Britain’s young people have been betrayed by lies and hypocrisy, and are struggling to make sense of the events of 2016, Sue Williamson, chief executive of the Schools, Students and Teachers Network (SSAT), has said.
Addressing delegates at the organisation’s national conference in Birmingham in December, Ms Williamson said 2016 had been “a very difficult year in many ways, and many young people feel betrayed by the older generation”.
She said one of the joys of teaching young people was to guide them in debate and helping them to “coax out the key points of an argument – to understand the points for and against – and to reach a well-argued conclusion that is supported by facts”.
But there was currently a lack of balance in public discussion about the challenges facing this country and the world.
That included confusion in the debate around British values.
Ms Williamson had been accused, she said, of “not loving my country” because she had questioned in a conversation what was meant by this and what should be taught.
Ms Williamson spoke to around 1,000 delegates at the two-day conference, the theme of which was Leading: Making the Impossible Possible.
During her address she referred to Sir Alex Ferguson’s autobiography, Leading, in which he makes the statement “My job was to make everyone understand that the impossible was possible. That’s the difference between leadership and management.”
Ms Williamson said the book “made me reflect on what leadership is needed in the school-led system and what lessons might school leaders learn from other sectors”.
She continued: “I think that we are a long way from a school-led system – there are still too many top-down initiatives, and we need a different accountability framework.
“However, we are on a journey and school leaders need to be leading. SSAT has always advocated ‘by schools, for schools’ and principled leadership.”
One of the successful signs of a good leader, she said, was absorbing and managing the pressures imposed on schools from the outside, and not cascading this down to staff and pupils.
She said: “For too long, we as school leaders and governors have put pressure onto our staff and students because we’ve thought certain behaviours and practices were required.
“As school leaders, it really is your choice how many of the external pressures you allow to go outside your office door. How realistic are your policies to implement and do they all have a genuine impact on learning?
“We know that we are facing a teacher recruitment and retention crisis.
“Often we look for external factors to attribute to this – how often do we look at what negative behaviours are being driven by our own school policies?
“I am going to make a direct appeal to you now. Make one commitment to yourself that will improve the lives of your staff or students back in school.
“You might ban the phrase ‘for Ofsted’, making sure you never do anything to please an outside agency.
“You might ban emails after 5:30pm and at weekends to help staff workloads. You might systematically make sure that every member of staff and every student receives one positive comment every week.”
She referred again to a comment by Sir Alex Ferguson from his book in which he states “I cannot imagine how anyone without firm convictions and beliefs can be an effective leader”.
Ms Williamson urged headteachers to “believe in what you believe and do what’s right for the individuals in your school”.
Speaking afterwards to SecEd, Ms Williamson said schools could not be expected to teach British values when so many people in public life did not abide by those principles.
She said an official from the Department for Education had accused her of not loving her country during a dinner at an event when she asked what the term British values actually means.
“When you live in a multi-cultural society you respect everyone’s values,” she said. “No-one should be made to feel unwanted.”
She said the aftermath of the referendum had left many young people feeling betrayed and confused.
“The arguments in the run up were very poor and there were some blatant lies told,” Ms Williamson said.
“We expect our children and young people to adopt British values when our own politicians are not setting any sort of standards. We see people who blatantly lie rewarded with top jobs in government. What are children supposed to make of this?
“Teachers are the most important role-models children now have outside the home and young people will look to them to make sense of the world.”
On the issue of school leaders absorbing the pressures of the job, Ms Williamson likened their role to that of a football manager.
“I am very concerned about where the next generation of leaders is going to come from,” she said.
“People look at headteachers and see the pressures they are under and don’t want to do the job. School leaders have to remember they aren’t doing it for Ofsted or the government but for the pupils.”
Meanwhile, the SSAT is to fund a professional training programme to develop the next generation of school leaders, Ms Williamson announced at the conference.
Existing school leaders will be invited to nominate colleagues who they believe have the potential and aptitude to be a headteacher of the future.
The SSAT plans to fund 100 individuals, although Ms Williamson indicated that the organisation would try to find the money for more if the scheme ended up being oversubscribed.
The successful applicants would get opportunities to work alongside some of the brightest and most successful school leaders in the country to learn at first hand the challenges and rewards of headship.
The prospective heads will remain at their schools working as normal, though the programme may require them to have some days out.
- The details of the scheme are still be finalised but schools will receive further information early in the new year, Ms Williamson said.
- Dorothy Lepkowska is a freelance education journalist.
Further information
For more on the SSAT’s work, visit www.ssatuk.co.uk