‘’e-maginative learning’’

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Transformational Leadership in Schoolsthe
journey from good to great

• e-maginative learning
• 6th July 2005

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Covering

• The leadership challenge
• The moral imperative
• Ninestiles
• Federations
• Management and Leadership
• Factors affecting school improvement

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SIGMOID CURVE !
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Explanation and Key The solid red line shows that
better-off children who start with relatively
high levels of cognitive ability at the age of 2
also rank well at age 10. The dotted red line
shows that poorer children who start with the
same high levels of cognitive ability rank much
more poorly by age 10. The solid blue line shows
that better-off children who start with
relatively low levels of cognitive ability at the
age of 2 rank well by agel 0 -they overtake
poorer children who started off with much better
levels of development. The dotted blue line shows
that poorer children who start with relatively
low levels of cognitive ability still rank poorly
by age 10.
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Leadership that seeks to maximise motivation
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Ninestiles 1988 Brushstroke 1

• 5 A C 6
• 5 A G 44
• 1 A G 68
• So 32 with no passes, Kings School with 33 no
  passes got the negative headline and was closed
  in 1989.

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Ninestiles 1988 Brushstroke 2

• Roughly 7 forms of entry in each year
• Rigid streaming with little movement
• Bottom 3 streams following separate curriculum
  and not entered for GCSEs
• 90 of C passes confined to top stream.

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Ninestiles 1988 Brushstroke 3

• Happy and good natured staff with no sense of
  failure acceptance that not much is possible
  with pupils from area.
• Good and generous response to charity appeals.
• Middle managers role limited to stock control
  and allocation of teaching groups
• Focus on process not outcomes

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Ninestiles 1988 Brushstroke 4

• Teachers working largely on their own
• Little if any discussion about teaching and
  learning.
• Known as tough school in the area and
  undersubscribed with appeals against placement.
• Banda machine overworked!

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Ninestiles 1988 Brushstroke 5

• Very poor social relationships amongst pupils.
• Fighting, swearing, racist name calling very
  common.
• Pupils locked out at lunchtimes with special
  needs pupils labelled units and seen as fair
  game.
• 3 different colours of flaking paint, and 30
  buckets in use when it rained.

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Ninestiles 2004 Brushstroke 1
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2004 Brushstroke 2

• A genuine learning community with the capacity
  for continuous change
• Students are taught national curriculum levels
  criteria and then choose their own level to work
  at in each curriculum area.
• The highest quality of teaching grades awarded
  by Ofsted during a full inspection 85 good or
  better and 100 satisfactory

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2004 Brush strokes 3

• First school in the region approved by the TTA
  to run its own Graduate Teacher Programme.
• Cisco academy on site and Microsoft partner
  school
• Largest school wireless network in Europe with
  over 1200 laptops on site.
• ICT integrated across the curriculum.
• Fifteen ASTs all home grown.

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2004 -Brush stroke 4

• Supporting the TC Trust in school improvement
  partnership projects.
• School Improvement company Ninestiles Plus-
  established, providing training and consultancy
  to LEAs and other secondary schools
• Funded by a foundation to train middle managers
  from 3 other schools.

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2004 -Brush stroke 4

• 3 yr government/local authority contract first
  Hard federation with Waverley School.
• Second 3 yr hard federation contract with The
  International School.
• Visitors on a weekly basis from around the
  country.
• Impacting on school improvement nationally

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Our third Sigmoid Curve September 1998 to
August 2004

• Moving from mixed ability groups to students
  choosing their own National Curriculum levels in
  each subject
• Introducing attendance focus meetings
• Introduction of smart cards and cashless
  catering.
• Running our own catering and aiming for a
  restaurant rather than a canteen ambience

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Our third Sigmoid Curve September 1998 to
August 2004

• A holistic approach to the school day with
  morning breakfast (break) and the lunch break
  staggered and fully integrated into the planned
  teaching and learning.
• No school bells
• An open school with students having access to our
  Open Learning Centre between 8am and 5pm
• Introducing Working At Grades for yr 10

