According to deputy prime minister Nick Clegg, the government is to create a “champions league” (their phrase) of headteachers and deputies ready to take over failing schools in deprived areas. It will, they tell us, “be like bringing in Sir Alex Ferguson to turn Swindon Town into Manchester United”.
Inept and inappropriate footballing analogies apart (did I hear you mention Clough at Leeds United?) and regardless of how the scheme is dressed up and presented, we have been here before. Twitter is full of the inevitable references to the Blair/Blunkett “superheads” of the late 1990s.
The trouble with applying high-profile political “quick fixes” for problems that are actually diverse and complicated is that they expose the heads and the schools to even more pressure.
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