across the wider community is integral to the Great North East Schools Challenge. In its aim to support young people “from cradle to career”, the Great North East Schools Challenge will aim to influence the non-schools factors impacting on educational outcomes in the region, and work with stakeholders to develop coherent approaches to the provision of early years education, work-related learning opportunities, progression to HE, apprenticeships and employment and information, advice and guidance.
Schools Challenge Cymru Scale: National programme throughout Wales. Forty secondary schools and their cluster primaries in 15 of the 22 local authorities will receive challenge and support. The programme will operate on a national level and regionally through Wales’ four regional education consortia. Origins and drivers: Launched in February 2014 by the Welsh Government and currently in development, Schools Challenge Cymru will formally roll out in schools from September 2014. Initiative for and direction of the programme came directly from ministerial level, based on the Minister’s priorities, which includes reducing the impact of poverty on educational outcomes.53 Funding / timeframe: Up to £20m has been committed for the 2014/15 financial year with an initial commitment for the programme to run for at least 2 years. The success of the 53
Interview, Schools Challenge Cymru team, 12 June 2014.
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programme, including consideration of any emerging evaluation evidence, will be used to inform decisions around an extension of this initial timeframe.54 Approach: Building on the lessons from the London and Manchester Challenges, Schools Challenge Cymru aims to accelerate and concentrate Welsh Government school improvement efforts for participant schools and to stimulate system-wide improvements. The programme also aims to empower and resource schools (including ‘Pathways to Success’ schools) to overcome the challenges they face, and will focus on delivering improvements across four themes: leadership, teaching and learning, the pupil, and the school and community (including parents or carers). It is underpinned by a belief that all children can achieve. Although initiated by government, it aspires to develop and evolve from the bottom-up by building capacity in the system and supporting schools to identify solutions to their challenges. Governance structure: Strong mandate from the Welsh Government, led by the Minister for Education and Skills. A Champions Group (with Champions including Prof Mel Ainscow of the Greater Manchester Challenge), who bring high levels of skills and experience to provide strategic support to the programme, are directly accountable to the Minister, as are the Schools Challenge Cymru Advisors who will work with schools to provide challenge, support and to monitor progress. Delivery team: 12 Schools Challenge Cymru Advisors (mainly former UK headteachers or Ofsted inspectors) will work directly with each Pathways to Success school for around 25 days per year. Advisors will meet as a group on a monthly basis, sharing learning and best practice as they locate and broker additional support from other schools and external agencies. External challenge: Primarily from 12 Challenge Advisors recruited from around the UK to work with schools directly, and also the five Champions. Work strands: ::
54 55
Currently work is predominantly taking place in 40 secondary schools selected as ‘Pathways to Success’ schools. These schools were identified centrally (using performance information, socio-economic context data and local intelligence) as those that are challenged in terms of circumstances and their stage of development.55 Schools Challenge Cymru Advisors – working directly in these schools – will focus on helping schools to reflect on their work, improving teaching and learning, building leadership capacity and support, raising aspirations and attainment of pupils and monitoring progress. As part of this work with secondary schools, cluster primary schools will also receive targeted support to address issues at the earliest opportunity and to improve transition arrangements. Schools’ solutions are to be bespoke, designed with their advisor.
Interview, Schools Challenge Cymru team, 12 June 2014. Interview, Schools Challenge Cymru team, 12 June 2014. Huw Lewis, ‘Written Statement, Schools Challenge Cymru, Pathways to Success Schools’, 1 May 2014, available at: http://wales.gov.uk/about/cabinet/cabinetstatements/2014/schoolschallengecymru /?skip=1&lang=en
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::
Further work will aim to build capacity in other schools that are able to provide support and experience, thereby developing the system overall.
Wider community involvement: The central Welsh Government team is developing policy around the ‘pupil offer’, which will include drawing on opportunities provided by the regional and national community. This might include employers’ organisations, and local arts, sports, and cultural organisations (e.g. to deliver opportunities that raise pupil aspirations, improving engagement and attainment). Schools are also encouraged to consider in their Development Plan how the local community, including parents and carers, can be involved in the school’s improvement journey.
Central South Wales Challenge56 Scale: 5 local authorities: Cardiff, Bridgend, Merthyr Tydfil, Rhondda Cynon Taf and the Vale of Glamorgan, encompassing 417 schools and around 30% of Welsh pupils.57 Origins and drivers: Initiated by the Central South Consortium (a joint education service for five local authorities), the educational challenge was launched in January 2014 and will now run in parallel with Schools Challenge Cymru.58 Funding / timeframe: Through the Central South Consortium, whose funding is determined annually. A business plan is set until 2016. Approach: Central South Wales Challenge aims to shift the leadership role for school improvement away from local authorities and towards schools.59 Its aims are to “stimulate the sharing of expertise amongst schools and joint efforts to innovate” in order to improve school performance, to increase the numbers of good and excellent schools, to reduce attainment gaps, and to improve outcomes for vulnerable pupils.60 Priorities for 2014-15 are:61 1. Narrow the gap for children in poverty and looked after children 2. Raise standards in literacy in English and Welsh first language 3. Raise standards in numeracy 4. Improve significantly the proportion of pupils at the Level 2 threshold, including English/ Welsh and maths 5. Improve the quality of leadership 6. Improve the quality of teaching and assessment 7. Improve overall attendance rates Governance structure: A joint committee of the 5 local authorities oversees the Central South Consortium. There is also a Strategy Group consisting of 17 leading headteachers, who plan to elect a chair from amongst them, leading the development of the Challenge. 56 57 58 59 60 61
Further information about Central South Wales Challenge available at http://www.cswchallenge.com/ Hannah Woodhouse, Presentation to Governors Wales, March 2014. Central South Consortium, Newsletter, February 2014 (Issue 2). Interview, Central South Consortium, 24 April 2014. Central South Wales Challenge website, available at: www.cswchallenge.com Hannah Woodhouse, Presentation to Governors Wales, March 2014.
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Delivery team: The Central South Consortium conducts diagnostic work, planning, case reviews, and works with Challenge Advisors and Prof Mel Ainscow on the practicalities of school-to-school working. Interim managing director is consultant Hannah Woodhouse (who formerly worked in the DfE on London Challenge). External challenge: Currently recruiting external Challenge Advisors, and are deploying some external NLEs.62 External knowledge and challenge also coming from Prof Ainscow and Hannah Woodhouse. Work strands: ::
All schools have been placed into one of 34 primary and 10 secondary School Improvement Groups (SIG),63 each SIG containing 6-8 schools with a range of intakes, locations, and school improvement journeys, grouped largely using soft intelligence. Each SIG has seed funding.
::
Within each SIG, at least one pair of schools is in a ‘pathfinder partnership’. This connects one school with capacity to support with another which is beginning to improve but still has further to go. It is currently anticipated that each partnership will require 8 days of school-to-school working, funded by the Central South Consortium.64
::
Other planned work involves: developing teaching schools, creating a trained group of peer reviewers, developing ongoing CPD programmes around a ‘Central South Wales teacher’ identity, and improving data collection and analysis.
Wider community involvement: Currently limited; some plans to increase the number of Teach First graduates in the region. Future possibility to involve third sector, local businesses and cultural resources.65
Yorkshire and Humber Education Initiative Scale: All (15) principal local authorities across Yorkshire and Humber, currently working in 30 primary and secondary schools across the region. Origins and drivers: Initiative came from the local authorities, having worked with Prof Sir Tim Brighouse (London Challenge) and Prof Mel Ainscow (Greater Manchester Challenge) over a number of years. Pressure from Ofsted and poor regional attainment figures accelerated this process, and the project was effectively launched at a conference in February 2014. Funding / timeframe: Around £45k from the 15 local authorities for work in ‘pathfinder schools’ and Mel Ainscow’s involvement. Initial progress will be reviewed by the local authorities, possibly at a conference in early 2015. Approach: The strategy takes learning from Prof Ainscow and the Greater Manchester Challenge. The local authorities involved regard working within a single authority as limiting, instead seeking a more united, collaborative approach (in both local authorities 62 63 64 65
Interview, Central South Consortium, 24 April 2014. Central South Consortium, Newsletter, March 2014 (Issue 3). Central South Consortium, Newsletter, March 2014 (Issue 3). Interview, Central South Consortium, 24 April 2014.
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and schools) to tackling common issues across the region, including a focus on regionallyspecific issues. Priority are 30 ‘pathfinder schools’ (not yet Good but on an improvement journey) selected from and working across the local authorities. Governance structure: Currently through regular contact between the local authorities as a loose federation, and the regional Directors of Children’s Services group, with no formalised structure. Delivery team: The second tier within each local authority collaborate to identify issues, examine Ofsted results, and have commissioned Prof Ainscow. Delivery of work with ‘pathfinder’ schools is through Prof Ainscow and his team. External challenge: Prof Ainscow is working closely with the ‘pathfinder’ schools in facilitating and coordinating work, and will produce the first interim report in autumn 2014. Mutual challenge is being stimulated between schools from different local authorities, and between different local authority school improvement services. Work strands: ::
30 ‘pathfinder schools’, usually selected as 1 primary 1 secondary from each of the 15 local authorities. These 30 schools will work together to move knowledge and learning around the local authorities, sharing good practice between schools in the same position; the principle being that knowledge is already in the system but needs to move around. Brokering and identification of schools is done by the local authority, then handed to Prof Ainscow.
