Evidence based policy or policy on the hoof?

I am fascinated by Sir Michael Wilshaw's call for local school commissioners which took everyone by surprise as they were digesting their Christmas pudding. Was this simply a story for a quiet day which was short on bigger news or was there more to it?

If this is a proposal which is more than an off-the-cuff idea the possible interpretations become interesting.  Why would  a new chief inspector, even before taking up his post, come up with a proposal which was effectively an devastating critique  of government policy, based on the premise that the move  an autonomous system of academies without local accountability has massively increased the risk of school failure?  If thisis a sign of things to come we are certainly in for ‘interesting times’ 

An alternative  interpretation might be that the debate that has been started is a ‘kite being flown’ as an attempt to find a politically acceptable way to get the government out of a hole it has created by fragmenting the system?  That argument seems highly implausible bearing in mind that the proposal is predicated on a return to expensive field forces and external intervention and flies in the face of the whole thrust of coalition policy which is based on freedom and autonomy.

Another interpretation might be to view this as a bid to build up an Ofsted field force. That would seem premature but also very worrying in itself if Ofsted is being seen as  a hit squad which will go out and sack ‘incompetent’ heads and teachers. It raises all kinds of questions about the purpose of Ofsted and indeed the role of the Chief Inspector.

But the biggest question this raises for me is how education policy is developed. There is nothing wrong with a healthy public interest in education debated actively via the media. However there is a difference between the discussions any of us might have over dinner or a drink and making that official policy.  Over and over again  policies develop which are based on ideas arising from  the personal experience and views of individuals -whether they be employees of think tanks, officials or even ministers.  These get adopted and superimposed on whatever set of policies currently prevails adding further initiatives and turbulence for those in the field. This characteristic is not limited to the current government; we all remember it happening after the previous government published the Children's Plan which was to set out the whole range of policies and to which all kinds of others were added almost before the ink was dry.

For a number of years ASCL has been arguing for an alternative to this disruptive approach which actually militates against school improvement and adds immense difficulties to the role of school leaders whose job it is to implement government policy effectively. We believe that the one appointment the government should make is of a Chief Education Officer similar to the Chief Medical Officer. It should be a Crown appointment whose role as a leading expert with the highest levels of specialist knowledge and experience would be to evaluate proposed and existing government policies with complete independence. In such a context  a proposal of this kind be would substantiated by a robust, credible and above all independent evaluation of its merits before a Chief Inspector announced it on the front page of a national newspaper.

There has never been a better example of why this is necessary than the debate that has taken place publicly over recent days.

A high status profession does not deserve insults.

The appalling comments by the Prime Minister in the Telegraph on Monday (http://t.co/aj0al19v) are evidence of one of two things: either they show how out of touch Number 10 is with what is happening on a day to day basis in schools, or they demonstrate that the Prime Minister is willing to sacrifice hardworking teachers and schools leaders to score political points. The cynic in me thinks that it’s easier to justify stripping pensions when the message is that teachers and support staff don’t deserve them in the first place.

The Government does not have a monopoly over high aspirations for our education service. School leaders are at the forefront of driving up standards and strive tirelessly to build upon the improvements that have been achieved to date.  

Don’t get me wrong, we know there are examples of ‘coasting’ schools where the catchment is less challenging, where students have more advantages, yet they do not make the progress that they could or should. But these schools are hardly endemic, and to assume the problem stems from complacent and uncaring teachers is frankly an insult.

Of course there is more to do, but that work requires the support, not the denigration, of our political leaders. It also requires an understanding of the fact that not only inner city schools face challenges – some of the most entrenched deprivation is in rural and coastal areas.

The coalition government proudly states that it believes in a high status teaching profession. Assertions by the Prime Minister, of all people, that schools are content to ‘muddle through’ and accept mediocrity make a mockery of teachers’ commitment and demoralises a hardworking profession which is battling to continue the trajectory of improvement in the context of falling budgets, worsening pay and conditions and stinging cuts in front line services.

The Prime Minister and his government need to work with, not against the profession.

