I always enjoy ResearchEd but the London conference on Saturday really broke previous records for sessions I was keen to get to - tricky decisions at every point!
Personal highlights
There was all the usual thought and analysis about quality and about what kind of research is useful for what purpose. But there were increasing numbers of examples of high quality disciplined practitioner enquiry (eg a really good qualitative investigation into how to make the new English curriculum work and its relationship with research about spacing and memory from Ashlawn School in Rugby and a mini experiment from Huntingdon in Cambridge into preparations for exams with some neat modelling of learning from school leaders thrown in). I also loved the thought provoking piece of scholarship from Laura McInerny about who teachers are and why they leave the profession. Another theme was calmness and rationality – both in the important reminder from Tim Leunig that evidence will play an important part in the debate about grammar schools (if presented rationally and in an orderly fashion) and in the calm and non defensive listening to ideas and suggestions about Ofsted from Amanda Spielman as she prepares for her role as HMCI.
More than an intervention – quality, CPD and partnership
Several members of the Expert Group that developed the CPD standard were there and our wonderful Vice Chair, Helene Galdin O’ Shea was, of course, a key architect of the programme - for which huge appreciation! Some of us grabbed a quiet moment over the lunch break to reflect on where we are, what is needed and the forthcoming conference at RSA where we hope to identify next steps and partnerships that will help us achieve them (which you can find out more about here).
One key issue is quality assurance. One group member, the amazing Rob Coe, constantly reminds us that a standard isn’t a standard if it isn’t quality assured. On the drive home I started to think about what this means in a Self Improving System where the government certainly isn’t going to introduce new regulation. Here are six connected but not necessarily wholly aligned questions that might work as a starter for ten for thinking about quality assurance in preparation for the event on 3rd October.