::
Triads of local authorities for self-evaluation through peer challenge (based on Ofsted framework) and followed up by formal evaluation letters.
Wider community involvement: Currently none, with future aspirations to work with the LEP and employers/businesses and with regional higher and further education institutions.
Somerset Challenge Scale: Single local authority, 38 secondary schools Origins and drivers: Somerset Challenge developed throughout 2013 and early 2014, amidst criticism from Ofsted that 44% of Somerset’s secondary schools were not yet Good.66 It is supported by Somerset County Council but developed bottom-up from the county’s secondary headteachers as a ‘practitioner-led collaborative partnership of schools’.67 School participation is voluntary, pledged through a membership commitment form. 38 of 39 secondary schools in the county have signed up. Funding / timeframe: up to £1m over 3 years (£300k from Somerset County Council specifically for Somerset Challenge, combined with other school improvement budgets and County Council funding).68
66 67 68
BBC News, ‘Somerset’s secondary schools fall ‘below average’’, 23 Sept 2013, available at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/ uk-england-somerset-24202508 Interview, Somerset Challenge, 10 March 2014; Somerset Challenge, ‘Somerset Challenge Prospectus’, 2013. Interview, Somerset Challenge, 10 March 2014.
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Approach: Informed by London Challenge, its core principles emphasise practitioner-led work to develop a self-improving system, supporting collective and shared responsibility for ‘our students, not my school’, school-to-school collaborative working, an ambitious vision, and ethos that ‘challenge is the best form of support’.69 It has an outward-looking approach, aiming to mobilise external knowledge in order to build long-term capacity within Somerset. It is working in particular with the London Leadership Strategy and with London NLEs to achieve this. Core aims are: ::
to achieve better outcomes at 14, 16, and 18, with a particular focus on English and maths at KS4;
::
to close attainment gaps both in terms of groups of young people and regional disparity while raising the level of the best;
::
to increase the proportion of Good/Outstanding schools in Ofsted inspections;
::
to secure system-wide transformation led by school leaders.
Detailed, ambitious aspirations for 2016 and onwards are set out in the Somerset Challenge Prospectus.70 Governance structure: The Somerset Challenge Board, consisting of the Somerset Association of Secondary Heads (SASH; headteachers nominated from specific localities), Simon Faull (project director), a representative from each Family of Schools (usually the headteacher nominated to the SASH Executive), a local authority representative, and an independent Chair, Dr Vanessa Ogden.71 Somerset Challenge also has a ‘link HMI’. Delivery team: The project director (Simon Faull) works with the London Leadership Strategy to broker NLE support for Somerset’s Keys to Success schools, and also works with two SASH Executive Officers and a Somerset Challenge administrator. Families of Schools will report back to the Challenge Board regularly on progress. External challenge: Dr Ogden as the independent, external chair of the Somerset Challenge Board (a highly successful London headteacher, she brings a detailed knowledge of London Challenge as a practitioner but also from a research perspective). Dr Ogden is key in developing links for Somerset Challenge with key organisations in London e.g. the London Leadership Strategy, London NLEs, and Teach First. Work strands: Adapting key programmes from London Challenge to its own needs, Somerset’s work plans include: ::
69 70 71
Families of Schools: mixed groups developed largely using ‘soft intelligence’, not joined by context data, Ofsted ratings, or geography. The Family receives data sets, and is responsible for driving its own work (electing one facilitating headteacher), including producing a plan of work, regular meetings, a budget, peer review visits between schools, and reporting to the Board.
Somerset Challenge, ‘Somerset Challenge Prospectus’, 2013. Somerset Challenge, ‘Somerset Challenge Prospectus’, 2013. Dr. Ogden is headteacher of Mulberry School in Tower Hamlets. Her role is unpaid although her school receives some benefits.
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::
Keys to Success: participating schools will be supported by a current or recently serving headteacher after a careful brokering and matching process, and will set out a contractual and bespoke programme of challenge and support.
::
The ‘Somerset Teacher’, aiming to develop a clear identity among the area’s teachers, especially since Somerset’s demography has low levels of 20-35-year-olds.
::
Other planned work includes a focus on transitions across phases of learning, closing the attainment gaps, closer work with Ofsted, and establishing a ‘challenge and innovation fund’. Other developing ideas include working with Teach First and Teaching Leaders, linking schools with support from a national school improvement provider, e.g. Challenge Partners, the PiXL Club, the National Education Trust, and the London Leadership Strategy.72 Somerset Challenge is also working closely with the Behavioural Insights Team, who are providing evaluation and working on trialling a number of interventions focused on inspiring and boosting aspiration, feedback and recruitment and retention of staff.
Wider community involvement: Somerset has no university, and very few schools eligible for Teach First. No other non-school stakeholders sit on the Board. Over the longer term Somerset Challenge intends to extend work to other stakeholders and to develop the infrastructure for long-term systemic improvement, but this is not a current priority.73
Liverpool Education Commission / Liverpool Learning Partnership Scale: Single local authority, working across school phases. 94% of Liverpool’s schools have signed up as members of the Liverpool Learning Partnership (LLP). Origins and drivers: An independent Education Commission, initiated by the Mayor of Liverpool and chaired by former Secretary of State Baroness Estelle Morris, reported in July 2013.74 Following a 12-month widespread consultation with partners and stakeholders its 16 recommendations included a ‘Pupil Promise’ and Liverpool Curriculum; making Liverpool the foremost ‘reading city’ in the country; developing stronger links between businesses and schools; and an accredited Liverpool Teacher Charter Mark and review of teacher training. The Council endorsed its recommendations and the LLP is the lead agency in their implementation. Funding / timeframe: The LLP’s funding is around £1m,75 consisting of schools’ membership fees (membership is voluntary, priced at £3 per pupil), Dedicated Schools Grant delegated funding and services in kind. The mayor funded the Liverpool Education Commission, as well as initiatives such as the City of Readers programme (funded until 2015 but intended to become self-sustaining). Approach: A city-wide, inclusive approach to educational improvement, regarding all students as ‘Liverpool learners’ and envisaging the city as ‘one family’. Aims include 72 73 74 75
Somerset Challenge, ‘Somerset Challenge Prospectus’, 2013. Interview, Somerset Challenge, 10 March 2014. Mayor of Liverpool’s Education Commission, Report ‘From Better to Best’, Mayor of Liverpool, July 2013, accessible at: http:// liverpool.gov.uk/media/589311/education-commission-report-july-2013.pdf Interview, Liverpool Learning Partnership, 30 April 2014.
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creating opportunities for lifelong learning for children and adults, encouraging learning agencies to work together, and developing links with the city’s overall strategy for regeneration by creating school specialisms focused on the local business and industry needs.76 Governance structure: Mayor and City Council (e.g. for the City of Readers initiative). The LLP is governed by an Executive Board, which is chaired by a secondary headteacher, and consists of representatives from the primary, secondary, and special sectors, the local authority, the chair of Schools Forum, the chair of the governors’ forum, the elected member for education within the City, and Liverpool City College. Delivery team: The creation of the Liverpool Learning Partnership originated in discussions with Liverpool schools (primary, secondary and special) resulting in the establishment of a task and finish group comprising Headteacher representatives from the three managerial associations and a representative from School Improvement. The LLP has been supported by nominated CEOs Phil Daniels and Tony McKee, one a serving Headteacher and the other a recent Headteacher in the city.77 The commission deemed the LLP to be a key delivery mechanism to implement its recommendations. External challenge: The initial Independent Education Commission, which is to be followed by annual independent reviews of progress. The first review, working with Estelle Morris, is planned for autumn 2014.78 Liverpool is involved in some cross-authority school improvement work in the North West, which is expected to develop further.79 Work strands: Building on the commission’s 16 recommendations, work includes:
76 77 78 79 80 81 82
::
The City of Readers project80 which aims to improve reading among Liverpool’s children, also engaging with the city’s cultural, sporting, community and business organisations. It also focuses on adult literacy, working with employers and volunteer organisations.
::
Devising an enhanced ‘Liverpool curriculum’ and strengthening links with local cultural organisations, aiming to develop a more rounded education system. For example, secondary school pupils can learn financial management, which earns them UCAS points.81
::
Plans to strengthen professional development for teachers (the commission recommended a ‘Liverpool Teacher Charter Mark’) and training for leading headteachers.82
::
Increased school-to-school working. The LLP’s work is cross-phase, including early years, one FE college, special schools, as well as primary and secondary.
::
Developing a data-based ‘pupil tracker’, which tracks life event of pupils rather
Liverpool Learning Partnership, Presentation to Education Commission Conference, 1 October 2012, available at: http://liverpool. gov.uk/media/157176/Education-Commission-Conference-Presentations-1-Oct-2012.pdf Liverpool Learning Partnership, ‘Written Evidence to Education Select Committee’, October 2013, available at: http://www. publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201314/cmselect/cmeduc/269/269vw12.htm Interview, Liverpool Learning Partnership, 30 April 2014. Interview, School Improvement Services at Liverpool City Council, 28 May 2014. Further information on the City of Readers initiative available at: http://www.cityofreaders.org/ Interview, School Improvement Services at Liverpool City Council, 28 May 2014. Mayor of Liverpool’s Education Commission, Report ‘From Better to Best’, Mayor of Liverpool, July 2013, accessible at: http:// liverpool.gov.uk/media/589311/education-commission-report-july-2013.pdf
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than performance. The LLP also uses performance data collected by the local authority. Wider community involvement: The Education Commission saw a key role for civic participation in improving the city’s education system. It recommended that the Mayor take the lead in developing stronger links between industry, employers and schools, a greater recognition for volunteers who help out in schools and work on governing bodies, and improving accessibility to Liverpool’s cultural offer. This work is being led directly by the Mayor.
