Support and challenge for school leaders

Abstract

For three years from 2008 every school in England had a designated school improvement partner (SIP), portrayed as a critical friend, whose role was to support and challenge the headteacher. A mixed-methods study involving a national survey and face-to-face interviews evaluated the enactment of the national policy from the perspective of the direct recipients – the headteachers/school principals. Headteachers’ perceptions of their school improvement partners, and their experiences of the support and challenge provided by SIPs, varied. Much seemed to depend on individual SIP’s expertise and conduct. The SIPs’ prescribed agenda was seen as too focused on data rather than discussions about learning and teaching, and requirements for SIPs to report to the local authority and governors were in tension with trustful relationships with headteachers. The SIP programme could be interpreted as a commitment to the entitlement of headteachers to support and challenge, or as a mechanism for surveillance and discipline. Lessons are drawn for the ‘national’ and ‘local leaders of education’ who have replaced SIPs, and for anyone internationally concerned with support and challenge for school principals.

Keywords

challenge critical friend headteacher local leader of education national leader of education principal school improvement partner SIP support

Introduction

School improvement partners (SIPs) were introduced to maintained schools in England by the last Labour government, with the aim of streamlining communication among the central government education department, local authorities (LA) and schools, and thus establish ‘A New Relationship with Schools’ (NRwS) (DfES, 2004). A SIP’s main role was to challenge and support the headteacher in relation to the school’s performance and targets for improvement (DfES, 2004, 2005, 2006), and they were portrayed as ‘critical friends’.

This article reports headteachers’ perceptions of SIPs, which was one aspect of a national study that enquired into headteachers’ views of support and challenge more broadly. Data were collected during the brief period when every school in England had a SIP. The study is therefore one of the very few to cast light on a national policy that ensured every school and headteacher had a designated professional with the time and responsibility to provide support and challenge in relation to the school’s performance. While this research is clearly located in a single country at a particular time, the central issue – external professional support for school leaders – is of ubiquitous and enduring relevance, as noted for example in the OECD study of school leadership around the world (Pont et al., 2008a, 2008b).

SIPs were allocated five days per year for each school they worked with, regardless of the performance or circumstances of the school. Previous policy was for similar arrangements for support and challenge to be in inverse proportion to success (DfEE, 1999), so that schools deemed to be successful would have limited provision. Some SIPs were LA advisers, while many of them (the target was three-quarters for secondary schools) were serving or recent headteachers, and could be from another LA. ‘The school improvement partner works for and on behalf of the local authority’ (DfES, 2006: 13) and ‘reports to the school’s local authority’ (DfES, 2006: 19). The SIP was required to ‘report the outcomes of the dialogue with the school to the school’s governing body, the headteacher, [and] the school’s maintaining authority’ (DfES, 2006: 20) and to alert the LA if the school was causing concern (DfES, 2005). As part of their role in challenging and supporting headteachers, SIPs were also charged with advising governors on the headteacher’s performance management, taking over the role of former ‘external advisers’ (Jennings and Lomas, 2003).

SIPs were phased in over the period 2005–2008, but following a change of government in May 2010 the coalition’s Schools White Paper (DfE, 2010) signalled the end of SIPs. While LAs, the SIPs’ employers, were at liberty to continue with SIPs, the lack of obligation coupled with severe budgetary cuts (HM Treasury, 2010) meant that the rapid demise of SIPs was a foregone conclusion.

The research reported here evaluates the enactment of a national policy from the perspective of the direct recipients, leads to a theorization that draws on Foucault (1980), and proposes lessons for everyone concerned with the role of external professionals in school improvement. In England this includes National Leaders of Education (NLEs) and Local Leaders of Education (LLEs) – headteachers that spend part of their time working with other heads, and who have been presented as the replacement for SIPs (DfE, 2010). Internationally the nature of provision for supporting and challenging school principals varies, but findings from this study are pertinent as they shed light on the possibilities and potential pitfalls of such arrangements.

Two aspects of terminology require explanation. SIPs’ stated role was to ‘support and challenge’ – a commonly used phrase especially in relation to school improvement (for example, Barber, 2007), with the pair often viewed as a dualism. ‘Support’ is perceived as the more benign, while ‘challenge’ can be ambiguous and is not always seen in a positive light. ‘Headteacher’ is the term commonly used in England for the educator with executive authority for a school, and is used predominantly in this article since the research took place in England. ‘Headteacher’ or ‘head’ is synonymous with the more internationally recognized ‘principal’, a term employed in this article when the discussion is generic.

