Trusts and tribulations: 4 takeaways from the Schools White Paper

“The Department for Education has revealed details of their plans to improve outcomes for disadvantaged young people in the newly published Schools White Paper . Our Head of Research and Policy, Billy Huband-Thompson, unpacks the detail from the document. It’s been just over a week since the publication of the Schools White Paper. In this blog, I’m focusing on a few lesser-discussed tensions and challenges that the government will need to navigate going forward. 1. Reclaiming and reframing ‘standards’ ‘Standards’ was the watchword of the previous government. In Reforming Lessons, former Schools Minister Nick Gibb (along with co-author Robert Peal) writes of his efforts to champion phonics, put knowledge at the heart of the curriculum, increase school autonomy and transform school accountability. He recalls painstakingly reviewing government papers, adjusting the language to ensure they reflected this vision. In many ways, this approach paid dividends and the Conservatives oversaw England’s rise in the PISA and PIRLS rankings. The wider educational legacy may be greatly contested but on school standards, there is a lot to be positive about. This presents a challenge to the current government – how do you acknowledge and protect standards while reforming parts of the system that are not working? Weary of critique around the ‘soft bigotry of low expectations’, the term ‘high standards’ appears 23 times across the 100-odd pages. Moreover, the target to halve the disadvantage gap is framed around an ambition to raise disadvantaged pupils’ Attainment 8 scores by around 10 percentage points, implying over 30,000 more disadvantaged children achieve a grade 4 or above in GCSE English and maths each year. The White Paper also looks to address what may have been lost in the previous government’s focus on standards. As Jon Hutchinson has argued, the ‘trads’ have won on progress and grades. However, some are quietly questioning what may have been lost along the way, as they see their own kids “disillusioned and disengaged with school as a result of the sorts of policies they argued for”. In this context, the government has brought questions about school absence and belonging into the conversation, along with greater emphasis on inclusion in Ofsted inspections. Ultimately, the White Paper attempts to find a middle ground, framing standards and inclusion as “two sides of the same coin”. Here, there are challenges and trade-offs. The Conservative’s focus on academic ‘standards’ may have come at the expense of other important things. However, diluting the term too much could reduce its currency, undermining the high academic expectations that characterised the previous government’s reforms. 2. In trusts we trust? While the academies movement really started with New Labour (inspired by Kenneth Baker’s City Technical Colleges in the late 1980s), the ‘trust’ movement is very much associated with the previous Conservative government. The White Paper promises to have “all schools being part of school trusts”, including trusts established by local authorities and Area Partnerships, along with updated commissioning guidance. This is another interesting build on previous government policy, particularly given Labour were previously said to be “agnostic” on school structures . The White Paper argues that the “best school trusts use their scale, governance and high-quality leadership to innovate and drive excellence in standards and inclusion”. However, it’s unclear if trust growth will receive any financial backing . Moreover, while the White Paper makes repeated reference to the self-improving school system and the importance of innovation, the Schools Bill may limit the freedoms that have arguably driven much of this change. Whatever the direction of travel, greater clarity of vision, and the mechanisms for achieving it, would be helpful for the sector. 3. Partnerships and schools’ community role I’ve been thinking a lot about schools’ relationship with other schools, wider services and organisations – how can we harness schools’ community role while protecting teacher professionalism? There are plenty of examples of schools of different stripes working together to tackle local challenges, including Area-Based Education Partnerships (ABEPs). These often less formalised arrangements may also involve local authorities, services, charities, and other partners. The question here is what role, if any, government should play in supporting these partnerships. The White Paper sets out to establish “a new model of local partnership and shared accountability for children’s outcomes across local communities”. In addition, the government will also include ‘community collaboration’ in Trust Standards, ask trusts for annual public benefit reporting, and eventually account for this community role in trust inspections. While it is good to see the recognition of schools’ community role, the government’s approach seems to go against the bottom-up and responsive spirit of ABEPs, which often emerge organically through school leaders and others identifying and responding to local need. Moreover, there is a danger that bolting community and partnerships onto the accountability system may encourage partnership for partnership’s sake, rather than to a particular end. The government should focus on creating the capacity in the system that allows local partnerships to emerge and flourish, while ensuring reporting requirements are not overly prescriptive. 4. Alignment with wider public service reform Many of the arguments underpinning the White Paper borrow from the government’s approach to wider public service reform, including ‘test, learn and grow’. In particular, the White Paper emphasises preventative spend – investing early to improve outcomes and avoid greater costs later down the line. There’s an Early Years Fund, Best Start Family Hubs with dedicated SEND practitioners, and a Families First Partnership programme that aims to keep families together. Securing strong early outcomes is crucial for young people’s outcomes and public finances, and this longer-term view should be commended. The challenge is we will not see fully the fruits of this investment for a number of years. The Schools White Paper sees the government seek balance and compromise across a series of fraught debates. However, to govern is to choose and greater clarity of vision is needed around issues of autonomy, structure and accountability to ensure reforms are coherent and that the sector can turn to the tricky task of implementation. The post Trusts and tribulations: 4 takeaways from the Schools White Paper appeared first on The Sutton Trust .

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