Norfolk – A Good School for Every Norfolk Learner Scale: Single local authority (but includes some work with neighbouring local authorities), both primary and secondary schools. Origins and drivers: Norfolk’s strategy developed from the top down (but in conjunction with headteachers, governors, local dioceses and academy groups), primarily as the County Council’s programme, ‘A Good School for Every Norfolk Learner’.83 The strategy was developed in response to serious concerns about the performance of the county’s schools, especially highlighted by Ofsted’s reclassification of its Grade 3. Prior to the strategy’s launch in September 2013, Ofsted had judged the local authority’s arrangements for supporting school improvement to be ineffective, although leadership within the council has changed significantly. Funding / timeframe: A total of £2.5m from Norfolk County Council, including £1m for the Norfolk to Good and Great (N2GG) programme.84 The strategy is planned to run until summer 2016. Approach: Norfolk’s ambition is for every Norfolk learner to have access to a Good school by 2016 (having seen rapid improvement since 2013) within a self-sustaining, outward-looking system. They plan to intervene quickly in schools at risk of being judged Inadequate, as well as developing Good schools to become Outstanding as system leaders.85 The strategic plan has 4 main aims: 1. Raise standards at all Key Stages 2. Increase proportion of schools judged Good or better 3. Improve leadership and management including corporate leadership and strategic planning 4. Improve monitoring and evaluation of impact Governance structure: Norfolk Education Challenge Board, consisting of headteachers, teachers, governors, and council officers.
83 84 85
Further information about ‘A Good School for Every Norfolk Learner’ available from Norfolk County Council at http://www. schools.norfolk.gov.uk/School-management/School-Performance/Schoolimprovement/index.htm and http://www.schools. norfolk.gov.uk/view/NCC130259 Director of Children’s Services, ‘A Good School For Every Norfolk Learner’, Norfolk County Council, 8 May 2014, available at: http://www.schools.norfolk.gov.uk/view/NCC123395 Norfolk County Council, ‘A Good School for Every Norfolk Learner’, available at: http://www.schools.norfolk.gov.uk/view/ NCC146237
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Delivery team: Council’s Education Achievement Service and Education Intervention Service; headteachers (e.g. Families of Schools were initiated by the secondary local headteachers’ association); London Leadership Strategy (brokering NLE support); Cambridge Education (provides Education Challenge Partners who visit schools annually/ biannually to test out its needs and plans). External challenge: In particular working with the London Leadership Strategy; also with Cambridge Education and Isos Partnership (who assist in self-evaluation of the local authority); Norfolk Education Challenge Board chaired independently by Prof David Woods; peer reviews and partner work with surrounding local authorities; and strengthening networks around England. Work strands: ::
The flagship programme ‘Norfolk to Good and Great’ (N2GG) is targeted at schools Requiring Improvement, and aims to help schools identify their own needs and develop a plan to meet them, both by offering a core menu of support as well as tailored support. Directed by a headteacher and currently engaging with around 120 schools, the programme works in a number of ways, including partner working with a Good/Outstanding school and their NLE/LLE/ Norfolk System Leader, as well as providing additional resources and access to the London Leadership Strategy’s programmes. 8 Norfolk schools were placed on the London Leadership Strategy’s ‘Securing Good’ programme, and 11 on the ‘Good to Great’ programme, in 2013.
::
Monitoring school performance, including data-based risk assessment, and intervention in schools causing concern utilising (where appropriate) LA powers to remove delegated authority or install interim executive boards. This involves some 70 of Norfolk’s 425 schools.
::
Secondary schools are being placed into contextual ‘triads’ and Families of Schools. This includes work with Cambridgeshire, Suffolk, and Essex, connecting schools across the region to widen the pool of knowledge/resources. Primary schools have set up leadership ‘hubs’.
Wider community involvement: Some engagement, including encouraging involvement of employers in raising a ‘Norfolk workforce’ and a ‘Raising Readers’ scheme to encourage parents to read with their children.
South Gloucestershire Scale: Single local authority, 16 secondary schools. Origins and drivers: In response to serious concerns about secondary schools in the local authority, South Gloucestershire Council set up an independent commission of external experts (chaired by John Harris and including London headteacher Dame Sue John) to investigate secondary and post-16 education. It produced 14 recommendations in January 2014 which have been adopted by the council and schools.86 86
South Gloucestershire Education Commission Report, South Gloucestershire Council, January 2014, available at: http://www. southglos.gov.uk/Documents/EducationCommissionReportJanuary2014.pdf
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Funding / timeframe: Funding from the Council, with some from schools. The scheme is expected to run for 3 years. Approach: Work is focusing on the 16 secondary schools and post-16 provision, aiming to develop systemic improvement. Two key elements of the report are initial priorities: developing an Education Partnership and work relating to leadership for a self-improving system.87 Governance structure: An Education Partnership Board is currently being set up to develop a performance challenge framework, vision and programme. This is likely to consist of 4 secondary headteachers, 4 primary headteachers, representatives from the local authority, special schools, further education providers, business and skills, and possibly with an external chair.88 Delivery team: The London Leadership Strategy, local authority officers, and headteachers. A ‘Change Group’ of secondary hub leaders will implement short-term commission recommendations and develop the Partnership’s role. External challenge: Initial external challenge from the independent commission, and an ongoing relationship between schools and the London Leadership Strategy. Work strands: ::
The 16 secondary schools are divided into 4 geographical hubs, each led by one of the headteachers, and supported by an NLE (brokered and delegated by the London Leadership Strategy using soft intelligence). Each hub has developed a plan of work reflecting their specific needs and supporting practical school-toschool working, such as sharing Advanced Skills Teachers.
::
Leadership training for headteachers, e.g. a conference in March 2014 to develop partnerships and relationships between the secondary schools and to change leadership thinking and behaviour.
::
Other work includes developing a Years 5-8 ‘learning pathway’ to support progression from primary to secondary, work around skills, and improving use of data.
Wider community involvement: The commission recommended developing distinctive educational vision for South Gloucestershire shaped by employers and the wider community as well as schools and colleges. It also called for greater strategic engagement with employers and raising the profile of technical and employability skills in schools through the development of Employment and Skills Hubs.
87 88
South Gloucestershire Council (Children and Young People’s Committee), South Gloucestershire Education Commission Update, 30 April 2014. Interview, Department for Children, Adults and Health (South Gloucestershire Council), 14 May 2014; South Gloucestershire Council (Children and Young People’s Committee), South Gloucestershire Education Commission Update, 30 April 2014.
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Suffolk – Raising the Bar89 Scale: Single local authority. Origins and drivers: In response to Suffolk’s poor educational attainment in comparison to the rest of England, Suffolk County Council commissioned an independent inquiry from the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA). Following extensive consultation with stakeholders, their report No School an Island was published in May 2013 and the implementation phase of the Raising the Bar programme began in the autumn.90 Funding / timeframe: A one-off £2.4m from Suffolk County Council (plus redirected existing resources). The County Council has agreed targets for up to 2017, but acknowledges that it will take longer to achieve the programme’s ultimate objectives. Approach: A ‘movement for educational change’, Raising the Bar is seeking to create a joined-up response among stakeholders to raise attainment and aspirations across Suffolk. The programme prioritises “raising the bar” in terms of educational attainment and aspirations among young people, and seeks to move towards a school-led improvement system. Core aims are that: every child reaches his/her potential; every child is taught by a Good or Outstanding teacher and attends a Good or Outstanding school; and every child is given the best preparation for life before and beyond school. Governance structure: Suffolk County Council initiated the programme. A sponsoring group (to consist of representatives from the county, district and borough councils, the Learning Partnership, primary/secondary/FE/HE phases, businesses and parents) has recently been set up and will set direction and hold the programme to account. Delivery team: Mainly within the County Council, including the Learning Improvement Service, Skills team and corporate centre (a Programme Board of business change managers is responsible for delivering results). A Programme Manager within the local authority was appointed in November 2013. A Learning Partnership is being set up by education practitioners, with wide consultation with schools. External challenge: The programme was initiated through the independent RSA inquiry, to be followed by annual reviews beginning in autumn 2014. Additionally, the programme promotes linking Suffolk and Hackney schools as a cultural, professional and educational exchange programme, particularly in acting as a mirror in terms of aspiration and achievement.91 Raising the Bar encourages schools to develop such links themselves, and some have done so with schools in other parts of London.
89 90 91
Further information about ‘Raising the Bar’ available from Suffolk County Council at: http://www.suffolk.gov.uk/your-council/ plans-and-policies/raising-the-bar-briefing/ Louise Bamfield, Joe Hallgarten and Matthew Taylor, ‘No School an Island: Suffolk education inquiry final report’, RSA Action and Research Centre, May 2013, available at: http://www.suffolk.gov.uk/your-council/plans-and-policies/raising-the-bar-briefing/ raising-the-bar-the-report/ Suffolk County Council, ‘Suffolk and Hackney join forces’, 24 May 2014, available at: http://www.suffolk.gov.uk/your-council/ about-suffolk-county-council/news/show/suffolk-and-hackney-join-forces/
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Work strands: based around the inquiry’s 20 recommendations, work includes: ::
Establishing a Learning Partnership aiming to promote system-led improvement
::
School improvement and increasing the number of Good/Outstanding schools
::
Teacher recruitment
::
Developing primary and secondary pupils’ understanding of employability skills and work opportunities (such as through education/employer brokerage, and an online platform ‘Showcase the Economy’).