Background

As background to the research relevant literature is reviewed from two angles. First, evaluations of the role and work of SIPs are summarized and, second, literature is examined to identify key factors influencing the relationship between headteachers and SIPs.

School Improvement Partners

Evaluations of SIPs were reported in two empirical studies of the broader NRwS programme that encompassed SIPs. Halsey et al. (2005) evaluated the NRwS trial over the period September 2004 to July 2005, based on questionnaire responses from 68 of the 93 schools involved, interviews in 16 schools and 10 telephone interviews. Following their report changes were made to the nationally implemented NRwS programme, which was itself the subject of an evaluation published by Cowen in 2008. This two-year study commenced in May 2006 and involved surveys of headteachers, SIPs and SIP managers (total responses 3731), 46 case studies and national consultations. A concurrent study into school leadership (PricewaterhouseCoopers, 2007) also included reference to SIPs. Two further pieces (MacBeath, 2006; Swaffield, 2007) critiqued SIPs as depicted in official documentation in relation to their portrayal as critical friends.

Responses from 68 headteachers in the trial of SIPs gave ‘an overwhelmingly positive view of their SIPs’ (Halsey et al., 2005: iv), although some primary heads reported the challenge element as not always apparent. Many interviewees thought it important that SIPs had recent headship experience. According to Cowen’s (2008) evaluation, aspects of the core support function were being fulfilled effectively by many SIPs, but the picture was more mixed in relation to challenge and headteacher performance management. Seventy per cent of primary headteachers and 80 per cent of secondary heads agreed that their SIP was able to provide informed challenge to the school. One of Cowen’s (2008: 43) key points about SIPs was the tension she identified between the SIP’s ‘independence to play an ongoing challenge role with the school’ and the SIP’s involvement in support.

At the time of the PricewaterhouseCoopers (2007) study, almost all secondary schools and one-quarter of primary schools had a SIP in place. It reported that secondary heads were more ambivalent about their effectiveness than primary heads: 47 per cent of the secondary heads who responded viewed the SIP arrangement as ‘very’ or ‘quite effective’, as compared with 68 per cent of the primary heads. One-quarter of the nearly 1000 headteachers respondents said they lacked support from other professionals (not just from SIPs), and a distinction was made between more personal support and what was seen as the supervisory role of SIPs.

In a book considering the NRwS MacBeath’s entitlement of one chapter ‘Who needs a school improvement partner? Critical friend or trojan collaborator?’ (MacBeath, 2006: 120) made clear the tension he perceived between SIPs as critical friends to headteachers, and as agents of LAs and governors. In a continuation of this argument (Swaffield, 2007: 217) stated ‘the SIP's brief and terms of reference pose many potential threats to trust, which is the first condition for…critical friendship’.

Four other documents (House of Commons, 2010a, 2010b; Muijs et al., 2009; Ofsted, 2010) include reference to the work of school improvement partners, although these were published during or after the data collection reported here. Each asked slightly different questions and used different approaches, but all attest to a general pattern of declining levels of satisfaction. Muijs and colleagues (2009) found an even split between headteachers agreeing and disagreeing that SIPs had a positive effect on the quality of education. The House of Commons Select Committee (2010a: 11) reported that ‘many witnesses welcomed SIPs’ work in providing the support and challenge necessary to support school improvement; but others found their effectiveness to be variable’. Inconsistency was also noted by the inspection agency Ofsted: ‘The contribution of school improvement partners is very variable’ (Ofsted, 2010: 147). This report also repeatedly criticized many SIPs’ lack of classroom observation and direct engagement with learning, teaching and school improvement.

In summary, literature points to high levels of satisfaction with school improvement partners by headteachers who were the first to experience SIPs in the trial period, followed by an overall reduction of approval as the programme spread to include all schools. This is a common characteristic of innovations ‘scaling-up’, but is perhaps surprising in this context since all SIPs, whether employed for the first or last schools to be included in the scheme, were trained and accredited by the National College (DfES, 2004, 2006).

Conditions

Trust, closely connected with confidentiality and credibility, and time, have been identified as key conditions necessary for supportive and challenging relationships with school leaders.

