Case Studies

Ziauddin Yousafzai will tell his life story, illustrating how, as a father, he transformed patriarchal norms, misogyny, and gender discrimination into beautiful family values of equality, respect, love, and freedom. As a teacher, Ziauddin utilized his educational platform for positive social change by involving parents and students in reshaping the traditional and passive system of pedagogy into a robust and creative approach.

If we are thinking about educating Westminster, maybe this is a good time to look backwards as well as forwards. If successful systems are those that adapt, rather than those that adopt, it might be time to take the ideological blinkers off and see what the strengths in our system are and look at how we build on these. We are too ready to look at system change and reform, before we think about the less glamorous task of fixing the broken bits and highlighting the many successes of schools and teachers

The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) measures 15-year-olds’ abilities in reading, mathematics, and science, evaluating their skills in applying this knowledge to real-life challenges. With participation from over 80 countries and economies, PISA provides invaluable data for global benchmarking and offers policymakers evidence, insights, and opportunities for international peer learning.

Although PISA commonly focuses on national-level cross-country comparisons, it also provides data for regions within countries. This regional data reveals that student performance can vary within countries, indicating that national averages alone can offer only a partial view of a country’s educational attainment.

The presentation will delve into these regional differences, focusing on the teaching and learning environments as well as the socio-economic and cultural backgrounds of students. By examining these elements at regional level, we can better understand how different regions compare within a country and identify the factors that need addressing to reduce educational inequalities.

Dan will explore how the North East’s dramatic history helped to make us England’s most distinctive region, and how learning from the achievements of the past might help us all to build a better future.

With ever increasing numbers of learners being identified with SEND and with growing complexity of need, it’s more important than ever that education policy supports leaders to practice fair and effective leadership.

Schools are working hard and have significant success over the last five years to improve the experiences of young people with SEND. Brave leadership has strengthened inclusion despite the disincentives of accountability and cost. How can we build on school knowledge and strengths ensuring best practice is shared, not constantly reinvented across the country.

This presentation will explore the possibilities presented by a new government to influence change for our most vulnerable learners. This is a timely opportunity to advocate for a systemic approach to the education policy making process that plans explicitly and deliberately for SEND provision as the first thought rather than as an afterthought. The new government recognise the ‘SEND system is broken’ so the recommendations we make for improvement have to reduce incidence of lost learning through building on the knowledge and expertise in the system.

John Roberts, Deputy News Editor, Tes will chair a panel to discuss the theme of our event.

Despite what those with the most power might think, they can’t know everything, and it’s our job as a community to educate decision makers on exactly what it is that the North East needs, so they can finally align their policies with our priorities.

Confirmed Panellists:
Colin Lofthouse, CEO, SMART Academy Trust
Jo Heaton OBE, CEO, Northern Lights Learning Trust
Margaret Mulholland, SEND & Inclusions Policy Specialist, Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL)

This session will consider the current and future inspection reforms signalled by Ofsted and government, asking:

What is the underlying theory of change and why does this matter?

How radical are the changes?

How might the September 2024 changes impact on school inspection this year?

What are the risks and opportunities in reforms still to come, including report cards, annual safeguarding checks and trust inspection?

Gayle Munro and Samantha Spencer will present some of the findings from education-related research and evaluation studies at the National Centre for Social Research (NatCen). NatCen carry out a number of schools-based trials for the Education Endowment Foundation. The presentation will draw on some of the findings from recent trials in early language and communication, maths and science.

The NatCen team also conduct, on behalf of the Department for Education, SEND Futures – a national study which follows young people in England with all kinds of special educational needs and disabilities. Over two years (2022 and 2023), the study collected data from or about more than 3000 young people with SEND – when they were in Year 8 and again when they were in Year 9.

The presentation will introduce delegates to the study and share some of the findings. We heard about a wide range of things, including how the young people were getting on at home and at school, how they got on with their peers, and what their expectations were for the future. We also heard about the support they received at school, and what they thought about this.