Oct 9, 2022 | Leadership, Partnerships, Professional development, Updates
One could have felt more en-burdened than en-lightened coming away from the joint HMC/IAPS conference for school leaders this week, given the focus on many of the current challenges and even crises in education globally. But conversations with fellow educators and some inspiring talks from influential leaders gave me hope. All the speakers agreed upon the transformative power of education. But how best to harness that power? Set in the elegant city of Edinburgh, the conference took its theme as “Enlightened Education”. If the...
Jun 17, 2022 | Leadership, Partnerships, Primary, Professional development, Secondary
[This blog first appeared in May 2022 on the FED website, following a FEDSpace Round Table event at which I was a panellist.] As we move into the second year of our work at the Foundation for Education Development (FED) and following the launch of the FED National Education Consultation Report, we hosted a roundtable discussion focussed on ‘Partnership working : Art or science? How to develop and manage long term, effective partnerships for education’. We asked Christina Astin, an education consultant working with schools and businesses...
Apr 1, 2022 | Partnerships, Primary, Professional development, Secondary, Updates
In education we often talk about “weighing the pig” as a metaphor for assessing student progress. “Does weighing the pig make it any fatter?”, we ask. Academic monitoring in schools has become the engine of accountability and SLTs up and down the land are forever discussing whether to spend more time learning or testing, in other words, feeding or weighing said pig. What about weighing the partnerships pig? How do we go about measuring the effectiveness of educational partnerships? Do they make...
Jul 23, 2021 | Communication, Leadership, Partnerships, Primary, Professional development, Secondary, Updates
I’ve just read Nancy Kline’s book “Time to Think” – over 20 years too late. As a new middle leader in the 90s I could have done with her sage advice. However, I think that many of us in education naturally use these summer weeks as ‘time to think’ (once we’ve slept for a few days and reacquainted ourselves with our families!). It’s part of the ebb and flow of the school year. For school leaders it’s a time to zoom out and think strategically. And that might include reflecting on partnerships with other schools: how do these fit...
