Schools North East Logo

News

Proud year for Schools North East supporting the fourth emergency service

End of term typically comes with celebrations, fun, special assemblies, sports day and of course, reflections. However, you certainly don’t need us to tell you that this year has been anything other than typical! More than any other year, the current circumstances offer a great opportunity for reflection, both on the long term issues that Covid-19 has exposed and the incredible work our schools have achieved in the last four months.

Proud to be part of the NE Schools community

More than anything else we are incredibly grateful and proud of the hard work of our school staff who have stepped up under unbelievably difficult circumstances to support not just their students but entire school, and even local, communities. Our schools have been working together, and with local charities and businesses to do what they can to support our children with basic necessities, as well as trying to teach remotely. You have kept our vulnerable students safe, supported families in need, and allowed our critical workers to do their jobs to keep the country safe.

Never before has there been a summer break which is so needed or so well deserved!

As ever, we have worked to support our schools in whatever way we can. Watch our short video on what we’ve achieved this year:

Our network

With the challenges we have all had to face this year, the Schools North East network has become stronger than ever. We’ve engaged with over 6,000 members of school staff from 1,039 schools across the North East and beyond. For our Partner Schools, this year saw us break the 500 mark and we now have 555 Partner Schools – nearly half of all schools in the North East, not to mention 42 Partner Multi Academy Trusts. Following on from our first Non-North East Partner Schools last year, we now have 16 out-of-region Partner Schools and have had engagement from nearly 200 out-of-region schools.

We want to give our sincere thanks to all of our Partner Schools who believe we are stronger working together for the benefit of all of the region’s young people. No other region has such a network of schools collaborating to help each other and change the education sector for the better. Without your contributions to our events programme, lobbying, media campaigns and more, Schools North East would not exist and would not have the impact that it does now.  

As well as growing our North East network, we have finished the year on some exciting news. We have been commissioned by the DfE to set up a national network for School Business Professionals in Special Schools and Alternative Provision. We announced the National Network of Special Schools for School Business professionals, or NNoSS, just last week and already have representatives from over 50 LA areas throughout England signed up. You can find out more at www.nnoss.co.uk

Influencing and making your voice heard

The beginning of the academic year saw a very strong focus on representing the concerns of school leaders and influencing those who develop and implement education policy and practice, with the development and publication of our Manifesto for North East Education, calling on all parties to ensure that education policy properly understands and supports North East schools. This was built on through the year at various events including the start of our Policy Roundtable events in February to dig deeper into these issues. We also introduced our Bitesize Briefings for our Partner Schools, one page summaries of major policy reports which help to put them in context of the North East and the specific challenges the region faces. 

Our events also attracted senior figures within government and the educational establishment, providing our schools with a platform to influence the influencers.  In October we hosted Lord Agnew, previous Minister for the Schools System, and in January Education Secretary Gavin Williamson came up to the North East to speak directly to and hear from our school leaders. 

Since March this work has become all the more important as schools became buried under a mountain of government guidance, which has been at best tough to navigate and at worst contradictory and impossible to implement. To support you at this time we set up regular CEO and SEND/AP Roundtables to hear your concerns. We’ve also hosted an SBM Coffee break to hear what you’ve been doing in your schools and share your issues and concerns in an informal space. 

We’ve responded to calls from school leaders on important issues, such as the concern around next year’s exams which came from Head Teachers in Durham, leading us to get in touch with a range of senior figures on the topic and eventually hold a Roundtable with directors from Ofqual to hear directly from our school leaders. 

The issues that Covid-19 has exposed around many aspects of the education sector – from access to technology for disadvantaged students to the faults of our high stakes accountability systems – have shown the points we raise in the Manifesto to be even more important than ever before. We will be continuing this work in the new academic year to highlight the specific issues faced in the North East to key politicians and policy makers, helping to make the voices of North East schools heard at the highest level.  

Communicating and connecting

The beginning of the year saw a gentle roll-out of our online community ConnectEd, to help North East school staff, leaders in particular, connect, engage with each other and share ideas and resources. However, with lockdown and partial school closures, connecting to colleagues has become more important than ever.  The online community has boomed with almost 3000 now signed up, over 30 groups including role specific areas for SBMs and Governors, and subject hubs for teaching staff. 

We’ve also been keeping you up to date with everything you need to know, sending over 130 coronavirus updates to CEOs, Head Teachers, SBMs and Governors, with news, government guidance, resources and support. We’ve dug through the mountain of government guidance, helping you to see relevant information as soon as possible. 