Wider community involvement: Central to Raising the Bar as a movement for wider educational change; the programme acts as an umbrella for a range of activities between schools and partner organisations and the community. For example, Suffolk’s Community Foundation helps to fund work between schools and local businesses/third sector organisations, primarily aiming to broaden horizons and to ensure children are ‘ready to learn’ (such as potentially funding a paid coordinator for Age UK Suffolk’s volunteer school reading scheme). Parental engagement is promoted (e.g. through a communications campaign and a Families First Award Scheme).
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:: Chapter 4: Key considerations for a challenge “The key message of London Challenge: ambition for every child in every school is transferable. Some of the policy levers are transferable. But the way they combine and are used together demands careful attention to context.” – Prof Chris Husbands Director, Institute of Education, 31 December 201392 The previous chapters have sought to distil key elements of London and City Challenge and to provide an overview of some of the emerging area-based programmes that have been inspired by and sought to learn from the earlier initiatives. This chapter seeks to bring the two together, viewing these emerging challenges both in comparison with one another and through the lens of London and City Challenge. The intention is not to propose a single blueprint for success, but rather to draw out some key lessons and issues to consider for those seeking to address the problems of regional variation through area-based initiatives in the current educational and financial context. To do this, the framework set out in Figure 10 – identifying a series of key, interacting elements or considerations – will be used.
Figure 10 – Defining elements of a challenge Defining the Problem What are the issues the challenge is seeking to address to improve education in that locality? What outcomes will it achieve? The strategy for achieving these tightly focused goals needs then to consider the following four elements:
Scale What is the locality in which the area-based approach will be delivered? Single or multiple local authority area?
Mandate What authority does the challenge have to drive change? Where does this come from?
92
Chris Husbands, ‘Exporting London Challenge is complex and challenging’, IOE London Blog, 31 December 2013, available at: http://ioelondonblog.wordpress.com/2013/10/31/exporting-london-challenge-is-complex-and-challenging/
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External Challenge What contribution can external players make to defining the problem, reviewing progress and driving change?
Approach Is the initiative conceived of as a narrow school focused improvement programme or is it also more broadly concerned with durable, systemic change?
Policy context It is important to first recognise that no initiative like the emerging challenges operates in a policy or financial vacuum. Despite regional differences, overall school standards today are higher than they were at the start of London Challenge; most secondary schools are now academies and government is actively promoting a self-improving school system, with a much reduced role for local authorities; school and pupil level data is now at the heart of driving school improvement; and while school budgets have largely been protected, education funding has also experienced the squeeze on public sector spending. The overarching framework for education policy for the 2010-15 parliament was set in the schools white paper ‘The Importance of Teaching’ (2010) which stated: “The primary responsibility for improvement rests with schools…Our aim should be to create a schools system which is self-improving...We will make sure that schools are in control of their own improvement and make it easier for them to learn from one another.” National and Local Leaders of Education (NLE/LLE) (developed by London Challenge) “are a key element in current school improvement strategies”, with the National College for Teaching and Leadership currently overseeing 800 NLEs and 1800 LLEs and 500 teaching schools.93 The model has also now been followed for Outstanding middle or departmental leaders (Specialist Leaders of Education or SLEs). Professionally-led partnerships also have a key role in school improvement, such as teaching school alliances and legacy organisations from London Challenge such as Challenge Partners and the London Leadership Strategy. This approach represents a mainstreaming of learning from London Challenge, which is now embedded across the English education system, and is apposite to any discussion of its contemporary relevance. A combination of local authority funding cuts and the reintroduction of the inspection of local authority support for school improvement by Ofsted has provided further impetus for regional challenges. In this context, the challenge approach appears to offer an effective area-based model for school improvement and this may partly explain the recent upturn in interest in it. This would appear to have merit. However there is a risk that some local authorities might use the challenge approach as an attempt to recreate something more akin to the traditional vision of a local authority-led school system to subvert the schoolled system advocated by government. 93
Merryn Hutchings and Ayo Mansaray, ‘A review of the impact of the London Challenge (2003-8) and the City Challenge (2008-11)’, Research paper for Ofsted’s ‘Access and achievement in education 2013 review’, 20 June 2013.
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To bring an additional focus and resources to improving education in a locality, a programme of interventions drawing on London Challenge or labelled as a challenge has to provide something more than just the promotion of a self-improving schools system in which schools learn from one another. If that is all it attempts, it is little more than the implementation of government policy on school improvement by another name. Emerging initiatives must therefore consider each of the key elements of a challenge identified above, which the remainder of this chapter will address in turn.
Defining the Problem Perhaps one of the most important – if slightly counterintuitive – lessons from London Challenge is not to straightforwardly copy it. The starting point for any discussion on setting up a challenge is a clear focus on raising achievement.94 This has to be informed by a detailed audit of need in the locality to provide an in depth analysis of the specific issues affecting the area’s educational underperformance. Put another way, the nature of the problem that is facing a school system has to inform the strategy of what needs to change, which in turn dictates the approach most appropriate to deliver it. It is crucial to pay sufficient attention to this. Simply adopting the interventions used by London Challenge, which themselves were developed in response to London’s specific problems and circumstances ascertained through a ‘shared and accurate audit of need’, is unlikely to produce the same positive outcomes.95 The second slightly counterintuitive lesson from London Challenge is that despite the breadth of its ambition and the areas in which it sought to make changes, the key to its success was in its ability to “focus, focus, focus”.96 Many elements can be identified as factors influencing or impairing educational improvement; it is therefore an important task for any challenge programme to narrow them down to a manageable number of key goals and interventions. The crisis in London secondary education came from a problem with the quality of teaching and learning in the classroom and it was clear that addressing this had to be at the heart of improving pupil outcomes. But what made London Challenge special was the way its analysis of the problem drove it towards the need to address the underlying factors that made failure endemic. In other words, the problem it took on was to achieve a fundamental and irreversible change in school performance by sorting out the longstanding issues with London schooling for good. The analysis of the issues facing London led to the conclusion that part of the solution lay in raising aspirations in pupils, parents, the teaching profession and wider community about the potential that existed in all pupils: deprivation would no longer be destiny. This is often referred to as changing the narrative about education. London Challenge was also informed by a deep, data-driven analysis of the way that issues such as high staff turnover and a shortage of good teachers posed long-term systemic barriers to excellence. Filling teacher vacancies simply by attracting existing staff into underperforming schools might help to improve attainment in those schools, but only 94 95 96
Michael Wilshaw, ‘Unseen Children’ speech at Church House, Westminster, 20 June 2013 Ofsted, ‘London Challenge’, 10 December 2010, p.8. Interview conducted by CentreForum with member of London Challenge leadership team.
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at the risk of destabilising staffing and standards elsewhere in London. The analysis also identified that while it was important for London Challenge to focus intently on improving specific underperforming schools – the Keys to Success schools – there were wider issues such as increasing the number of Good and Outstanding schools and improving the quality of school leadership, which had to be addressed alongside this. A number of the emerging challenges have used the creation of independent education commissions as helpful vehicles to provide this deep reflection on both the presenting and underlying problem/s that need to be addressed. Liverpool’s education commission, for example, made place specific recommendations as diverse as: setting up an accredited Liverpool Teacher Charter Mark, the development of a high quality programme of professional development and for the Mayor to take the lead in developing stronger links between businesses and schools.97 The equally broad vision from Suffolk’s education commission report No School an Island, written by the Royal Society of Arts98 addressed: ::
building a movement for educational change
::
strengthening capacity for leadership and collaboration
::
enhancing and enriching the quality of teaching and learning
::
broadening horizons for growth, enterprise and well-being
::
celebrating success and sustaining momentum over time
As was also the case in South Gloucestershire, education commissions can operate like a select committee inquiry, taking witness evidence and considering detailed written and quantitative data and evidence of best practice.
