Developing a school-led education

It has been refreshing to witness the recent awakening of policy-makers to the fact that education is part of the solution to poverty and disadvantage and not the silver bullet it has been promoted as by successive governments.

Policy-makers’ preoccupation that education alone could break the cycle of poverty both added pressure to the education system and provided a stick with which to beat it when government-set targets were not reached.

This overdue awakening will not have an immediate impact on schools, that will take time.
While education remains at the political mercy of the election cycle, the current government does have time, if it has the will, to initiate positive changes that could make a difference to pupil outcomes and the system. Schools are expected to deliver more and more with diminishing resources, so such changes could support them to make an even greater difference to pupil progress and to teacher workload.