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Our third Sigmoid Curve September 1998 to
August 2004

• Creating double classrooms to facilitate team
  teaching
• Building up our AST team now 15 home grown
  teachers
• Daily assemblies to share the vision and
  reinforce school values - for students and
  teachers
• Establishing a student support centre
• Using brain learning to influence schemes of work

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Our third Sigmoid Curve September 1998 to
August 2004

• Annual post 16 residential conference at a
  university
• Laptops for all staff
• Leased laptops for students with equity a
  principle
• Developing a wireless network
• A school intranet that can be accessed by staff,
  students and parents
• High quality IT training for all staff

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Our third Sigmoid Curve September 1998 to
August 2004

• Becoming a Cisco Academy
• Introducing GNVQ IT and other vocational courses
  at key stage 4
• Rethinking the balance/role of support staff
• Involving staff and governors in strategic
  planning and monitoring of implementation
• Major improvements in the physical environment
• Ceiling projectors in every classroom with team
  approach to developing and sharing resources

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Our third Sigmoid Curve September 1998 to
August 2004

• Becoming a Leading Edge school
• Becoming a TTA approved DRB for graduate trainees
• Developing Ninestiles Plus as a company providing
  school improvement training and consultancy
• Being actively involved in school improvement
  through our work in the Federation
• And now planning for our fourth

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From Improvement to Transformation

• Fast Tracking School Improvement within a
  Federation Context

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Leadership History of the Ninestiles Federation

• Feb 01 Christine Quinn, Ninestiles Deputy
  becomes Head of Waverley (4Start) with Dexter
  Hutt, Head of Ninestiles having overall
  responsibility. John Allen is Deputy of
  Waverley.
• Sept 03 International School (project
  accelerate) joins Federation. Existing Head
  remains and DH has overall responsibility.
• 09 Oct 04 Internationals existing Head
  resigns, CQ moves to International as Head on
  10th October, and John Allen becomes Head of
  Waverley.
• Jan 05 Ruth Robinson joins International as
  Associate Head working with Chris.
• Sept 05 Dexter Hutt becomes Executive Head of
  Federation, Ruth Head of International, and
  Chris Head of Ninestiles.

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School Improvement within a Federation Context
-Waverleys Experience
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Waverleys Context

• Serving one of the most economically
  disadvantaged communities in Birmingham.
• Very low levels of attainment, for a sustained
  period of time.
• 60 FSM.
• 85 EAL.
• 55 Pakistani origin, 15 Bengali.
• Very high levels of student mobility.

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Waverleys Context

• A compliant wider community who understand of
  importance of education although are not always
  clear on how to support the learning of their
  children.
• A core of committed staff.
• Poor behaviour.
• Inability to break the downward spiral.
• Displacing tactics.

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Recent History

• HMI SFCC inspection January 2001. Serious
  concerns. I will be back!
• LEA intervened February 2001. The school joined
  with Ninestiles, the DfES, LEA to form the
  4Start partnership.
• A period of rapid change followed.
• Follow up by same HMI Dec 2001. Very positive -
  outlook of and for the school has been
  transformed
• Culminating in significantly improved exam
  results 18 - 51 -62, and a successful OFSTED.

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• School Improvement at The International School
• Context
• Merger of one school in special measures and one
  school very near to it (2002)
• Split site with four buildings (now five)
• 1500 students 11 18
• GCSE results Summer 2003, 9 students gained 5A
  - C passes and 36 gained 5A - G passes

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• School Improvement at ISCCeb
• Federation with Ninestiles
• Officially started in September 2003
• Began in earnest on 13th October 2003.
• Phase 1 to put in place whatever was needed to
  force feed Year 11 (2004) results, and to
  improve student behaviour throughout the school
• Phase 2 to begin to put the school in the
  position where it would get through an impending
  Ofsted successfully