Figure 11 – Examples of data to be looked at
97 98
::
pupil performance and attendance data
::
pupils’ social and cultural capital and health
::
school performance data
::
Ofsted reports
::
curricula
::
the state of school buildings, IT and other infrastructure
::
the school improvement capacity of the local education system
::
wider education system data, eg early years, FE, HE and third sector providers
::
teaching workforce
::
employment and economic data
::
social geography of the place, its people, communities, culture and history
::
social attitudes to education and aspiration
Mayor of Liverpool’s Education Commission, Report ‘From Better to Best’, Mayor of Liverpool, July 2013, accessible at: http:// liverpool.gov.uk/media/589311/education-commission-report-july-2013.pdf Louise Bamfield, Joe Hallgarten and Matthew Taylor, ‘No School an Island: Suffolk education inquiry final report’, RSA Action and Research Centre, May 2013, available at: http://www.suffolk.gov.uk/your-council/plans-and-policies/raising-the-bar-briefing/ raising-the-bar-the-report/
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With the government, Ofsted and others looking for quick answers from underperforming schools and local authorities, there may be a temptation to simply apply the interventions that the evidence shows have been so successful in London. This would be a mistake. While London Challenge may appear to offer attractive, road-tested and to some degree evidence based interventions, the best learning to take from London and more recent challenges is again to focus on understanding the specific issues around underperformance and tailoring the solution to focus on the problems that the challenge intends to tackle. Some interventions used by London Challenge have been successfully adopted in other places; for example, other challenges have chosen to focus attention on Keys to Success schools. Even so, the learning has been about the value of focusing effort on a target group of schools whose success is crucial to the performance of the whole education system in question rather than identifying schools using the same metrics as London. Thus, while the Yorkshire and Humber Educational Initiative has adopted this same targeted approach with its ‘pathfinder schools’, a different (context specific) definition means that it is a quite different group of schools that constitute the “keys to success” in this area (specifically schools on a journey towards the Ofsted Good category). Similarly other challenges have adopted the language and the practice of breaking schools down into smaller units or families of schools. But rather than following London’s example of using performance data to create groups of similar intakes but widely different outcomes, Somerset and Norfolk, for example, have adopted geographically-based families, and Central South Wales Challenge has school improvement groups with a range of intakes, locations, and school improvement journeys. In all three cases, the Families of Schools are being used much more proactively as improvement partnerships, reflecting more the approach taken by the Greater Manchester Challenge to Families of Schools than in London. This approach of learning from the spirit rather than the detail of what happened in London is very much consistent with the flexible approach taken by London Challenge itself. Within the twin parameters of a clear change agenda set by the detailed analysis of the issues that needed to be addressed and an underpinning theory or approach to school improvement, interventions in schools were differentiated according to their needs and circumstances and developed by innovating and investing in what worked. It also believed in investing in teachers and encouraging bottom-up innovation. In summary, the first key element to take from London Challenge and the emerging challenges is the importance of starting with a rigorous contextually specific analysis of the issues that are impacting on the area’s educational underperformance. This focus on tightly defining the problem and goals of the programme should lie at the heart of every challenge. The strategy for addressing the problem is discussed in the rest of this chapter, in relation to the four interacting elements. For each element there are a range of possible approaches that challenges can take.
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Scale There are three principal considerations in choosing the area to include within a challenge: 1. A shared problem that the challenge has been set up to fix; 2. A coherent school system with a strong sense of identity; and 3. An education system with sufficient expertise and capacity to raise standards by mobilising the knowledge already in the system through effective school to school support. These do not always neatly align and, like the other issues discussed in this chapter, different challenges will adopt different approaches depending on the priority given to the different considerations. The decision to address London’s shared crisis in secondary education, and to work on deep systemic issues like pupil aspiration and teacher supply, overrode the existing governance structures and boundaries of 33 very different education systems which had little history of communication and collaboration to build on. Even if the earlier existence of the former Inner London Education Authority meant that there might have been some residual sense of being part of an inner London education system, this did not extend to London as a whole. A sense of London-wide identity was important therefore in fuelling the moral purpose that helped to collective approaches to improving outcomes for ‘this place and its children’. Importantly, working at this London-wide scale, with its 400+ secondary schools including both some of the best in the country alongside the most challenging, enabled the vast majority of the capacity to support schools and coach headteachers to be sourced from within the capital. The knowledge existed in the system to transform outcomes if it could be harnessed and ‘moved around’. London Challenge was particularly successful in brokering support networks with schools which shared similar characteristics but different outcomes (identified through Families of Schools data) and heads who would work well together but were sufficiently geographically distant that they did not feel they were competitor institutions. Operating at a scale which cut across local authority boundaries helped to maintain a positive balance between collaboration and competition, reflecting Prof David Hargreaves’ comments to the Education Select Committee:
“It is commonly claimed by school leaders that collaboration between schools would increase if only competition between them were to be removed. In the business world, including Silicon Valley, collaboration and competition live side by side. It seems that if the system is rich in social capital, competition does not drive out collaboration but may actively promote it.”99 The London Leadership Strategy developed to provide the infrastructure to facilitate this brokering and support. The capacity in the system was quite limited at first but grew over time. However, as London Challenge demonstrated even with the support of the London 99
‘School Partnerships and Cooperation’, 6 November 2013, available at: http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/ committees-a-z/commons-select/education-committee/news/publication-of-school-partnerships-report-substantive/
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Leadership Strategy, brokering bespoke solutions of this sort can be time-consuming and requires staffing infrastructure both to set up the partnerships and also to project manage the process. There is significant variation in the proposed scales at which the emerging challenges will operate. This includes a whole nation (in the case of Wales), although the majority of the emerging initiatives are taking place in single local authority areas. While this reflects a strong local sense of identity and a coherent educational system, initiatives within tightly drawn boundaries may struggle to access the school improvement knowledge and NLE or teaching school capacity they need (discussed further in Chapter 5). Many of the emerging challenges have explicitly sought to compensate for this by devising ways to bring additional knowledge into the system as well as mobilising what is already there. Norfolk has sought to broaden its base for school-to-school sharing by seeking to draw in expertise from schools in other local authorities. Similarly, Somerset, South Gloucestershire and others have sought to inject further capacity by making links with NLEs from outside the area. Both Norfolk and Somerset have formalised this in the form of a strategic alliance with the London Leadership Strategy. Suffolk, similarly, has developed direct links with schools in the London borough of Hackney. This appears to have strong advantages directly, and also through a further galvanising effect on those within the system: as one interviewee put it, ‘if they can achieve that in London then so can we’.100 However, it is clearly harder at a smaller scale to replicate the similarity of intake and circumstances in school to school support arrangements which was a key feature in London. Similarly, on the issue of heads working with schools which are not direct competitors for pupils or resources, while there is a feeling that rurality can make this easier to achieve in a large county, it remains the case that these sorts of arrangements were found to work best with people who did not know each other well (which is hard to achieve in a challenge based around a single local authority area). The experience in the North East may help to explain the apparent preference for single authority challenges. With over a thousand schools across 12 local authorities, the North East has some of the potential advantages of scale enjoyed by London (both in terms of capacity in the system and the ability to circumvent intra-local authority competition). However, the difficulty of generating from the bottom up the necessary authority to instigate and drive an initiative at this scale in the current educational landscape (with a corresponding increase in the number of stakeholders) has proved challenging. This relates directly to the concept of mandate.
Mandate The authority to drive change through a school system in need of reform and the determination to take decisive action are key elements of any successful challenge. This is both a matter of political will and having sufficient executive powers to take decisive action where improvement is too slow.101 This mandate can come primarily from outside the local school system, what might be termed a top-down mandate, or can be achieved 100 Interview conducted by CentreForum. 101 Ofsted, ‘London Challenge’, 10 December 2010.
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by harnessing the collective will to reform from within the system, a bottom-up mandate. London Challenge had a clear top-down mandate from the very highest levels of government to do whatever was necessary to reform London education. However consensual its language and approach, no one was in any doubt therefore that there was an iron fist inside London Challenge’s velvet glove. There is a tendency on historical reflection to perhaps to focus more on the element of collaboration and in so doing to lose some sight of the tough accountability.102 London Challenge was strongly driven by a small and tight-knit leadership team. Professional leadership may have been based symbolically away from the DfE, in the Institute for Education, but this was more a visible sign of the differing leadership roles than of any significant policy differences between the three elements of the leadership. It is notable that high level and consistent political support for the programme was maintained over many years and it was not allowed to be blown off course by events or other external political pressures. The entire leadership team, including the designated London Schools Minister, was very ‘hands on’, staying closely engaged with schools, local authorities and other key stakeholders. They had no formal powers but they were the ones ‘calling the shots’. They decided on the strategic vision and goals and ensured effective delivery, working through a central team of project managers and a field force of advisors. Their mandate also enabled them to cut though bureaucratic or organisational barriers which proved invaluable. This ensured that change happened. The widely acknowledged sense of crisis in London also provided a top-down moral authority for change, today in some ways the equivalent of a local authority “failing” an Ofsted support for school improvement inspection as was the case with some of the challenges described in Chapter 3. Of the emerging challenges, only School Challenge Cymru draws on an explicit top-down mandate derived from national government. In the North East, for example, the absence of a clear and authoritative overarching ‘deal maker’ has presented significant problems to turning the widespread in principle buy-in to the challenge into a fully-fledged initiative. As such, the emerging challenges showing greatest levels of development at this stage tend to be those relying on a local democratic mandate from a single local authority or small number of local authorities in collaboration. In these instances, the impetus for the challenge has sometimes been initiated as a result of a change in political or managerial leadership (as in Norfolk or Suffolk). Sometimes a change of policy or circumstances (as in South Gloucestershire) has led to a reappraisal of schools’ performance. School status has an impact on the degree of authority a locally-based challenge has. For community schools, the local authority’s mandate is hard-edged in the form of statutory intervention powers, such as withdrawing delegation or imposing an interim executive board. This has been a very important aspect of Norfolk’s challenge programme, even 102 Interview conducted by CentreForum.
