Building System Capacity in the SEF Professor David Egan Professor Alma Harris Professor David Hopkins

Introduction and Context System Leadership The Model for School Improvement Building System Capacity in the SEF

INTRODUCTION AND CONTEXT

Co-Construction This presentation sets out our thinking on building the system capacity we will need to support the SEF and achieve its purposes. Opportunity in the workshops that follow to test out this thinking and to modify it as a result. This will continue after the conferences in a planned programme of work with LA Consortia and head-teachers. This has been agreed with ADEW. So we will co-construct the modus operandi and the model of school improvement that will drive the SEF from September 2010.

School Effectiveness Research: Ten Principles for System Reform 1.Ensuring that the achievement and learning of students is at the centre of all that we do. 2.The enhancement of the quality of teaching should be the central theme. 3. Selection policies that ensure that only the very best people become teachers

4.Professional learning opportunities that develop a common ‘practice’ 5.Leadership for student achievement 6.Clarity on standards. 7.Procedures to provide ongoing and transparent data. 8.School performance can be improved through early intervention. 9.Inequities in student performance must be relentlessly addressed. 10. System level structures should link the centre, the locality/region and schools/classrooms (tri-level reform).

A Contemporary ‘School Effectiveness’ Framework

SEF Stage Two Model LocalAuthorities School Effectiveness Framework DCELLS Classrooms and Schools

DCELLS: Strategic Direction Provide strategic direction for SEF within a narrative that is well communicated to all parties, including politicians, key members of governance, teachers, students and parents. Coordinate under the umbrella of SEF key policy areas in order to strengthen teaching, leadership and curriculum. Develop rigorous qualitative and quantitative outcomes that are sought through SEF and align these to the new Common Inspection Framework. Continue to develop high quality data sets.

Local Authorities: Operational Capacity Take the SEF forward through the four regional Consortia. Each Consortia develops a discrete SEF programme (to be agreed with DCELLS) allowing for regional needs, within the overall national strategy for SEF. Each Consortia to have in place a System Leadership Team to lead the operational implementation of SEF at school level. This will require extensive capacity building from September 2009 to prepare for SEF roll-out from September 2010.

Schools and Classrooms: SEF Impact Focus on within-school variations. Concentrate on improving teacher pedagogy to promote enhanced student learning. Build instructional leadership capacity. Seek external support as appropriate. Adopt new qualitative and quantitative approaches to self- evaluation aligned to CIF. Participate in school-to-school professional networks.

SYSTEM LEADERSHIP

Defining system leadership ‘A system leader is a head-teacher or senior teacher who works directly for the success and well- being of students in other schools as well as their own.’ Higham, Hopkins and Matthews ( 2009) System Leadership in Practice

System leaders share five striking characteristics, they: Measure their success in terms of improving student learning and strive to both raise the bar and narrow the gap(s). Are fundamentally committed to the improvement of teaching and learning. Develop their schools as personal and professional learning communities. Strive for equity and inclusion through acting on context and culture. Understand that in order to change the larger system you have to engage with it in a meaningful way.

Adapting system leadership for SEF Majority of system leaders drawn from existing head-teachers. Remainder would be drawn from other senior leaders in our system who meet the criteria for system leadership, including recently retired head-teachers, current and recently retired LA Officers and recently retired HMI. System leaders would be deployed in System Leadership Teams within each LA Consortia as the key operational cadre who take forward SEF in their regions.

Taking forward system leadership for SEF Identifying and recruiting system leaders using robust criteria. Development of roles and responsibilities. Training of system leaders. Possible development of a Staff College.

THE MODEL FOR SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT

The model for school improvement SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT THROUGH SEF A theory of action Component parts of the SI model Differentiated strategies System Leadership

A theory of action: Diana’s Line of Success A theory of action: Diana’s Line of Success Coming out of special measures ( ) Enriching teaching and learning environment Making school secure Improving teaching and learning in classrooms Leading by example Establishing a student behaviour policy and improving attendance Vision and values Developing resources Success of leadership in terms of effect upon broad pupil outcomes Ofsted Inspection 1998 (Special Measures) onward 2. Taking ownership: an inclusive agenda (2000– 2002) Vision and values: developing school’s mission Distributing leadership Persisting priority on teaching and learning: becoming a thinking school curriculum development Performance management and CPD Inclusivity: integrating students from different social and cultural backgrounds Focus on monitoring and evaluation 4. Everyone a leader (2005- present) Creative partnership and creativity Self evaluation Personalised learning 3. Developing creativity ( ) Restructuring leadership Involving community Assessment (personalised) Placing staff well-being at centre of school improvement Broadening horizons Ofsted Inspection 2002 (Very Good) Ofsted Inspection 2007 (Outstanding)

The component parts of the model High quality teaching and pedagogy that is focused on student learning and achievement. Distributed leadership that is focused on improving student outcomes. A curriculum that engages and motivates students Intelligent accountability that is focused on self evaluation and school improvement Exploiting rich data to assist student and school improvement. Reducing within and between school/LA variations. Aligning the work of the school to wider strategies designed to improve student wellbeing.

Differentiated strategies SEF cannot be a ‘one size fits all model’. It must have discrete strands that are responsive and aligned to where schools are in the improvement journey.

Differentiated strategies: one approach Type of School Highly effective Effective school but with internal variations Low performing school Schools in Estyn category SEF Strategy - Become curriculum and pedagogic innovators and thereby continue to strengthen their own performance - Support other schools through system leadership and Learning Communities - Focus on specific teaching and leadership issues and build capacity to address. - Through support of system leaders and involvement in Learning Communities utilise external support. - Rely on external support to identify issues and provide support. - Formal local authority support utilising capacity within System leadership teams and Learning Communities.

Professional Learning communities The building of learning capacity within, between and across schools and the system. A focus on: ✓ Supportive and distributed leadership. ✓ Collective enquiry. ✓ Student learning. ✓ Supportive conditions. ✓ Sharing effective practice. Based on an action enquiry model as piloted in

Final thoughts ‘ Successful systems have fewer but better teachers, get the right people to become teachers, develop effective leadership, have high standards, establish structures that empower and hold people accountable, embed professional knowledge and skills and continuously challenge inequity.’ ( Barber and Fullan,2009) ‘There are only three ways to improve student learning to scale. You can raise the level of the content that students are taught. You can increase the skill and knowledge that teachers bring to the teaching of that content. And you can increase the level of students’ active learning of the content. That’s it. Everything else is instrumental. That is, everything that is not in the instructional core can only affect student learning and performance by, in some way, influencing what goes on inside the core. Schools don’t improve through political and managerial incantation: they improve through the complex and demanding work of teaching and learning’.( Elmore, 2008)