Taking Reform to Scale

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Taking Reform to Scale
Professor David Hopkins
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High Excellence High Equity Raising the Bar and
Narrowing the Gap
560
High excellence Low equity
High excellence High equity
Finland
540
U.K.
Canada
Korea
Japan
520
U.S.
Belgium
500
Switzerland
Spain
Germany
480
Mean performance in reading literacy
Poland
460
Low excellence Low equity
Low excellence High equity
440
420
60
80
100
120
140
200 Variance (variance OECD as a whole 100)
Source OECD (2001) Knowledge and Skills for Life
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Ingredients of successful systems from the
PISA studies

• Systematic and equitable funding
• Universal standards - mirrored in the views of
  students, parents and school principals
• School autonomy
• Mix of accountability systems - internal and
  external
• Continuous monitoring of standards and quick
  interventions when failure to achieve them is
  identified
• Creating the appropriate environment to achieve
  the standards set
• get the right people to become teachers
• develop teachers into effective instructors (PD
  internal and external)
• place incentives and differentiated support
  systems to ensure that every child get the
  supported that it need (Excellence and equity are
  achievable)
• Focus on the curriculum and introduce skills
  required for the 21st Century
• Networking and innovation

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School Improvement
Teaching and Learning
Success for All
System Wide Reform
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Core Principles Teaching and Learning

• Actively engage learners in the learning process
• Explicitly link the planned new learning to what
  learners already know
• Challenge and motivate learners through high
  expectations and well-paced teaching
• Help learners to acquire learning skills and
  strategies
• Use assessment for learning to get learners to
  reflect and set targets
• Reflect on and enhance your expertise in teaching
  and learning

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Lessons from the McKinsey study

• 1. The quality of an education system cannot
  exceed the quality of its teachers.
  Top-performers
• attracted great people into teaching
• rigorous about teacher recruitment
• paid good but not great salaries
• 2. The only way to improve outcomes is to improve
  instruction
• Take Professional Development in the classroom
  and make it routine (peer observation, lesson
  study, demonstration lessons)
• Reforms that focus on teacher quality improve
  outcomes
• 3. High performance requires every child to
  succeed
• Inspections and examinations enabled schools to
  continually track their performance and improve
• Provided differentiated support to students
• 4. Great leadership at school level is key
  enabling factor
• Recruit and train leaders

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Effect Size of Teaching
Student Performance
McKinsey Company, 200711
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I wrote (with Bruce Joyce) some time ago that

• Learning experiences are composed of content,
  process and social climate. As teachers we create
  for and with our children opportunities to
  explore and build important areas of knowledge,
  develop powerful tools for learning, and live in
  humanizing social conditions.

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Three ways of thinking about Teaching
Teaching Relationships
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Teaching Models

• Our toolbox is the models of teaching, actually
  models for learning, that simultaneously define
  the nature of the content, the learning
  strategies, and the arrangements for social
  interaction that create the learning contexts of
  our students. For example, in powerful
  classrooms students learn models for

• Extracting information and ideas from lectures
  and presentations
• Memorising information
• Building hypotheses and theories
• Attaining concepts and how to invent them
• Using metaphors to think creatively
• Working effectively with other to initiate and
  carry out co-operative tasks

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Structuring Staff Development

• Workshop
• Understanding of Key Ideas and Principles
• Modelling and Demonstration
• Practice in Non-threatening Situations
• Workplace
• Immediate and Sustained Practice
• Collaboration and Peer Coaching
• Reflection and Action Research

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Core Principles School Improvement

• Create a single focus for improvement
• Agree clear and unifying targets
• Set up a school improvement group
• Enhance teaching skills through focused
  professional development
• Embed the development work into normal school
  processes
• Collaborate with other schools

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The overall design of an Outward Bound Academy
School

• Leadership and School improvement
• Training School tailored Professional
  Development
• ASTs to act as school designers
• Distributed leadership and school improvement
  groups

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Processes of School Improvement

• The journey of school improvement
• A clear reform narrative is created, and seen by
  staff to be consistently applied, with a vision
  and urgency that translates into clear principles
  for action.
• Organizing the key strategies
• Improvement activities are selected and linked
  together strategically supported by robust and
  highly reliable school systems with clear SMT
  roles in key areas.
• Professional learning at the heart of the process
• Improvement strategy informs CPD knowledge is
  gained, verified refined by staff to underpin
  improvement networking is used to manage risk
  and discipline practice.
• Cultures are changed and developed
• Professional ethos and values that supports
  capacity building are initiated, implemented and
  institutionalized, so that a culture of
  disciplined action replaces excessive control.

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System Leadership and Student Achievement

• To sustain improvement
• the leadership develops a narrative for
  improvement
• the leadership is highly focussed on improving
  the quality of teaching and learning (and student
  welfare)
• the leadership explicitly organises the school
  for improvement
• the leadership creates
• clarity (of the systems established)
• consistency (of the systems spread across
  school), and
• continuity (of the systems over time)
• the leadership creates internal accountability
  and reciprocity
• the leadership works to change context as a key
  component of their improvement strategy

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Elmores Principles for Large Scale Improvement

• Maintain a tight instructional focus sustained
  over time
• Routinise accountability for practice and
  performance in face-to-face relationships
• Reduce isolation and open practice up to direct
  observation, analysis, and criticism
• Exercise differential treatment based on
  performance and capacity, not on volunteerism
• Devolve increased discretion based on practice
  and performance

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Dianas Line of Success

• 2. Taking ownership an inclusive agenda
  (20002002)
• Vision and values developing schools mission
• Distributing leadership
• Persisting priority on teaching and learning
• becoming a thinking school
• curriculum development
• Performance management and CPD
• Inclusivity integrating students from different
  social and cultural backgrounds
• Focus on monitoring and evaluation