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though it only affected a minority of schools. However, local authorities cannot exercise these same formal powers over academies or free schools. In other respects, however, different types of schools are not treated differently. South Gloucestershire provides a strong example of this, with the local authority explicitly choosing to provide funding on an equal footing on the basis that the challenge’s goal is to help all the children in the area. In the challenges researched for this report, local authorities have strengthened their mandate by working with a school partnership board of headteachers to provide effective institutional leadership of the challenge. This builds a sense of inclusive leadership but also to a degree reflects the move to a more school-led improvement system and the weakened local authority role in education discussed earlier in this chapter. While all recent challenges are aiming to develop a more effective school-led improvement system in some areas (e.g. Central South Wales), this is still quite local authority led. Somerset Challenge is the most bottom-up of the examples discussed in Chapter 3. It is a voluntary school-led programme, with only one school opting not to join in, and its operation is entirely independent of the local authority. This bottom-up approach has advantages, including over securing genuine buy-in of schools to the challenge and a closer fit to the specific needs and context of the locality. But it relies even more heavily on the cohesive glue provided by the sense of moral purpose generated by coming together to help children within a particular place and also on the philosophy that offering support is always beneficial to the school providing support as well as the receiving it. This helps to both secure participation and to trump any reluctance to collaborate borne from competitive pressures. One consequence of this is the imperative not to over-focus on particular schools and to be seen to offer something to every participating school. This clearly risks some loss of focus on the key problems the challenge was set up to address. A further point, however, is that the degree of mandate required may also depend on the problem the challenge has been set up to address (and the approach chosen to do so). For example, the degree of authority required to broach the challenge of the schools deemed the ‘keys to success’ in London (generally those missing floor targets or deemed Inadequate) is potentially very different from that required in relation to Yorkshire’s ‘pathfinder schools’ (i.e. those committed to and already someway along a journey to improvement). Similarly, the make-up of the London Challenge leadership team and where it sat in government meant it was well-placed to deliver the broad vision of systemic and community level change. This may be harder to achieve at the single local authority level and may drive a narrower focus as a result. This not only relates to reduced local authority powers over academies and free schools, but also because local authorities lack powers in areas like employability or teacher training. Broadening the leadership of a challenge through a LEP (as is proposed for the Great North East Challenge) could be one way to address this; though as was the case even in London, statutory community school intervention powers would still remain with individual local authorities.
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External challenge It is often hard to expect people working within a local education system to show the degree of self-criticism required to initiate a programme of radical reform to it. London Challenge was entirely outside the London education establishment and the formal local government structure of 32 boroughs and the Corporation of London. While they worked and consulted closely, the vision, strategy, leadership and advisor team were all independent of the London school system and existing accountability structures. There are three main areas where external challenge can be useful when the leadership of a challenge is internal to the system it is seeking to reform. 1. As discussed above, bringing in a group of outside experts provides a clean slate analysis of the area’s problems (‘holding up a mirror’) and helps to set goals and draw up a vision and strategy for change, challenging the natural tendency in any system towards “group think”. This process can also be helpful in saying what has previously been unsaid and getting schools and other education stakeholders to confront the brutal facts about underperformance. The Welsh government commissioned a report from the OECD to inform its own Schools Challenge Cymru, but a common format for this is an education commission. This is generally an advisory body, so that it is the local leadership team in the place – be it the local authority or schools or both – that draws up and consults on and leads the detailed implementation plan. 2. Whether leadership is through a group of schools, local authorities or a single local authority, it still needs to exhibit the determination to accept and commit to any radical prescription for change. For this reason, there is equally a place for some form of ongoing external scrutiny of the pace and delivery of the programme. Some challenges have planned for an annual review, either by members of the original education commission team or others external to the delivery of the challenge. Somerset has a different approach and is using a London headteacher to chair its partnership board. Similarly Prof David Woods chairs the Norfolk Education Challenge Board. This element of external challenge interacts closely with the concept of mandate: who monitors the progress of the initiative, and what levers are available to them if it is not sufficient? One of the key challenges with implementing area based initiatives effectively is often that the body with sufficient mandate to give rise to the initiative must also be willing to vest some of this power / authority in someone else (to provide accountability or ‘teeth’) if it is to have maximum impact.103 3. More closely derived from London Challenge is the use of a team of external expert leaders and advisors brokering bespoke solutions, and with the authority to lead on the tougher conversations with schools where progress is not as fast as required. This is perhaps most likely to be necessary where there is a focus on improving very weak schools (as per the Keys to Success initiative in London) where formal intervention may have to be considered. Having access to a team of external advisors of this sort is different from using NLEs (or other expertise from outside the area) for school to school support.
103 Interview conducted by CentreForum.
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Another potential source of external challenge is through Ofsted, whose role has changed markedly since the start of London Challenge. The recent re-introduction of inspections of local authorities certainly provides a sharp form of external accountability to any local education system. However, being quite closely aligned to a specifically school improvement and intervention agenda, Ofsted’s inspection framework is more suited to a narrowly scoped challenge rather than one which is aiming for system-wide changes as is discussed in the final section of this chapter.
Approach The range of possible approaches to raising achievement can extend from narrow schoolfocused improvement programmes to more broadly-based initiatives seeking durable, systemic change. One of the clearest differences between the various emerging challenges is their place on this spectrum on possible approaches. The key principle informing London Challenge’s strategy was that the knowledge and expertise needed to drive school improvement was largely in the local school system already, but that this knowledge had to be transferred to where it was most needed. This was also supplemented by a belief in ‘upward convergence’, whereby schools that recieved help improved, while the schools who offered help also took something away that raised their own performance as part of the process. These concepts are also central to the emerging challenges. Indeed, where initiatives are more bottom-up, convincing leading schools in an area of this latter point takes on even greater significance. In London, interventions were therefore focused around involving the best local leaders and schools in directly supporting other schools to strengthen their leadership, teaching and overall performance. This approach to driving school improvement was underpinned by the application of a theory of system leadership. This theory had two elements: the value that leaders should strive for the success of other schools and their students, not just their own; and delivered through the practice of actively working with and in some other schools to help them to become successful. This was, however, supplemented by a third element of ‘re-culturing’, where everyone is committed to realising greater benefit for all pupils in all schools in the London school system. As such, the wider approach taken by London Challenge – moving beyond core elements of school improvement – stemmed directly from the analysis that the problems were as much to do with addressing the underlying factors that made failure endemic as they were about interventions to drive improvement in particular schools and boroughs. It was for this reason that alongside school-based and peer-led improvement initiatives, harnessing London’s huge under-exploited assets and cultural capital became an important element of London Challenge. London Challenge pursued interventions like the London Student Pledge, the Business Challenge, and better links with Higher Education, ensuring London pupils got better access to the capital’s world class academic institutions. London Challenge also sought to maximise the role played by third sector organisations in raising attainment and pupil outcomes as well as creating an environment where new education-focused social enterprises could grow, the best example of many being Teach 50
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First. It also helps to explain why, once there had been a significant impact on raising standards, London Challenge initiated a marketing campaign to build confidence in school improvement and to persuade a sceptical public of its successes. This broad approach was central to delivering that key systemic break with London’s past and to changing the narrative about education in London. System leadership was deployed and distributed to create a collective moral purpose which included not just teachers and schools, but all those with a stake in a successful education service: government, employers and wider society.104 There is a wide range of approaches across the emerging challenges. Central South Wales Challenge and the Yorkshire and Humber Education Initative state that wider community involvement is currently limited. The same is true for Somerset Challenge though it intends over the longer term to extend work to other stakeholders and to develop the infrastructure for long-term systemic improvement. In contrast, Liverpool’s ambitious ‘City of Readers’ project is engaging with the city’s cultural, sporting, community and business organisations, and includes a focus on adult literacy, working with employers and volunteer organisations. North East, which sees the long term economic prosperity of the region as the issue it has to address, is seeking a much broader systemic transformation. No consideration of London Challenge’s approach is complete without also addressing the culture of support for teachers, the use of non-stigmatising language about schools, and a timescale that reflected the scale of the ambition for change. At the centre of London Challenge was the distinctive attitude of respect for teachers, the culture of support and the promulgation of strong, shared and inclusive values. It was in direct contrast to the prevailing political culture of the time that talked of “bog-standard comprehensive schools”105 and saw name and shame as an effective strategy for raising attainment. Language was very important in the creation of this different culture within London Challenge (see Figure 12). The exclusive use of non-stigmatising language was not agreed without a fight within government, but it was a major achievement at the time to ensure that the word “failure” was only used in the context of London Challenge in relation to the intervention boroughs but never in relation to schools, whatever their challenges. Calling the worst performing schools “the keys to success” epitomised the approach, though in truth it was more than spin, because if these schools could be helped to succeed, then you really could conclude that any school in London could do so too. Equally important was the care and consideration taken by all the London Challenge leadership, though this is particularly associated with the approach and style of Tim Brighouse, with his hand-written notes to headteachers and ability to lift the spirits and aspirations of even the most struggling individuals.