A parallel universe

That confirms it; I am definitely living in a parallel universe. As most ordinary schools went about their business of starting the new school term in the usual orderly way a newspaper headline shouted ‘schools failing on safety’. This was their interpretation of an Ofsted report which had stated that ‘almost all schools now take a careful and responsible approach to their safeguarding arrangements’ and that only 2% were inadequate in this respect. And let's not make the mistake of blaming it entirely on the media. Ofsted caused the problem in the first place by turning the dictionary definition of satisfactory on its head by stating that ‘safeguarding arrangements in 21% of schools were only satisfactory overall, indicating the need for considerable improvement’

At the same time Michael Gove's speech at the Durand Academy was widely reported. One paper gleefully stated: ‘At last teacher is back in charge! Tories pledge to end classroom chaos....’ The opportunity for rational discussion about the points he had made was drowned out by the noise.

All of this had come at the end of a week which had been dominated by ill-informed party political posturing about the relative merits or otherwise of the so-called ‘academic’ subjects as defined in the English Baccalaureate. Once again any reasoned discussion about the kind of curriculum young people in 21st century need was shouted down.

These and an almost constant barrage of similar examples highlight the real challenge our profession faces at the moment.

I have been warning ministers and their advisers for some considerable time about the messages they are repeatedly sending out about our education service which not only plays into tabloid headlines but most significantly sends out a deeply damaging message to young people that they are not being served by their schools. Messages such as these:

·         behaviour is extremely poor and needs to be sorted out by government,  army officers or male teachers.

·         truancy is rife

·         the curriculum is not fit for purpose

·         exams have been dumbed down

·         the quality of teachers being recruited into the profession is not good enough

·         teacher training is based on ‘outdated theory’ rather than best practice

·         almost every other country has a better education system than ours.

I wonder whether those who make such statements somehow think that young people do not hear these messages. Having taught in and led schools for more than 30 years I know exactly how acutely tuned the antennae of young people are. They know exactly what is being said and these kinds of messages make the work of teachers and school leaders unnecessarily difficult.

And critically these messages also prevent us from having the level of debate we really need in our quest to improve the education service which is the bread and butter of our professional territory. No school leader I have ever met believes that our education service is perfect. In fact they are one of the most self-critical groups of professionals I have ever come across whose confidence is constantly being undermined by these utterances. Talk of a high status profession sounds deeply hollow in the context of the barrage of denigration we face.

And the even greater danger is therefore that the real ‘dumbing down’ is of the professional debate that needs to take place.

During the last few weeks significant numbers of young people have had the opportunity to explain their perspective on these issues in the media in the aftermath of the riots. The message they have been giving us is that they need hope. They hear about the economic context, they know that jobs are few and far between , they know that University places are under great demand and that the new fee regime which they perceive as a deterrent is being introduced, they see the reductions in services that affect their lives including youth facilities, careers advice and EMA as schools and colleges try harder than ever to motivate them to aspire towards greater things. In addition many are being told that the curriculum that interests them is the wrong one and that the only ones that matter are those that are irrelevant to their specific needs and led them to being disengaged in the first place.

We ignore these messages at our peril. English society faces some unprecedented challenges which can only be addressed together.  Any school or college leader will tell you how important the establishment of a positive ethos is to the success of their institution. We need an ethos in our society which gives our young people the confidence to complete their education with hope, aspiration and self-belief. 

Without that our profession will have to get used to remaining in a parallel universe.

Social mobility - I rest my case!

Alan Milburn's well attended Tribal lecture was a strange affair. It started with a message which chimes loudly with school and college leaders for whom the improvement of social mobility is at the heart of their raison d’être. He tracked the changes from a period starting in the 50s where social hope underpinned a commitment by the state to move away from a culture of ‘birth not worth’ to a society decades later which is more ossified and reflects greater social resentment. He talked of the progress the last government made to raise the glass ceiling recognising that there is much to do and cited the fact that three out of four judges, half of civil servants and one in three parliamentarians were educated privately. He described the valuable work of the Social Mobility and Child Poverty commission which will rigorously and independently assess the impact of what any government is doing on the creation of a fairer society in which people from all backgrounds have equal chances of progression. So far so good until he started talking about schools.......