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• School Improvement at ISCCeb
• Phase 1
• Introduction of Behaviour for Learning
• Timetable rewritten to support implementation
• Immediate significant improvement in behaviour
• Joint residentials to share schemes of work and
  develop team culture
• Introduction of regular assemblies

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• School Improvement at ISCCeb
• Phase 1 - Year 11 Results
• Introduction of GNVQ ICT to a significant number
  of the year group
• Introduction of Working at Grades to teachers and
  students (and later parents )
• Introduction of year group assemblies
• August 04 5A -C up to 34 , 5 A-G up to 75.
• Phase 2 Ofsted Dec 04 reports This is a good
  school

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Key ingredients of a Federation aiming to achieve
rapid improvement

• Additional strategic leadership from lead school,
  quality Head with shared vision of school
  improvement
• Management fees paid to lead school to create
  capacity for teachers to team teach.
• Lead school frees expert teachers to support
  client school staff in the classroom.

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Management and Leadership

• The role of the Head
• HMI the single most important factor in the
  improvement of a school is the quality of
  management and leadership provided by the
  headteacher

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Management and Leadership

• Management
• Dealing with complexity, problem solving to
  bring order and consistency through structures,
  systems, procedures, and routines.

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Management and Leadership

• Leadership Strategic way forward, deciding on
  the direction, communicating this in a way that
  wins hearts and minds so that staff are aligned
  and working in the same direction. Inspiring
  staff to believe that they can overcome
• hurdles and achieve success

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Management and Leadership

• The right leadership for the right situation
• Hero Head or Distributed Leadership?
• Identifying different leadership styles
• Your preferred (default) style
• Leadership in different situations
• Resonance and leadership

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Factors Affecting a Schools Ability to Improve

• A vision for the school giving direction.
• -The 3 year planning cycle - what do we want
  the school to be like in 3 years time?

• The concept of phased development
• -The ability to judge the phase that the school
  is in and the appropriate initiatives to take the
  school forward from its current position.
• - How strong is the disciplinary platform?
• - How strong is the communications platform?
• - Revisiting and modifying as necessary

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Factors Affecting a Schools Ability to Improve

• The capacity for change
• How receptive are staff?
• How flexible is the organisation?
• How supportive are governors?

• The quality of leadership and management - at all
  levels
• - The leadership and management of the
  Headteacher and Deputies.
• -The crucial role of middle managers
• - The culture of the team

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Factors Affecting a Schools Ability to Improve

• The nature of the intake
• - Students and parents
• - Expectations

6. Funding making use of opportunities
- Identifying new sources of funding -
Making the best use of available funding
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Factors Affecting a Schools Ability to improve
7. Risk taking - Confidence, optimism and
detailed planning - The ability to respond
quickly to unforeseen situations

• Creating the culture
• - Building trust and encouraging an open culture
• - Developing a service approach to our
  students
• - A determination to aim for the best - and
  never be complacent

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Innovations are not independent of each other
they interlock with each other, they support and
reinforce each other.
Their combined effect is much greater than the
sum of their individual parts and it is this that
determines the resulting school culture.
Effective school leadership and management is
about the interrelationship of these factors,
within the context of the specific developmental
phase that a particular school is in making use
of the Sigmoid Curve concept ..
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• and recognising that
• good is the enemy of excellent

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Ninestiles Mission Statement- to be implemented
using the Balanced Scorecard strategic approach

• Ninestiles School will be nationally and
  internationally acknowledged as a high achieving,
  innovative and exciting school which respects and
  celebrates the diversity of its community. It
  will be structured and resourced to meet the
  needs of 21st century students. Within a caring
  environment, we will develop and reinforce the
  values, skills and attributes which promote good
  citizenship and lifelong learning. Parents,
  governors, and the wider community will work in
  partnership with our committed, appropriately
  skilled workforce and our students, to ensure
  that high quality learning takes place. Outcomes
  will be outstanding.

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SIGMOID CURVE !
Great can also be the enemy of World Class