3 Leadership and school improvement
Estyn’s extensive report Leadership and Primary School Improvement [Tip: hold Ctrl and click a link to open it in a new tab. (Hide tip)] (2016) includes an important acknowledgment that all schools have room to improve, and that leadership is the most significant factor in influencing the pace, quality and sustainability of the school’s improvement.
The report states that schools at different developmental stages often need different styles of leadership, and that leaders – at all stages of a school’s developmental journey – play a crucial role in developing the professional skills of their staff and supporting them.
The evidence base for this report is taken from primary school inspections across Wales between 2010 and 2015. It also includes a four-stage model for primary improvement that offers generic elements of improvement that are transferable to secondary education.
Leadership and Primary School Improvement identifies common characteristics of improvement at all stages:
These are where leaders:
- clearly define the vision and strategic direction of the school; this vision evolves as the school improves
- establish professional values and behaviours among staff to support continuous improvement and effective teamwork
- establish and maintain a culture where improving standards and wellbeing for all pupils is the main priority
- make improving teaching the key process that contributes to improving standards
- deliver a curriculum that fully meets the needs of all pupils
- sustain a consistent focus on improving pupils’ literacy (in English and Welsh), ICT skills, and numeracy (including higher-order thinking and reasoning skills)
- make sure that staff’s continuous professional development improves the quality of provision and outcomes for pupils
- ensure that all staff (especially those in management roles) are accountable for their areas of work
- ensure that self-evaluation outcomes derive from first-hand evidence, and are linked closely to school improvement priorities
- provide governors with clear, understandable and honest analyses of how well the school is performing, and encourage them to challenge underperformance.
You should now use these leadership characteristics as you attempt Activity 3.
Activity 3: Estyn’s leadership characteristics
Look carefully at each of Estyn’s commonly occurring leadership characteristics.
Now go to both of the polls on the course website to identify what you think is the most and least commonly occurring characteristics in your school.
After voting, you’ll be able to see what other learners picked. Visit the forum to discuss your choices.
Now consider whether any of the characteristics could be usefully addressed and improved within your organisation? If so, what leadership actions would need to take place to enable this to happen in an optimum manner?
(If you want to read more of Leadership and Primary School Improvement, it’s available on Estyn’s website.)
You are invited to consider how these characteristics work against a real-life example. Take a look at the Parkland Primary School case study, go to your blog on the course website and create a two-column table, similar to the one below and try and find an example of each characteristic from the Parkland example. The instructions on how to do this are included below the example table.
Activity 4: Estyn’s leadership characteristics and the Parkland case study
Go to Activity 4’s blog on the course website and create a two column table, similar to the one below:
| Characteristic | Example from study |
|---|---|
| Clearly define the vision and strategic direction of the school; this vision evolves as the school improves | |
| Establish professional values and behaviours among staff to support continuous improvement and effective teamwork | |
| Establish and maintain a culture where improving standards and wellbeing for all pupils is the main priority | |
| Make improving teaching the key process that contributes to improving standards | |
| Deliver a curriculum that fully meets the needs of all pupils | |
| Sustain a consistent focus on improving pupils’ literacy (in English and Welsh), ICT skills, and numeracy (including higher-order thinking and reasoning skills) | |
| Make sure that staff’s continuous professional development improves the quality of provision and outcomes for pupils | |
| Ensure that all staff (especially those in management roles) are accountable for their areas of work | |
| Ensure that self-evaluation outcomes derive from first-hand evidence, and are linked closely to school improvement priorities | |
| Provide governors with clear, understandable and honest analyses of how well the school is performing, and encourage them to challenge underperformance |
To create a table, after you click on ‘New blog post’, first click on the top-left button on the message box: 
.
Then click on the ‘Table’ button: 
. At the prompt, create a table with eleven rows and two columns. (You don’t need to add a caption.)
(If you want to read more of Leadership and Primary School Improvement, it’s available on Estyn’s website.)
Having objectively considered the Parkland Primary School case study, you are advised to now conduct a similar reflective activity for your own school. You could create another table within your blog to complete this. This should be an interesting comparative exercise.
2 The context of leadership in Wales