School Leadership - A Scottish Perspective

I have again been thinking about education, and some of the frustrations built into our systems. It would seem as school teacher or school leader in Scotland and the UK, and I am sure elsewhere, we can be easy targets for other sections of society, especially when they are looking to score political points, sell newspapers or deflect from deficiencies elsewhere. I think they can also take advantage of our inability or unwillingness to push back too much, lest it impacts directly on our learners. Education is crucial to the wellbeing of all societies, to mankind and the planet as a whole. It is right that education systems, and their schools reflect the best parts of the societies and cultures in which they exist. Schools and education cannot exist in some sort of vacuum, independent of the context in which they are located. Education systems are a reflection of the wider society they represent. It is also crucial that such education systems look to keep developing within their contex

One of the issues that can sometimes get in the way of staff thinking around practitioner enquiry is the expectation that we somehow share our results, either at the end of a particular enquiry focus, or even during the process itself. In my experience some staff can feel very threatened or insecure about sharing their findings, outcomes and insights from any enquiry process, no matter how hard senior leaders might strive to allay such fears. This post is an exploration of  why we might wish to share, as well as some simple ways that you can disseminate outcomes, that are relatively straightforward, but are nevertheless powerful tools within the enquiry process. The first thing I would say is that we all need to see collaboration and sharing as key elements of any enquiry, not something that is bolted on at the end. For our enquiries to have the greatest impact, for ourselves, colleagues, schools, and  even the system, we need to be collaborating and sharing, not functioning in isola