• Coming out of special measures (1999-2000)
• Enriching teaching and learning environment
• Making school secure
• Improving teaching and learning in classrooms
• Leading by example
• Establishing a student behaviour policy and
  improving attendance
• Vision and values
• Developing resources

Ofsted Inspection 2007 (Outstanding)
Ofsted Inspection 2002 (Very Good)
Success of leadership in terms of effect upon
broad pupil outcomes
4. Everyone a leader (2005- present) Creative
partnership and creativity Self
evaluation Personalised learning
3. Developing creativity (2002-2005) Restructuring
leadership Involving community Assessment
(personalised) Placing staff well-being at centre
of school improvement Broadening horizons
Ofsted Inspection 1998 (Special
Measures)
2003
1999
2001
2002
2000
2004
2005
onward
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Ofsted and SATs Results

• 2. Taking ownership an inclusive agenda
  (20002002)
• Vision and values developing schools mission
• Distributing leadership
• Persisting priority on teaching and learning
• becoming a thinking school
• curriculum development
• Performance management and CPD
• Inclusivity integrating students from different
  social and cultural backgrounds
• Focus on monitoring and evaluation

• Coming out of special measures (1999-2000)
• Enriching teaching and learning environment
• Making school secure
• Improving teaching and learning in classrooms
• Leading by example
• Establishing a student behaviour policy and
  improving attendance
• Vision and values
• Developing resources

3. Developing creativity (2002-2005) Restructuring
leadership Involving community Assessment
(personalised) Placing staff well-being at centre
of school improvement Broadening horizons
4. Everyone a leader (2005- present) Creative
partnership and creativity Self
evaluation Personalised learning
Success of leadership in terms of effect upon
broad pupil outcomes
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Core Principles System Wide Reform

• Create a convincing and coherent rationale for
  reform
• Focus reform on embedding core principles
  developed with the profession
• Balance empowerment and accountability
• Develop teaching and learning frameworks and
  training materials on priority issues
• Strengthen collaboration between schools
• Establish coherent, responsive and effective
  external support

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The Challenge of Public Sector Reform
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One Size Does not Fit All
A-3
B -2a,2b
____________________________
C -I
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Differential Strategies for School Improvement

• Type 111 strategies are those that assist
  effective schools to become even better.
  Exposure to new ideas and practices,
  collaboration through consortia or 'pairing' type
  arrangements seems to be common in these
  situations.  
• Type 11 strategies are those that assist
  moderately effective schools become effective.
  These schools need to refine their developmental
  priorities and focus on specific teaching and
  learning issues, and build the capacity within
  the school to support this work. These
  strategies usually involve a certain level of
  external support.
• Type 11a strategies are characterised by a
  strategic focus on innovations in teaching and
  learning that are informed and supported by
  external knowledge and support.
• Type 11b strategies rely less on external support
  and tend to be more school initiated.  
• Type 1 strategies are those that assist failing
  schools become moderately effective. They need
  to involve a high level of external support.
  These strategies have to involve a clear and
  direct focus on a limited number of basic
  curriculum and organisational issues, in order to
  build the confidence and competence to continue.

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Segmentation of the Secondary School System
100
90
N 3313
80
70
Low Achieving
Below 30 5A-C
N 483
60
5A-C gt30, lower quartile value added
Underperforming
Actual 5A-C 2003
50
N 539
5A-C gt30, 25-75th percentile value added
40
Progressing
N 1495
30
5A-C gt30, upper quartile value added
High Performing
20
N 696
10
Leading the System
0
N 100
0
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
100
Estimated 5A-C from pupil KS3 data
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Networking and SegmentationHighly
Differentiated Improvement Strategies
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Governance and Segmentation System
transformation is both complicated and
facilitated by the high degree of segmentation
within the secondary school system.
Autonomous Federations Groups of schools opt
out of Regional control but accept
responsibility for all students in their area

• Greater responsibility taken for neighbouring
  schools
• All failing schools in Federations
• Significantly enhanced funding for students most
  at risk
• Rationalisation of national and local agency
  functions

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Coherent System Design
U N I V E R S A L H I G H
High quality personalised learning for every
student
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A Word from the Wise

• David,
• I'd promised to get back to you with thoughts on
  doing school reform.  Here are my general
  thoughts, such as they are.
• 1.  Be very clear with yourself on desired
  outcomes of the reform, and quantitative measures
  of success.  Have 4 or fewer goals.  I'd
  recommend national measures (ex., GCSE's) and
  student attendance as 2, but that's just me. 
• 2.  Get buy-in from the school Heads and the
  Local Authority on those goals and measures, or
  don't start.  No point in wasting your and their
  time. 
• 3.  If at all possible have all of the primaries
  or secondaries in an LEA or a geographically
  identifiable sub-LEA all working together.  If
  they aren't willing to share, the reform is
  doomed. 
• 4.  Tell the heads and teachers at first meeting,
  "I know a lot about school improvement and
  teacher effectiveness.  You are the world's
  leading experts on your school(s).  Either we
  co-construct change or we won't get change.  You
  in?  Right.  Let's get going."
• 5.  Engage the teachers and heads with more data
  analyses than they have ever seen before.  Have
  them engage the students, too. 
• 6.  Plan on cross-site professional development
  and inter-visitation. 
• 7.  Assume that it will take more professional
  development time and local investment than you
  wish were true.  Assume a minimum of three
  years. 
• 8.  The more concrete stuff to look at and use in
  classrooms, the better. 
•  
• Beyond those things, that may be obvious, you
  know as much or more as do I.  Best of luck with
  it. 
•  
• ...see, the 60's haven't killed us yet!
• Sam

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Professor David Hopkins