In Halsey et al.’s (2005) evaluation there were repeated references to SIPs’ credibility, and Cowen (2008) cited a number of case studies indicating that the SIP’s effectiveness depended on the level of trust established with the headteacher. However, SIPs’ accountability to governing bodies and LAs were seen as compromising the trust necessary for them to carry out their role of supporting and challenging headteachers as critical friends (PricewaterhouseCoopers, 2007). SIPs’ reporting requirements made confidentiality impossible, weakening what O’Neill (2002a) and Bottery (2003) referred to as ‘role’ trust. The Select Committee recognized the need for SIPs to build relationships with their colleague headteachers based on trust (House of Commons, 2010a), which in O’Neill’s (2002b) terms could result from ‘trust in the individual’. However, witnesses to the Select Committee spoke of some SIPs ‘placing unnecessary stress on school leaders and conducting their work in an atmosphere of suspicion and mistrust’ (House of Commons, 2010a: 38). Beyond the specific role of SIPs, trust is mentioned repeatedly in literature as a feature of successful mentoring and coaching relationships (Hobson, 2003; Holmes, 2003; Lord et al., 2008; Luck, 2003).

Trust is also closely related to time. The Select Committee learnt that ‘schools value the ongoing relationship [with a SIP] and the trust and understanding of a school’s context that can be built up over time’ (House of Commons, 2010a: 40), leading them to observe that ‘in order to be effective, SIPs need sufficient time’ (House of Commons, 2010a: 42). An earlier study (Derrington, 2000) referred to the time required to build trusting relationships between headteachers and LA advisers (the precursors to SIPs), and that opportunities were necessary for regular and meaningful dialogue. The SIPs’ allocation of five days per year, with a set agenda, would appear to meet the later condition. Research into school leadership (NCSL, 2007; PricewaterhouseCoopers, 2007) advocated headteachers having sufficient time for reflection. However, the time that SIPs had available, the demands on that time, and its perceived insufficiency, were commented on repeatedly by Cowen (2008).

Methodology

The research was a mixed-methods, though predominantly qualitative, study involving headteachers of maintained primary and secondary schools throughout England. Data were gathered through a national survey (including quantitative and qualitative items), informed by exploratory interviews and succeeded by follow-up interviews. In seeking both a general view of headteachers’ perceptions throughout the country, and detailed understandings gleaned from selected individuals, the study aimed for breadth and depth.

The National Foundation for Educational Research was commissioned to draw a random sample stratified by geographical region and type of school (primary/secondary, and school performance). The questionnaire was returned by 138 headteachers, a response rate of 35 per cent, which was greater than the common response rates to postal surveys of 20–30 per cent reported by Hayes (2000) and Berends (2006). The gender, school phase and geographical region of respondents were checked against the characteristics of the full sample and found to be closely matched (see Table 1).

Table 1.

Proportions of headteachers in each sample, by school phase and gender.

	Full sample (N = 400)	Questionnaire respondents (n = 138)	Interviewees (n = 25)
Primary	84	85	76
Secondary	16	15	24
Female	57	60	40
Male	43	40	60

Note: Figures in percentages – rounded.

Quantitative items on the questionnaire were analysed using SPSS, including Kendall’s tau-b test for differences between groups (Field, 2009; UNESCO, 2008). Twenty-five individual interviews (24 face-to-face and 1 by telephone) were conducted with questionnaire respondents throughout England. The interviewees’ characteristics broadly matched the full sample, but secondary heads and male heads were slightly over represented (see Table 1). Interviews took place in the heads’ schools, lasted about one hour, and followed a semi-structured interview schedule that included the opportunity to follow-up particular points on the questionnaire and explore issues in more depth, and allowed headteachers to talk freely. The interviews were audio recorded, transcribed, and analysed with an iteratively developed coding frame using the software package HyperResearch. The coding of transcripts and subsequent interpretation were informed and enriched by non-verbal and contextual information gathered during the interviews.

In addition to the questionnaire and interviews there were discussions with a reference group formed of the five headteachers interviewed initially. They assisted with the design of the survey and commented on emerging findings from both the questionnaire and the interviews.

Headteachers’ Perceptions of School Improvement Partners

In reporting the findings from both questionnaire and interviews, the school phase, headteacher gender and experience are given when these characteristics aid contextual understanding, and interview quotations are attributed to primary (P) or secondary (S) headteachers. However, differences in views between groups of headteachers (in terms of school phase, gender and headship experience) were minor. Some statistically significant differences were found (p < 0.05) but in every case the effect (Cohen’s d) was very weak. The largest effect size was d = 0.07, and in half of all instances of statistical significance the effect size was the smallest recorded (d = 0.03).

SIPs as a Source of Support and Challenge

When asked to name their most valued source of support and challenge 46 per cent of the headteachers who responded to the survey cited their school improvement partner. The majority of heads (64 per cent) reported experiencing both support and challenge from their SIPs but for other headteachers the balance was different (see Table 2). The 5 per cent who reported little support or challenge from their SIP suggested a rather ineffectual relationship, while the explanation for 6 per cent of heads saying the question was not applicable was unclear.