Events – physical and digital

We started the year with a packed schedule which has become our ‘normal’ for the last few years: 

  • A sold out Summit of 525 HTs/CEOs from across the region;
  • Over 450 attending our annual Ofsted Update;
  • Sold out events covering developments in curriculum and managing challenging behaviour, and 
  • Gavin Williamson using our Academies Conference in January as the platform to deliver his first speech as confirmed Secretary of State following election

We had an equally busy schedule for the summer term, but of course lockdown meant that four of our major conferences, not to mention our standalone single issue events, could not go ahead physically.

Fortunately, our amazing events team (both of them – Sam and Rose!) responded immediately, converting the entirety of our remaining events programme to a virtual one, all alongside homeschooling! This has enabled us to support staggering numbers of school staff from across the region, but also, Yorkshire, Cumbria, the South West, London, the Midlands, and beyond. 

Since March we’ve been able to: 

  • Hold 3 major annual conferences online to support over 3,000 delegates
    • Governance Conference
    • Healthy MindED 
    •  CelebrateEd 
  • Hold free legal support webinars to support you with the ever changing situation;
  • Host a CPD day for School Business Managers; and
  • Host the launch of the Money and Me resources from Bank of England, TES and Beano

Our new flexibility to be online has made our events more accessible to school staff. In total in 19/20 we’ve held 34 events, with a total of  7342 delegates throughout the year, reaching over 1,000 schools in the region. 

Supporting recruitment and retention

Our not-for-profit portal Jobs in Schools North East continues to grow with more schools signing up. This year has also seen an increasing number of MATs use Jobs in School to recruit across their whole trust. Despite the halt on recruitment due to Covid-19, we have still seen a total of  800 vacancies advertised this year. We have also supported our schools through the challenges to recruitment in this period with dedicated webinars on the topic. 

Next year will see Schools North East roll out plans to ‘sell’ the NE as a destination for trainee and existing teachers.  

Ednorth – driving a culture of change 

We are seeking to drive an educational culture change through our Ednorth programme. Launched this year we are being supported by Advocates across the region as well as a growing list of Ambassadors. Our partnership with SHINE is bringing over £500,000 worth of funding to the region and so far we’ve worked with teachers to devise over 40 projects. Of course Covid-19 has put a halt on things while many schools formed an emergency response, meaning the next round of funding has been extended to October. If you are interested in finding out more visit www.ednorth.uk/funding

As well as developing research projects, we have launched our first TeachMeets. At the first two physical events we hosted over 70 teachers at Macmillan Academy in Middlesbrough and Royal Grammar School in Newcastle. Since the lockdown began in March we have moved the TeachMeets to an online format, hosting three more events. Over 500 frontline teachers have attended the TeachMeets in total getting off to a great start. The introduction of a dedicated Ednorth group on ConnectEd has also allowed us to bring more teachers together than ever before to collaborate, network and share resources, currently we have over 1,100 members and growing.

Looking ahead

It’s been a busy year for everyone, and the challenge is far from over with plenty to be working on as we return in September. We will be back with events earlier than normal as we bring you a ‘Back to School’ Programme in August to support your plans to reopen fully. 

As we have mentioned previously, Covid-19 and the effects of lockdown and partial school closures have exposed many problems which are long term issues, from the serious digital divide suffered by disadvantaged students, to the learning loss suffered every year, and flaws in our high stakes accountability systems. These are issues that we will continue to address in the new academic year through our Manifesto and influencing work. 

We are incredibly grateful to all our school staff for their not only their hard work, but their determination to support the region’s children. We could not be more proud to serve a profession which had truly stepped up to the plate during such a challenging time, and will continue to do so in the future. You have truly been our ‘fourth emergency service’. 

For now it’s time to take a break and enjoy the summer, because this year, more so than ever, you certainly deserve it!

Similar News

31
Jan

Steve Stringer's remarkable milestone: 40 years of dedicated service

Steve Stringer is employed as a Cluster Manager (multi-site manager) within the Smart Multi-Academy…

Read story
24
Jan

Empowering Women Across Generations: Newcastle High School for Girls Partners with Smart Works as Whole-School Charity for 2025

Big news for Newcastle High School for Girls (NHSG)! They recently announced Smart Works…

Read story
10
Jan

A Tribute to Carolyn: A Legacy of Impact and Inspiration at Ascent Academies Trust

After a distinguished career spanning over 35 years, Carolyn is retiring from her role…

Read story