1. Professor David Hopkins HSBC iNet Chair of International Leadership
“School Effectiveness and School Improvement – the UK experience” Presentation to the World Bank South East Asia Conference on Education Quality New Delhi, India, Thursday 25th October 2007
Professor David Hopkins HSBC iNet Chair of International Leadership

2. Overview Preamble – effectiveness, improvement and moral purpose
The legacy of informed prescription
Towards informed professionalism
Coherent system design

3. PROFESSIONAL JUDGEMENT
KNOWLEDGE POOR
1970s Uninformed professional judgement
1980s Uninformed prescription
NATIONAL PRESCRIPTION
PROFESSIONAL JUDGEMENT
2000s Informed professional judgement
1990s Informed prescription
KNOWLEDGE RICH

4. “School Effectiveness and School Improvement – The UK Experience”
The Legacy of Informed Prescription

5. The 1988 Education Reform Act
State control
National curriculum
Assessment at 7,11,14 and 16
Teacher appraisal – teacher training
Formulae for school funding
School inspections every 4 years
Transfer to most LA powers to central government or governing bodies

6. Brief History of Standards in Primary Schools
11 plus dominated
Professional control
Standards and
"Formal"
"Informal"
accountability
NLNS
2004
1950
1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2010 6

7. This map shows in red those LEAs where three quarters of their children were achieving the expected level in English in This provided the clearest possible justification for the introduction of the National Literacy Strategy, and the position in numeracy was very similar. 7

8. This map showed the transformation that we had achieved by 2002
This map showed the transformation that we had achieved by And this year we have gone even further….. 8

9. 4
This map showed the transformation that has now been achieved 9

10. Distribution of Reading Achievement in 9-10 year olds in 2001
575
550
525
500
475
450
425
400
375
350
325
300
The recent international PIRLS report on reading standards confirmed that we are right to describe our performance as world class.
The study showed:
Ten year olds in England are the third most able readers in the world, behind Sweden and the Netherlands
England is the most successful English-speaking country.
There has been a marked increase in our international performance since the mid-1990s. An NFER report in 1996 said that our performance would have put us close to the international average in 1991
The study also exploded a number of common myths
Teachers say that the literacy strategy has introduced pupils to a wider range of texts
Schools in England use more real books and more longer books than those in other countries.
The high performance of our children is related to the broad reading curriculum that they follow
Italy
Israel
Sweden
England
Bulgaria
Latvia
France
Greece
Cyprus
Turkey
Kuwait
Belize
Lithuania
Hungary
Germany
Scotland
Iceland
Norway
Singapore
Romania
Slovenia
Colombia
Argentina
Morocco
Netherlands
United States
New Zealand
Czech Republic
Hong Kong SAR
Slovak Republic
Moldova, Rep of
Russian Federation
International Avg.
Macedonia, Rep of
Iran, Islamic Rep of
Canada (Ontario,Quebec)
Source: PIRLS 2001 International Report: IEA’s Study of Reading Literacy Achievement in Primary Schools 10

11. New Labour Policy Framework
Intervention in inverse proportion to success
Ambitious Standards
High Challenge
High Support
Devolved
responsibility
Accountability
Access to best practice and quality professional development
Good data and clear targets 11

12. Percentage of pupils achieving level 4 or above in Key Stage 2 tests 1998-2003
English
Maths 80 75 70
Percentage 65 60 55 50
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
Test changes in 2003
Major changes to writing test/markscheme
Significant changes to maths papers

13. The Key Question - how do we get there?
Most agree that:
When standards are too low and too varied
some form of direct state intervention is necessary
the impact of this top-down approach is usually to raise standards.
But when:
progress plateaus - while a bit more might be squeezed out in some schools , and perhaps a lot in underperforming schools, one must question whether this is still the recipe for sustained reform
there is a growing recognition that to ensure that every student reaches their potential, schools need to lead the next phase of reform.
The 64k dollar question is how do we get there? 13

14. “School Effectiveness and School Improvement – The UK Experience”
Towards Informed Professionalism