Table 2.

Balance of support and challenge from SIPs experienced by headteachers.

Both support and challenge	64
More challenge than support	18
More support than challenge	7
Little support or challenge	5
N/A	6

Note: Figures in percentages – rounded; n = 138.

The SIPs’ remit for school performance and improvement meant their time with headteachers concentrated on student attainment and progress data, and the agreement of data with targets, all closely linked with school self-evaluation. During their annual allowance of five days SIPs typically focused on different elements of the school’s self-evaluation documentation and improvement plan. Some heads used the prospect of a SIP visit to ensure their documentation was up-to-date and high quality, and subsequently had very focused and productive discussions with their SIP. During visits some SIPs gave specific advice, and/or suggested other schools to contact about an issue. It was clear that headteachers welcomed constructive challenge and questions that helped them focus on school improvement. Comments made in interview included: ‘I think the relationship with someone like a SIP ought to be a bit spikey’ (S), and ‘[meetings with my SIP are] challenging, very rigorous and thorough; but that is supportive in itself’ (P). A primary headteacher who divulged that her school had many problems welcomed the questions and challenges from her SIP because ‘friends and colleagues are supportive but they are too kind’. Nevertheless occasional praise was appreciated: one of the reasons given on a questionnaire for valuing one SIP was that she ‘says “well done” (no one else does)’. A considerable number of heads reported very positive perceptions of their SIPs; descriptions included: ‘tremendous’ (S), ‘excellent’ (P), and ‘exceptional…fantastic…absolutely superb’ (experienced secondary head).

However, other headteachers had less than positive experiences and perceptions of school improvement partners. One experienced primary headteacher reported with dissatisfaction that the balance had moved to challenge at the expense of support: ‘Their role is increasingly becoming challenge, challenge, challenge.’ Another described his SIP as ‘a nuisance rather than support and challenge’ based on his experience of ‘someone coming to test that I am doing what I am supposed to’; he concluded ‘I don’t need people coming every bloody term to make sure I am reading the data properly’ (P). Other heads were disappointed by their SIPs’ lack of interest and engagement: ‘this guy [the SIP] doesn’t excite, he doesn’t sit down and capture my attention with what he has seen and what he has heard’ (P), and conveyed impressions of SIPs as just ‘going through the motions’ (P). A primary headteacher was disdainful of her SIP’s lack of perspicacity and ridiculed his reliance on data and self-evaluation information:

My SIP said ‘this school is a good school, you have improved a lot since the last inspection’ but he hadn’t stepped outside the door. I had told him a few things and he had some data. I did smile and thought well done, that is all you do – sit and tell someone something and you are better.

A number of heads pointed to differences between their current and previous SIPs, perhaps having the upmost confidence in one but not in the other. One secondary headteacher described his first SIP as ‘great, prodding and asking questions, and “have you thought about…?”’ whereas he depicted his new SIP as amiable, uncritically admiring, and a waste of time: ‘I enjoy the company of my SIP and we spend three hours drinking tea and her blowing sunshine across the table at me, and then she leaves and I get on with the day'. Another likened his change of SIP as ‘going from the ridiculous to the sublime’ (S). So much seemed to depend on the individual SIP, and personalities and ‘personal chemistry’ undoubtedly played a part: comments included ‘it absolutely depends on the person’ (P) and ‘it is to do with personalities’ (P).

SIPs’ Agenda and Reporting Requirements

SIPs had an agenda set by the LA, which in turn was influenced by government and Ofsted. The agenda focused on data and in particular pupil attainment and progress, targets, impact of developments on raising standards, pupil attendance, and school self-evaluation. The heads understood the constraints that SIPs worked under, as evidenced by the statement that ‘when you see the agenda, you think the poor guy’s hands are tied.…no matter what he is like as an individual, with that agenda…and the report is all there, he has just got boxes to fill in’ (P). This headteacher went on to criticize the report format her LA provided as it had no place for successes, achievements or celebrations, something she felt influenced the SIP’s attitude.

A number of heads were very critical of the focus on data, saying that it had replaced previously valued conversations about teaching and learning, and that SIPs were ‘more data driven than person driven…too far removed from individual children’ (P). Instead the priority seemed to be looking for disparities in the data between targets and attainment, and on reaching the LA’s targets:

They come with their own agenda about getting targets. They are not giving you advice about your school, they are giving you advice about how they can meet their targets. They are using me to support them, that’s where I have the difficulty. (P)

In similar vein another head remarked, ‘the dialogue now feels more like a professional negotiation, and an armed position’ (P) because ‘they come with data, agenda, preferred outcomes like “I want you to agree to this that and the other”’ (P). The prescribed report formats often excluded a qualitative commentary.

