Our schools need more teaching and less management

WCC Management, read this:

Our schools need more teaching and less management

Do all managers that work their way up promptly forget what it was like to do the job they have been promoted from? In education, this definitely seems to be the case. The evidence for this sits in my email inbox and my pigeon hole every day in the form of ridiculous requests for information (usually that is already freely available on the school data system) yet more data analyses, estimated grades, or an item to be added onto a meeting agenda at a moment's notice. Tasks that will take a sizable chunk of my time for absolutely no conceivable benefit to teaching and learning at all. And this is getting worse for us as our management team has inflated recently. Our senior management team now consists of a head, two deputies and four assistant head teachers, even though we are a medium-sized secondary.

You may be tempted to think that having all of these senior, experienced members of staff helping to run the school would result in the school improving and there would be outstanding attainment for the pupils. Sadly no. Our senior management team (SMT) has expanded in direct correlation with a rapid decline in results; indeed, one assistant head was promoted from his post as head of English despite a 20% drop in A*-C pass rates in that subject this year, a drop so big that it cannot be dismissed as part of the national grade boundary crisis. He is now, however, tasked with supporting departments in improving. What sense does that make?

And so the task is handed out. Duplication of all evidence is the key. Printed and electronic versions are required, as is the plentiful application of multiple colour highlighters. Most staff have a moan but get on and do it. Anyone that protests or intimates in any way that this meaningless and lengthy task may actually harm teaching and learning or get in the way of books being marked this week is deemed to be a troublemaker, someone who does not want to get on board with helping the school improve. But we need it, they reiterate. We need it to help the school improve. Don't you want the school to improve? The guilt is laid on thick. How does this happen? You would think that, as once strong classroom practitioners themselves, SMT would realise the importance of prioritising teaching and learning above all else. Our leadership team consists of some very strong and experienced teachers. Yet the vast majority of their week is spent doing anything but teaching. To think of the wealth of experience and skills that now sit in incredibly expensive thrice weekly meetings, making decisions and handing out jobs in a completely 'top down' management style, is frightening. There they sit, collective salaries topping a quarter of a million pounds annually, sustained by frequent coffee and biscuits, shielded from the pressures of waiting pupils and persistent bell ringing, deciding on which lengthy paper exercise to hand out next. Surely, if we all do this, the school will improve, they concur.

This week's job was to provide a list of all the 'intervention' strategies that have been employed for each child that is, in any way, below target. The fact that these targets are often ludicrously out of reach and set by KS2 data which is often inflated due to similar pressures in primary schools is never discussed. The clear implication is that a child being below target is the teacher's fault, that they must do something about it, and that it should be done in their time, usually lunchtime or after school revision or support sessions. Don't get me wrong, I'm not against helping pupils in my own time. I spend a significant amount of time after school with pupils, and I rarely take longer than 10 minutes at lunchtime, but this has grown from something pupils and parents are grateful for, to something that is expected. 'Intervention' is a trendy word in education, and, like all trends, it is now beginning to fall out of favour. The word on the street is that 'intervention' shouldn't really be necessary if the quality of teaching and learning is good in the first place – and so we come full circle.

We are still being asked to spend our time completing tasks that were taken off us as part of a workforce reform package that included a reduced pay rise in 2006. This workforce reform was aimed at allowing teachers to concentrate on teaching and learning by removing tasks that were taking up valuable time. Anyone taking part in the action short of a strike union action is tolerated, but made to feel guilty. Non-union or non participating staff are still asked publicly to do these jobs, the message being clear, those of us who want to help the school will do them.

This is crazy thinking. We wouldn't dream of asking our GP to give our car a quick service after our five minute appointment, or asking the pilot of a plane to hoover the peanut shells up. We would assume their time would be better spent, say, treating patients or flying planes. So why do we not assume that our teachers time would be better spent planning lessons rather than sticking nice things on walls or collecting in money for school photographs?

The link here is the cost of the management tier. They cost so much money but contribute little directly to teaching and learning. Their salaries could pay for three TAs or admin assistants to do the sticking and the money collecting, freeing the teachers to actually plan and teach more effectively.
It's time to reduce the ludicrous management tiers in schools. These people should be doing more teaching because they certainly aren't improving the school's teaching and learning sitting in meetings.

I was told this week that one of our SMT is tired of hearing everyone moaning about workload and conditions in our school at the moment. That if we don't all get our act together then, when Ofsted return for their monitoring visit then there would be plenty of sackings. With that sort of inspirational leadership, I invite you to imagine the morale at our school at the moment.

Today's Secret Teacher works at a secondary school in the north of England.

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