 For a while I was on board as he emphasised the importance of employability skills as a key and gave some strong messages to the coalition about the parlous state of careers guidance and the fact that we cannot afford not to invest in education. However, then came the proposed solutions:

Another regime of targets for schools, judging them on outcomes such as destinations of pupils.

National programmes to raise aspirations because “there aren't enough good schools”. The language of failing schools came to the fore.

And then, quite bizarrely, a proposal for parents to be ‘empowered’ to choose ‘good’ schools. Parents of children who attend ‘failing’ schools would be given a voucher to the value of one half times the per pupil funding which they could take to another school with their children.

As you can imagine a lively discussion ensued.

I continue to despair as schools are presented as the problem rather than the solution. Where are these leaders who do not want young people to succeed – who will only ‘shape up’ with yet more threats and accountability measures in a system which must be the most monitored in the world? We know the problems are so much more complex than that.

But most importantly we all know that proposals such as this would simply not work. Pupils with parents who know their way round the system would be channelled away from the schools in challenging areas to schools in leafy suburbs which would thrive on the additional funding. The remaining pupils in other schools would be condemned to education in a poorly funded environment undergoing a slow process of attrition. The gap would widen as they missed out on their only chances.

In the discussion an example was given of a school which had  apparently been ‘failing’  for many years. Why didn't the local authority close the school we asked? Because no politicians will close schools because it would lose votes.

Commitment to improving social mobility?  I rest my case.

Are we entering into a new era of cooperation between employers and educators?

Anyone  reading the media coverage of the latest CBI Education and Skills Survey would have felt a strong sense of déjà vu. The usual depressing story – school leavers lack the skills they need etc. etc. Interested in hearing the truth I went to the launch with some trepidation only to discover a classic ‘cup half empty’ story.

First of all my questions about what the definition of  a school leaver– a 16 year old with or without GCSEs, an 18 year old A Level leaver a university graduate all or some? – all remain unanswered. There is a real danger in generalisations of this kind which undermine the validity of any survey.  Nevertheless as I looked at the results it became abundantly clear that they actually confirmed a far more positive picture and a high level of consensus between employers and  school and college leaders. Here are some headlines:

68% of employers are satisfied with school and college leavers’ teamworking skills, 65% with their positive attitude to work, 64% with their basic numeracy skills, 59% with their basic literacy skills. Ironically one of the lowest  scores was 45% satisfaction with their self management skills. This includes punctuality – an irony which did not escape some of those present who were still waiting for the minister an hour after his scheduled slot. All of this demonstrates a great deal of good news, none of which was reported, yet we all recognise that we all need to work together to improve things further.

An interesting statistic was that 64% do not believe that the quality of careers advice is good enough  but a very encouraging 54% are willing to do more to support schools in delivering this. This is a great relief in the light of the continuing complete lack of progress in taking the promised All Age Advisory Service forward or even deciding what it will look like.

The DfE response was a highly predictable restatement of its commitment to the English Baccalaureate and increasing emphasis on GCSE English and Maths. This missed the point entirely as the speakers representing major employers highlighted the key issues:

Employability skills should be embedded in the national curriculum and certainly not ignored. Functional skills in literacy and numeracy should be taught and assessed – GCSE is not necessarily the answer. Problem solving skills are the least developed and need to be a priority. None of these should be taught separately – they should be integral to the teaching of all subjects. We need to continue to emphasise stem subjects. All of this sounded to me like a resounding endorsement of the kind of priorities ASCL has highlighted in making the case for a better baccalaureate

Most encouragingly employers said that they do not want to stand on the sidelines and complain. Some apt quotations from a report written in 1899 bemoaning the way young people are equipped for the world of commerce reminded the audience that this is not exactly a new problem. The need to redefine what we mean by employability skills has never been greater. ASCL is engaged in a constructive dialogue with CBI about these skills and I know from firsthand experience working with the Education Employer Taskforce that some sterling work is going on there too.

Although I was unable to wait for the minister I left feeling a lot less depressed than teachers and school leaders will have felt when reading the morning papers.

Protecting freedom or a Luddite reaction?