15. Towards system wide sustainable reform
Prescription
Building Capacity
Professionalism
National Prescription
Every School a Great School
The real challenge we all face is to move the system from National Prescription  Schools Leading Reform.
As the Minister says, to move from a situation where Government delivers policy  to one that builds capacity.
This is not a chronological shift, it takes time and it is always a blend, but we want to shift the balance.
The aim is to go from a)  through b)  c). When at c) = High Excellence High Equity
Schools Leading Reform
System Leadership 15

16. System Leadership: A Proposition
‘System leaders’ care about and work for the success of other schools as well as their own. They measure their success in terms of improving student learning and increasing achievement, and strive to both raise the bar and narrow the gap(s). Crucially they are willing to shoulder system leadership roles in the belief that in order to change the larger system you have to engage with it in a meaningful way.’

17. Lead and Improve a School in Challenging Circumstances
Act as a Community Leader
Work as a
Change Agent
Managing Teaching and Learning
Developing Organisations
Personal Development
Partner another School Facing Difficulties and Improve it
Moral Purpose
Lead a Successful Educational Improvement Partnership
Strategic Acumen
Developing People
Lead and Improve a School in Challenging Circumstances

18. Leadership for Learning
Setting direction 
Total commitment to enable every learner to reach their potential 
Ability to translate vision into whole school programmes
Managing Teaching and Learning
Ensure every child is inspired and challenged through personalized learning
Develop a high degree of clarity about and consistency of teaching quality
Developing people 
Enable students to become more active learners
Develop schools as professional learning communities
Developing the organization 
Create an evidence-based school
Extend an organization’s vision of learning to involve networks

19. System Leadership Roles
A range of emerging roles, including heads who:
develop and lead a successful educational improvement partnership across local communities to support welfare and potential
choose to lead and improve a school in extremely challenging circumstances
partner another school facing difficulties and improve it. This category includes Executive Heads and leaders of more informal improvement arrangements
act as curriculum and pedagogic innovators who develop and then transfer best practice across the system
Work as change agents or experts leaders as National Leader of Education, School Improvement Partner, Consultant Leader. 19

20. KEY STAGE CURRICULUM STRATEGIES INTELLIGENT ACCOUNTABILITY FRAMEWORK
NEW RELATIONSHIP WITH SCHOOLS
SCHOOL SPECIALISM & COLLABORATION
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING
TEACHING
CURRICULUM
STAFF DEVELOPMENT
INVOLVEMENT
LEADERSHIP
COLLABORATIVE PLANNING
POWERFUL LEARNING EXPERIENCES

21. “School Effectiveness and School Improvement – The UK Experience”
Coherent System Design

22. Coherent System Design
Hardware
Infrastructure
Operating system
Reform model
Software
Teaching and learning S T A N D R U N I V E R S A L H G
Recurrent funding
Physical capital
Human capital
Knowledge creation and management
Qualifications
framework
Curriculum
Personalised Learning and
Professionalised Teaching
Intelligent accountability,
Governance and Segmentation
Innovation, Networking
and System Leadership
Leadership and School ethos
Teaching quality
High quality personalised learning for every student

23. Complementary Policy Framework for System Reform
Ambitious
Standards
Devolved
responsibility
Good data and
clear targets
Access to best
practice and quality
professional
development
Accountability
Intervention
in inverse
proportion
to success
High
Challenge
Support
Governance and
Segmentation
Innovation and Networking
System Leadership
Professionalised Teaching
Intelligent Accountability
Every School a Great School
Personalised Learning

24. Every School a Great School Framework
Governance and
Segmentation
Innovation and Networking
System Leadership
Professionalised Teaching
Intelligent Accountability
Every School a Great School
Personalised Learning

25. ‘Joined up learning and teaching’
(i) Personalising Learning
‘Joined up learning and teaching’
Metacognition
Curriculum choice & entitlement
Assessment for learning
Co-production
‘My Tutor’
Interactive web-based learning resource enabling students to tailor support and challenge to their needs and interests. 25

26. (ii) Professionalising Teaching ‘Teachers as researchers,
schools as learning communities’
‘The Edu-Lancet’
A peer-reviewed
journal published for practitioners by practitioners & regularly read by the profession
to keep abreast of R&D.
Enhanced repertoire of learning & teaching strategies
Evidence based practice with time for collective inquiry
Collegial & coaching relationships
Tackle within school variation 26