104 David Hargreaves, ‘The Shape of Things to Come: steps towards a self-improving system’, Presentation, 2012; and Daniel Goleman, ‘Focus: The Hidden Driver of Excellence’, Harper Collins, 2013. 105 BBC News, ‘Comprehensive Changes’, 12 February 2001, available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/world_at_one/ programme_highlights/1166580.stm
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London Challenge approached raising attainment from the point of view that every teacher wanted all their pupils to succeed and was striving to be the best that they could be to enable this to happen. Its attitude was that in the right circumstances and with the right support all could succeed. Seen through that lens, it is easy to see why it was ultimately so successful in winning hearts and minds and getting everyone involved in London education in whatever way to focus on the shared moral purpose of raising attainment for all: ‘getting behind schools rather than on top of them’. It is important to stress that this was not about excusing underperformance but getting the balance between challenge and support that would ensure it was most effectively addressed. Key to London Challenge successfully delivering this approach was having a realistic timescale. School failure has to be addressed with a sense of urgency and a readiness to make tough decisions but those experienced in school improvement are clear that seriously underperforming schools cannot be turned around overnight. The same is even more true where a challenge aims to achieve system change that is irreversible, and sorts out the longstanding issues for good. A challenge should be considered as a time-limited improvement programme but one which allows enough time to make and embed fundamental changes. The amount of time required will absolutely depend on the issues the challenge has to address. The three-year timescale of City Challenge compared to London’s eight years is frequently cited as one of the reasons why it had less impact than the programme which inspired it.106 The DfE evaluation of City Challenge comments “a five-year period would probably have enabled them to make even more progress, and to ensure that the improvement was sustainable”.107 In this context, many of the timescales adopted by recent challenges such as the two-year timescale in Norfolk, appear to be ambitious. It is important to engage with the tension between the need for pace and the importance of embedding improvement. Quick wins may, as in London, be part of the solution to this but it is hard to see value in a challenge that pursues short-term or cosmetic interventions over the slow fixes of fundamental change to entrenched issues.
Figure 12 – The language of London Challenge108 ::
Shared vision and values
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A compelling and inclusive moral purpose
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Ambition and aspiration
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Inspirational leadership at all levels
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Exceptionality of practice and provision
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Striking impact
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Progress at a pace
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Building capacity
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Creating and managing knowledge
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A passion for excellence
106 Peter Rudd, Helen Poet, Gill Featherstone et al, ‘Evaluation of City Challenge Leadership Strategies’, NFER, 2011. 107 Merryn Hutchings et al, ‘Evaluation of the City Challenge Programme’, Department for Education, 28 June 2012, p. 103. 108 David Woods, Presentation ‘London Challenge & London Leadership Strategy, Retrospect and Prospect’, 20 May 2014
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::
Innovative and creative solutions
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Keys to success
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Success against stretching benchmarks
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A relentless focus
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Confront the brutal facts
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Fast on our feet
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Support and challenge
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Perpetual optimism
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Unwavering resolve
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Powerful partnerships
Conclusion Those thinking of setting up a challenge today must carefully analyse the problems their area is facing and then focus them down to a manageable number of key goals and interventions. In addition they should consider four key elements drawn from the experience of London Challenge: scale; mandate; external challenge; and whether the approach is to be narrowly school-focused or more broadly-based seeking durable, systemic change. The way these four elements have been addressed by the emerging challenges points towards a spectrum of ways of creating a challenge, rather than a specific blueprint or model. In part this reflects both the different educational and accountability landscape and financial circumstances from London Challenge, and the differences in the issues areas face. But another significant factor is the lack of direct government involvement and support for regional challenges since 2010. The case for government involvement through a nationally supported programme of challenges will be considered in the next chapter. Recommendation 3: Rather than straightforwardly copying London Challenge, the starting point for developing a challenge should be a detailed audit of need in that particular locality and a highly focused strategy of what needs to change, leading to agreement on a manageable number of key goals and interventions. Recommendation 4: Those seeking to learn from London Challenge should consider the implications of the following key features seen in London and City Challenge and also in emerging challenges: scale (single local authority area to region-wide); mandate (top-down or bottom-up); the degree of external challenge; whether the approach is narrowly school-focused or aims for a more broad systemic change.
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:: Chapter 5: The case for government support for regional / sub-regional challenges “The knowledge and skills were here in local schools in abundance…But they weren’t sufficiently moving around.” – Prof Mel Ainscow, chief advisor, Greater Manchester Challenge109 “There is now real appetite for the Great North Schools Challenge across all the key stakeholders. The problem is getting it off the ground – it is as if everyone is currently in some kind of dance in which no one feels it is appropriate for them to lead but equally no one really wants any one other party to lead – making for a bit of a confused and uncoordinated dance!” – Interviewee involved in proposed Great North East Schools Challenge110 “I very much favour the idea of sub-regional challenges, based on London Challenge, but adapted to the area or locality involved. London Challenge … worked because school leaders with the credibility to convey tough messages led it. It was a lean and mean organisation backed by big-hitting politicians. These key ingredients can be applied elsewhere with very little additional resource.” – Sir Michael Wilshaw, Ofsted, June 2013111 The preceding chapter sought to identify key lessons and considerations for those looking to use a challenge model as a means of driving area level improvement in the current educational landscape. The examples discussed illustrate that there is much to be positive and indeed excited about in these initiatives, with emerging challenges reapplying learning from London and City Challenge to their own specific contexts, often adapting and compensating for changed circumstances (and limited resources) in innovative ways. What is striking, however, is the extent to which – in contrast to London’s regional challenge – the emerging challenges are predominantly based around single local authorities. This chapter argues that the learning from London points to the fact that if challenge initiatives are to have full impact, it is necessary to supplement a bottom-up drive for 109 Martin Wainwright, ‘School matchmakers lift results’, The Guardian, 25 January 2011, available at: http://www.theguardian.com/ education/2011/jan/25/school-improvement-city-challenge 110 Interviewee involved in proposed Great North East Schools Challenge. 111 Michael Wilshaw, ‘Unseen Children’ speech at Church House, Westminster, 20 June 2013
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change with some degree of top-down sanction and support. This relates in particular to the key concepts of ‘mandate’ and ‘scale’ and the important interaction and tension between them. The point can be well illustrated by looking in slightly more depth at the proposed Great North East Schools Challenge.
The advantages of scale As the comment from Prof Mel Ainscow at the head of the chapter suggests, the challenge model draws on a theory of change based in part on mobilising the knowledge already in a particular education system, moving it from where it is to where it is needed. There are clear advantages, therefore, to having high levels of capacity and knowledge within that system to begin with. This consideration plays directly into the question of scale. Too big can certainly pose problems: the benefits of additional capacity may well be lost if it requires expanding the scale of an initiative beyond the boundaries of a ‘natural’ area / education system at the expense of the sense of place and identity that helps to create the driving sense of moral purpose. However, the opposite may also restrict the full impact that can be achieved. As discussed in the previous chapter, London Challenge gleaned significant benefits from operating at a sizeable (that is regional) scale: 1. There were already high levels of knowledge and capacity located in and around the system. This played an important role in both helping to confront the problem and in delivering the solution. The range and number of schools (over 400 at secondary) allowed for comparisons to be made between the significantly varying outcomes of schools with similar intakes, helping to first confront the brutal facts and to fuel the recognition that underperformance did not need to be the inevitable outcome for pupils from ‘this place’. In turn, the expertise that had helped to generate outcomes that broke the trend (and with it the link between ‘deprivation and destiny’) existed to a sufficient degree that it could – with effective brokering – begin to be spun out around the system with a view to transforming it. 2. It was possible to drive collaboration between schools in different localities, cutting across traditional local authority boundaries and therefore overriding the potential dampening effects of intra-local authority competition. This helped to create the positive balance between competition and collaboration that provided an important element in London’s success. Furthermore, schools and school leaders were able to benefit from exposure to people and experiences beyond their normal frame of reference, opening up a wider pool of knowledge than previously available in the largely siloed local authority education systems. 3. By operating at a level with significant cultural capital it was possible to harness the potential of the wider community to support education. This was important in achieving the level of dramatic change that went beyond what would have been possible through school focused interventions alone. Applying this learning to the North East suggests that a challenge conceived and implemented at this regional level might – if it can be established – have significant advantages to a series of initiatives operating at a smaller scale. As a region, the North 55
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East has a strong sense of collective identity to help generate the sense of moral purpose and drive a willingness to work together to benefit the area and its children. It also has – at this level – strong access to the broad cultural capital needed to help galvanise the wider community (for example, the potential for partnership with regional bodies such as the CBI North East). Most importantly, however, at this scale there is clearly a good degree of knowledge and capacity within the system. This is evident in Figure 13, which plots the distribution across the region of NLEs and teaching schools against schools deemed Inadequate at secondary level (the phase of greatest concern in the region). This analysis also highlights, however, the fact that this knowledge is not evenly distributed and often not located alongside or within the same local authority area as schools where additional support is needed. Thus, two local authorities at the South East tip of the region (Stockton and Redcar and Cleveland) collectively have 4 schools rated Inadequate, but no NLEs or teaching schools located nearby. By contrast, the cluster of four local authorities in the central-east area of the region (North Tyneside, Newcastle Upon-Tyne, South Tyneside and Gateshead) collectively have 8 NLEs or teaching schools and only 1 school deemed Inadequate. While other smaller scale emerging challenges have attempted to mitigate the lack of capacity in their local school system with strategies such as working with the London Leadership Strategy, this is ultimately not the same as using locally-based expertise and there has to be question about the capacity of London schools to expand their support to all the schools across the country which would benefit from it. Figure 14 extends this point. Chapter 1 highlighted the regional discrepancy in schools achieving better results for their disadvantaged pupils than the national average for all pupils. Closing the gap (particularly at secondary) is one of - if not the - most pressing challenge in the North East. Figure 14 demonstrates that there are secondary schools in the region able to break the link between deprivation and destiny and provide the crucial fuel for changing the narrative around educational aspiration and expectation. However, these schools (18 in total) are again unevenly distributed – half of the 12 local authorities in the region have one or more such schools (Durham has 7), the other half do not have any at all.
