Post Covid-19: Looking to the longterm
The ongoing situation and school closures as result of Covid-19 have a number of different implications for the education sector. We want to dig deeper into these issues, with help from the experts. This week, Fiona Spellman, CEO of SHINE Trust, looks at the long term issues that Covid-19 has exposed.
Covid-19 has shone a harsh spotlight on issues that have been ignored for too long. Our most disadvantaged children are being let down by a system that favours their better-off peers. We shouldn’t need a global pandemic to highlight this but perhaps it could be the trigger that brings about real change.
For years our education system has been dominated by short-term thinking which lets down our poorest children. Much of the focus is on school and teacher effectiveness in the classroom, with little recognition of the substantial impact of children’s experiences beyond the school gates. We end up trying to get more and more marginal gains from the classroom, and this places further pressure on teachers in the most disadvantaged communities, who already have the hardest job.
The truth is, there is often no shortage of interventions in these schools, nor people who care passionately about helping to close the gap. What we lack is a coordinated, evidence-based strategy for improving the life chances of the most disadvantaged children – an umbrella under which this myriad of interventions can become more than the sum of their parts.
SHINE and Schools North East are two charities with a common purpose – to shift outcomes for children in the most disadvantaged places and ensure that all children have the chances they deserve.
Over the next two years, SHINE is committed to investing up to half a million pounds in North East schools, helping them to trial new practice and tackle some of the systemic challenges the region faces.
The funding will focus on getting two crucial transition points right, from pre-school into the first year of primary, and from primary into secondary school – both of which are shown to involve significant challenges in the most disadvantaged places. Through the incredible power of EdNorth, these projects will be connected to a broader effort to improve outcomes across the region.
Much of what we are seeing from the Department for Education is a reaction to the immediate issues created by the school closures, with a focus on those students who are closest to sitting exams. We all care deeply about what happens to the current year’s exam cohorts, but the truth is, we need to place much greater emphasis on the students coming after them.
The latest announcement on tutoring is another example of a policy which is intended to help, but which currently lacks the kind of detail the profession desperately needs. For all the talk of using evidence-based approaches, COVID-19 is an unprecedented event and there is no rulebook for schools to follow. As well as additional resources, schools desperately need our trust.
The best school leaders in disadvantaged areas are not clamouring for intensive, academic programmes in the first week the schools reopen for their most vulnerable students. Instead, they are focusing on how they can reintegrate children in ways which support their long-term needs, socially, emotionally, and academically. Love is one of the most valuable things teachers can provide, and yet it’s the thing we often value the least. Just as nursing isn’t all about medicine, teaching isn’t all about curriculum.
There will be some students who need significant support to readjust to the routines and expectations of school when they reopen. The more pressure is heaped on schools to deliver rapid academic up programmes, the more likely that large numbers of students and teachers will struggle to cope. We need to ensure that schools are supported to meet the full range of students’ needs on entry back to school.
In recent years, many talented teachers and school leaders have been driven from the profession by a combination of high workloads and low morale, underpinned by an accountability system that rewards and punishes the wrong schools. Many more were teetering on the brink even before COVID-19 hit. If we do not resource and listen to our teachers now, we risk losing a generation of our best school leaders from the places that need them most.
Educational disadvantage did not begin with COVID-19 and it will not end when the headlines disappear. The North East has big challenges ahead, but it also has incredible possibilities. We have many talented teachers and schools already, and through Schools North East we have a unique community that binds them together. United we can build on these foundations and deliver a brighter future for our children.