Perspectives: Balancing act

How independent can you be in a highly accountable system? We asked two leaders for their personal views on this issue.

Dr Peter Kent, headteacher of Lawrence Sheriff School, a selective 11-18 boys school in Rugby, Warwickshire

The English education system has created a false dichotomy, within which any use of autonomy is immediately opposed by an accountability system that upholds conformity and opposes change. Inevitably the ‘big brother’ of accountability has come to be represented by Ofsted.

My personal experience of Ofsted inspectors has been very different. With the odd exception I have found them balanced, sensible and open to new ideas as long as they can be shown to boost the life chances of children.

Following a good inspection in 2005, my leadership team and I decided that the only way to get even better was to go for the ‘big bang’ approach of introducing a whole series of radical changes at the same time. Hence we decided that we would change our curriculum model, shifting to a two year Key Stage Three and a three year Key Stage Four. We wanted our pastoral system to support this more personalised curriculum structure, so moved to 28 vertical tutor groups, each one made up of students aged 11-18, with the intention that they supported one another in the manner of an extended family. Finally we changed the school day so that we could introduce enrichment periods, within which students could gain a set of new skills and experiences that the conventional curriculum model could not accommodate.

By the time Ofsted returned in 2007, these changes had been in place for a year. I did not find that the ‘big brother’ of accountability dismissed or attacked them out of hand. Instead, each was evaluated to see if they had worked and if they had actually benefitted students. Despite the many dire warnings that I had received, I found that the accountability system was more than willing to accommodate autonomy, as long as it was seen to be having a practical benefit.

Dr Susan Robinson, headteacher of Cherry Orchard Primary School and Children’s Centre, Birmingham

I welcome the expectation that as a school we should ensure high standards of care, attainment and progress for our children.

This is professional accountability and is stronger and more powerful than accountability to the government because it stems from a sense of professional pride and commitment to our community.

While embracing the principle of accountability there is nevertheless a contentious issue for me regarding the extent to which the government formally holds school leaders accountable for the performance of their schools through inspection and school assessments.

Do school leaders have any opportunity for autonomous action to ensure effective internal systems in a climate of control and micro management? The answer, I think, is yes providing they know what action to take and when to take it.

At Cherry Orchard we resist external forces determining our practice. We have found that a relentless focus on progress and standards does not have to mean ‘teaching to the test’.

Nor is it contradictory to a creative and personalised curriculum offering opportunities for children to gain skills and knowledge to make informed choices about their future.

We are aware that any autonomy for school leaders has to be ‘earned’ through achieving success within the accountability framework. Our practice has to translate into high standards of attainment and progress validated by Ofsted. And we need our own effective internal accountability arrangements to ensure this.

Robust tracking systems coupled with regular children’s progress meetings between year group staff and the senior leadership team, allows us to identify underachieving groups as well as to highlight what is successful practice.

More importantly, evaluating our practice helps us to rectify any quality issues we might find.

Our approach is values-led pragmatism, resisting or shaping externally imposed accountability to ensure we can provide what we judge to be the best education for our children.