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Figure 13 – Distribution of secondary NLEs, teaching schools and Inadequate secondary schools in North East England
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Figure 14 – Location of schools in NE that secure better outcomes for their disadvantaged pupils than the average performance for all pupils School location
The advantages of mandate Impetus – the need for a ‘deal maker’ These potential advantages of scale, however, also highlight a significant challenge to establishing a challenge initiative at this region wide level in the current educational context. The concept of a North East Challenge has been around since at least 2009 and, in the now over a year since the firm recommendation was made to establish the initiative in Lord Adonis’s North East Economic Review, widespread in principle buy-in has been secured from schools and stakeholders right across the region.112 However, the initiative has proved stubbornly difficult to get off the ground. In a region of 12 local authorities, 2 LEPs and over 1,100 individual (and increasingly autonomous) schools, there is a real question as to who has the mandate and authority to pull all the disparate stakeholders together and generate the necessary impetus and 112 Lord Adonis et al. ‘North East Independent Economic Review’ Report, North East Local Enterprise Partnership, April 2013.
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coherence. In a sense, the ambitious scale of the initiative provides both the opportunity and the problem – by definition, it involves a wide range of interested parties, all of whom have a direct interest in (and possibly slightly differing visions of) what it will look like, how it will be structured and how it will act. In turn, if the initiative is to work, each of these parties will have to surrender some degree of authority to the Great North East Schools Challenge. As the comment at the head of the chapter identifies, the final piece of the puzzle is therefore the coordination of the somewhat unstructured ‘dance’ between all of the parties involved (all of whose participation is vital). In explicit recognition of this, the North East LEP – as part of a drive to put educational improvement at the heart of the agenda for regional growth – have made an explicit ask of government to act as this “deal-maker”: “The missing piece in this alliance and important for success is a commitment from government to join as an active and full participant in the design of a new model of Schools Challenge.”113 In the current educational context of a strongly school-led approach to improvement, the same high degree of centralised, top-down leadership (and control) that characterised London Challenge would, importantly, not be necessary or appropriate. But some degree of political will and top-down support would definitely help to facilitate an already burgeoning bottom-up initiative by providing the coherence and impetus that only central government can when operating at this large scale (cutting across other centres of power). The contrast between the North East and the pattern of the other emerging challenges reflects this tension between mandate and scale. By operating predominantly at a single local authority level, many of these initiatives have been able to move at a fast pace with a clear driving force (with much to be positive about). However, by definition, this comes without the significant advantages of scale that helped to facilitate the wholesale systemic transformation in London.
Operation – authority and space However, the learning from London also emphasises that – beyond this initial impetus – there are significant advantages to a degree of central government support (and the mandate this brings) in relation to aspects of the actual operation of a challenge, as discussed below.
Brokering and having ‘difficult’ conversations A point made very forcibly by many of those involved with London Challenge was that the authority provided by having a mandate derived from government was vital in the day-today working of the initiative, particularly at the outset. It perhaps says something about the nature of memory that, looking backwards, it is the ‘collaboration’ element of London Challenge that is remembered far more than the ‘teeth’. However, the identification and strategies for dealing with the Keys to Success schools – all of which were suffering from chronic underperformance – were possible only through the degree of ‘bite’ or ‘muscle’ 113 North East LEP, Growth Deal bid to government, 2014
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(however well concealed) that lay behind those leading the initiative. As one expert contributor to the recent CfBT / Centre for London analysis put it well: “political support creates the legitimacy and soft power to make change.”114 In today’s improved education system, a new challenge may not be faced with quite the same extreme school-level problems as in London at the outset of London Challenge. However, it remains important that a challenge initiative is imbued with a clear sense of authority if it is to provide the brokering required to ensure knowledge is moved (to a sufficient degree) to where it is most needed. One of the potential pitfalls in a self-improving school system is that – as is well established in other areas relating to social mobility such as HE access – if information and best-practice guidance are simply put out ‘into the ether’, it is often those best placed to access them who take advantage rather than those most in need. This runs the risk of exacerbating rather than closing the gaps between high and low performing schools. In many of the emerging challenges, particularly those with the greatest emphasis on bottom-up school collaboration, there is an admirable buy-in from schools to share expertise driven solely by an overarching sense of moral purpose. However, a difficulty is likely to emerge – particularly in relation to an initiative at scale - in maximising impact if, in the absence of a body carrying sufficient external authority, a large number of schools are not sufficiently convinced of how they benefit directly. This echoes the concern raised by Graham Stuart, Chair of the Education Select Committee: “We support moves to give schools more freedom to innovate but we argue that the creation of a self-improving system needs a degree of coordination and strong incentives to encourage schools to look beyond their own school gate. Otherwise there is a danger that many schools will operate in isolation rather than in cooperation.”115
Funding This difficulty posed to maximising the impact of school to school collaboration via a heavily / exclusively bottom-up challenge is likely to be particularly acute if schools themselves are the predominant source of funding for the initiative, either through direct contributions or funding allocated through the Schools Forum. This highlights the important further relationship between funding and mandate (the question, as it were, of ‘who pays the piper?’), which is again particularly pressing in an initiative looking to operate at scale. Local authorities and individual schools will, quite understandably, want to see tangible, direct and proportionate benefits for money outlaid. This is hard to achieve at a region wide level where – by definition – support is needed more in some areas than in others, and more in some schools than others. This suggests a significant advantage where challenges are – at least in part – able to access some degree of central funding, allowing money to more directly follow need. 114 S Baars et al, ‘Lessons from London schools: investigating the success’, CfBT / Centre for London, June 2014, p. 100. 115 Graham Stuart MP, Education Committee Chair, launch of ‘School Partnerships and Cooperation’, 6 November 2013, available at: http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/education-committee/news/ publication-of-school-partnerships-report-substantive/
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This issue also, inevitably, interacts with the amount of funding that can be provided. For example, of the emerging challenges, only Schools Challenge Cymru (as the only centrally funded initiative) is planning to create a full team of advisors to play the active brokering role that was central to the scale of the success in London. In turn, both the source and potential scale of centralised funding are more suited to the pursuit of wider systemic / community interventions (such as teacher recruitment and retention).
Timeframe and space to innovate One of the key points emphasised in the evaluations of London and City Challenge was the need – if such large scale area based initiatives are to be effective – to allow a sufficient timeframe for a ‘tipping point’ in the system to be reached and significant improvements to follow.116 Those involved with London Challenge particularly emphasised the importance of the lifespan of the initiative. Ultimately, only central government – as the final arbiter of the educational context in which a cross-cutting, regional initiative would operate – can guarantee this kind of space. This again suggests a strong advantage to having some level of government engagement with and sanction of a challenge operating at a regional level, even if only to ensure it is not squeezed out by other policies. This ‘room to breathe’ in terms of timeframe is particularly important in relation to the earlier key recommendation that new regional challenges must be specifically tailored to the localised context (rather than an ‘off-the-shelf’ replication of elements of London Challenge) as this will require an opportunity to innovate and test.
A government supported programme of regional challenges As the recent CfBT / Centre for London analysis therefore concludes – as with Ofsted before them – one of the defining lessons from London is the importance of high-level sponsorship and support from politicians and policymakers.117 The learning from the emerging challenges supports this, particularly in relation to the significant advantages of operating a challenge initiative at scale coupled with the difficulty of achieving this in today’s educational landscape without a strong sense of cohesive mandate that only central government can provide. However, it is important to note that – as identified in relation to the North East – the level of top-down involvement required to drive regional challenge initiatives is potentially very different today (and more politically palatable) than that required by London Challenge itself. Greater capacity already exists across the system (not least thanks to the spread of initiatives born through London Challenge itself, such as NLEs and teaching schools). There is also clear evidence of a localised awareness and drive to tackle regional variation and underperformance (not least in the emerging challenges taking matters into their own hands). What is required, as Sir Michael Wilshaw suggests, is to supplement this bottomup drive with the necessary political will and impetus to draw things together at scale in a concerted attempt to transform outcomes for pupils across the country.
116 Merryn Hutchings et al, ‘Evaluation of the City Challenge Programme’, Department for Education, 28 June 2012 117 S Baars et al, ‘Lessons from London schools: investigating the success’, CfBT / Centre for London, June 2014, p. 12; Michael Wilshaw, ‘Unseen Children’ speech at Church House, Westminster, 20 June 2013
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Recommendation 5: Given the gap in performance between London and all other regions and how few emerging challenges are operating at a scale beyond a single local authority area, government should be proactive in facilitating challenges to be set up through a national programme offering both a degree of organisational and financial support.
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:: Summary of recommendations 1. Government should give greater priority to tackling the unacceptably large variations in pupil outcomes across English regions. 2. Given the turnaround in performance of London schools in recent years, the learning from London Challenge should be the starting point for area-based interventions intended to address regional underperformance. 3. Rather than straightforwardly copying London Challenge, the starting point for developing a challenge should be a detailed audit of need in that particular locality and a highly focused strategy of what needs to change, leading to agreement on a manageable number of key goals and interventions. 4. Those seeking to learn from London Challenge should consider the implications of the following key features seen in London and City Challenge and also in emerging challenges: scale (single local authority area to region-wide); mandate (top-down or bottom-up); the degree of external challenge; whether the approach is narrowly school-focused or aims for a more broad systemic change. 5. Given the gap in performance between London and all other regions and how few emerging challenges are operating at a scale beyond a single local authority area, government should be proactive in facilitating challenges to be set up through a national programme offering both a degree of organisational and financial support.
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