The Protection of Freedoms Bill now going through Parliament dedicates a chapter to biometric systems in schools and colleges. If it goes through unaltered, which is looking increasingly likely, it could cost the education system between £20 and £45 million a year. What’s worse, the changes are a knee-jerk reaction to unfounded protests from by children’s and civil rights groups, not legitimate concerns raised by parents.  

The definition of biometrics in the legislation means that the legislation will extend to all digital photographs used for identification purpose, as well as smart cards with student photos and CCTV. This means will be even more difficult for schools and colleges to use CCTV to help maintain discipline and order, in direct contrast to the government’s pledge to support schools in reducing bad behaviour.

The new legislation will require the written permission of both parents, plus any other person with parental responsibility for a child, in order to use biometric systems, including finger recognition, iris scanning and digital images. The only exceptions are if one of the parents cannot be found or lacks capacity (in a legal sense) to make the decision, or where it would not be in the child’s interest to allow the parent to know his/her whereabouts (as with an abusive parent). Consent can be withdrawn at any time.

We completely agree that parents should have a say in whether their children take part in biometric systems in schools and they should have the right to opt out of if they have concerns or are opposed in principle. However, if the bill goes through, the hoops that schools and colleges will need to go through to use these systems will be completely disproportional.

For some pupils this could involve three or even four adults, some of whom refuse to cooperate either with the school or another estranged parent. In almost all other aspects of school life, parents either chose to opt out or one parent signs on behalf of the family unit. Either of these options would ease the administrative and financial burden on schools and colleges considerably.

What is particularly worrying is that the Parliamentary committee scrutinising the bill has only called for oral evidence from children’s and civil liberties campaigners even though ASCL and others have submitted detailed written evidence pointing out that the vast majority of parents do not have an issue with the technology.

About 30 per cent of secondary schools use biometrics systems for access, libraries or catering. These systems are not susceptible to children losing smart cards or key fobs and their access rights cannot be stolen. They enable parents to ensure that children spend money on what parents have given it for and can make schools more safe and secure places.  Evidence shows that when parents have been made aware of how the system works and what kind of data it collects, 99.8 per cent have taken up the system. This is a Luddite reaction and a huge backward step.

ASCL’s full evidence to the bill committee is at www.ascl.org.uk/consultations

Blaming schools and colleges for the effects of tuition fees is a smoke screen

As the level of fees to be charged by England's top universities  has been announced and the government’s panic reaction has been the threat of yet more targets, there has been a suggestion from some quarters that schools and colleges will be to blame if the number of students applying to university from poorer backgrounds drops once tuition fees increase. Pointing the blame at schools is a smoke screen that masks the real issue -many young people will be put off by the thought of having to pay back tens of thousands of pounds once they start working. Parents who are neither the lowest nor high earners will understandably warn their sons and daughters against taking on significant debts. Those are the young people who won’t be eligible for grants or scholarships or free school meals, but will still find it a hardship to pay for living expenses, never mind paying back huge chunks of money when they graduate.

Schools and colleges have put a tremendous amount of effort into raising aspirations of students who have the ability but possibly not the confidence to aim for a university degree. When the A Level results were published last summer we saw an increase in the numbers of young people who have clearly chosen their subjects with the labour market in mind. Results continue to improve with students working harder than ever to gain top grades. This has been supported by a raft of initiatives to help young people stay in education and aspire to university – not just education maintenance allowance but programmes like Aim Higher – which have made a real difference to students’ aspirations. One by one these initiatives have lost their funding and schools have been left high and dry when trying to maintain this important provision. They are trying hard to do this but it is an uphill struggle in which not all will succeed.

The other element to consider is high quality careers advice and guidance. The Connexions service which used to provide this is being dismantled in many areas. The government is planning an all-age careers service, a concept which ASCL fully supports, but at the moment the detail of how this will operate or be funded is alarmingly absent. Once again the government has put the cart before the horse, dismantling one structure before it has thought through how it will pick up the pieces. Schools and colleges are completely in the dark about how this will operate in practice.

Schools and colleges will continue to do all they can to raise aspirations, but the bottom line is that they can’t do it in a vacuum. No matter how good their grades are and how well they are coached to pass an Oxbridge entrance exam, if they have to find an additional £40 or £50k for the privilege, many will say no.