27. ‘Balancing internal and external accountability and assessment’
(iii) Building Intelligent Accountability
‘Balancing internal and external accountability and assessment’
‘Chartered
examiners’
Experienced teachers gain certification to oversee rigorous internal assessment as a basis for externally awarded qualifications.
Moderated teacher assessment and AfL at all levels
‘Bottom-up’ targets for every child and use of pupil performance data
Value added data to help identify strengths / weaknesses
Rigorous self-evaluation linked to improvement strategies and school profile to demonstrate success 27

28. (iv) Networking and Collaboration
‘Disciplined innovation, collaboration and building social capital’
Best practice captured and highly specified
Capacity built to transfer and sustain innovation across system
Keeping the focus on the core purposes of schooling by sustaining a discourse on teaching and learning
Inclusion and Extended Schooling
‘Leading Edge Practice Partnerships’
Schools develop exemplary curriculum and pedagogic practices and share with others

29. ‘Autonomous Federations’
(v) Governance and Segmentation
‘System transformation is both complicated and facilitated by the high degree of segmentation within the secondary school system’.
Greater responsibility taken for neighbouring schools
All ‘failing schools’ in Federations
Significantly enhanced funding for students most at risk
Rationalisation of national and local agency functions
‘Autonomous Federations’
Groups of schools opt out of LA control but accept responsibility for all students in their area 29

30. (vi) System Leadership
‘System leaders care about and work for the success of other schools as well as their own’
Measure their success in terms of improving student learning
Are fundamentally committed to the improvement of teaching and learning
Develop professional learning communities
Strive for equity and inclusion
‘System leaders’
… understand that in order to change the larger system you have to engage with it in a meaningful way 30

31. Segmentation of the Secondary School System
100 90 80
N = 3313 70
Low Achieving
Below 30% 5+A-C
N = 483 60
Underperforming
5+A*-C >=30%, lower quartile value added
Actual 5+A*-C % 2003 50
N = 539
5+A*-C >=30%, 25-75th percentile value added 40
Progressing
N = 1495 30
High Performing
5+A*-C >=30%, upper quartile value added 20
N = 696 10
Leading the System
N = 100 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90
100
Estimated 5+A*-C % from pupil KS3 data

32. Key strategies – responsive to context and need System Leadership Role
Networking and Segmentation: Highly Differentiated Improvement Strategies
Type of School
Leading schools
Succeeding schools with internal variation
Underperforming schools
Failing schools
Key strategies – responsive to context and need
- Become curriculum and pedagogic innovators
Support lower-performing schools
- Regular local networking
- Subject specialist support to particular departments
Linked school support
- Consistency interventions
- Formal support in a Federation structure
- New provider
System Leadership Role
Leading Edge
- Consultant Leader
- Education Improvement Partnerships
partnerships
- Raising Achievement Transforming Learning
- School Improvement Partners
- National Leader of Education and National Support Schools
- School Sponsored Academy 32

33. Paulo Freire once said…
“No one educates anyone else
Nor do we educate ourselves
We educate one another in communion
In the context of living in this world”

34. Professor David Hopkins HSBC Chair in International Leadership
David Hopkins is the inaugural HSBC Chair in International Leadership, where he supports the work of iNet, the International arm of the Specialist Schools Trust and the Leadership Centre at the Institute of Education, University of London. He is also a Professorial Fellow at the Faculty of Education, University of Melbourne. Between 2002 and 2005 he served three Secretary of States as the Chief Adviser on School Standards at the Department for Education and Skills. Previously, he was Chair of the Leicester City Partnership Board and Dean of the Faculty of Education at the University of Nottingham. Before that again he was a Tutor at the University of Cambridge Institute of Education, a Secondary School teacher and Outward Bound Instructor. David is also an International Mountain Guide who still climbs regularly in the Alps and Himalayas. Before becoming a civil servant he outlined his views on teaching quality, school improvement and large scale reform in Hopkins D. (2001) School Improvement for Real, London: Routledge / Falmer. His new book Every School a Great School has just been published by The Open University Press.
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