Generally the SIPs spent their time in the headteacher’s office preoccupied with data and documentation, rather than in classrooms getting to know the school and supporting and challenging in different ways. The SIPs’ fixed agenda seemed to preclude the flexibility to offer practical support. Nevertheless, one very experienced secondary head reported that his SIP used data to identify a particular issue but then went on to spend time (within her allocated five days) talking with staff and students and helping to develop a strategy to address the matter.

SIPs were required to report back to the LA and also to the governing body. This made some headteachers circumspect in being open with their SIP, as exemplified by the remark ‘things I see on the horizon, I am less likely to share those now, I wait until we get there…’ (P). Few of the heads interviewed claimed complete openness with their SIP, and a number were concerned about what was reported back to the LA and the subsequent consequences.

SIPs’ Credibility and Background

The credibility of SIPs was a recurring issue, and depended on the SIPs’ skill and expertise, and particularly current or recent experience of headship. There was a widely shared perception that without having actually done the job it was impossible fully to understand a head’s perspective. Some headteachers commented on the short ‘shelf life’ of headship experience, feeling that things changed so quickly that even a few years away distanced you too much, and that it was easy to forget the everyday realities of being a head. That said, the highly valued individual SIPs identified as being outstanding were not all current or recent headteachers themselves: some were former LA advisers who had not led a school for some considerable time, if at all, suggesting that a SIP’s individual qualities and skills were more important to a headteacher than particular experience.

Two questions on the survey provided information about the actual background of serving SIPs, and the background that headteachers would have preferred. Results are given in Table 3.

Table 3.

Actual and preferred backgrounds of SIPs.

Is your SIP…		Would you prefer your SIP to be…
31	the school’s previous local authority (LA) link adviser?	30
24	another officer from within the LA?	8
4	an officer from another LA?	4
10	a serving headteacher from within the LA?	15
6	a serving headteacher from another LA?	30
19	a retired headteacher?	4
6	other? (please state)	8

Note: Figures in percentages – rounded (n = 131).

The marked preferences for the SIP to be a serving headteacher (30 per cent and 15 per cent) or the school’s previous LA adviser (30 per cent) were explained in the interviews. At a fairly superficial level, serving headteacher SIPs were seen by some as having information and practical ideas to share. More fundamentally though, practising heads were thought to have credibility as SIPs because they were daily living the realities of headship, and so understood the multiple and complex issues that heads were constantly juggling. Headteacher SIPs from another authority were favoured over local ones as the arrangement was perceived as removing the possibilities of competition, opened up the likelihood of exposure to fresh ideas, and provided a level of independence. Some headteachers also expressed a preference for SIPs who were heads of similar schools, whether the similarity was in context (for example, deprived inner city areas, or small rural primaries with a teaching head) or type (for example, church aided or specialist school).

In comparison with headteacher SIPs, previous LA advisers were thought to know more about practice in a greater number of schools, and to have more in-depth knowledge of the LA and its services. Headteachers who expressed a preference for their SIP to be their previous LA adviser were making a statement about the quality of that individual and also the relationship that had been established. Someone who had been working with the school for sometime already knew its history, its community, the issues it faced and the personnel.

Summary

Headteachers had varied perceptions of school improvement partners, and they reported differences among SIPs in their interpretation and enactment of the role. SIPs’ prescribed agenda limited their flexibility and responsiveness. Some heads perceived SIPs as ‘more data driven than person driven’, with a limited focus on learning and teaching. The requirement for SIPs to report to the LA and governors was in tension with trustful and open relationships with headteachers. Heads preferred SIPs to be the previous LA link adviser or a serving head from another authority, but their preferences for the background of their SIPs did not always match the actuality; in practice more SIPs were LA officers other than the previous link adviser, and fewer were serving headteachers from other LAs, than heads would have liked. Some SIPs did not demonstrate the necessary interpersonal skills or desired attitudes.

Discussion

The varied perceptions of school improvement partners reported by the headteachers in this study add weight to similar findings by Muijs et al. (2009), Ofsted (2010) and the Parliamentary Select Committee (House of Commons, 2010a), and contrast with earlier evaluations of the SIP programme (Halsey et al., 2005; Cowen, 2008) that presented a much more uniformly positive picture. Given that SIPs were established with the explicit brief to provide support and challenge to headteachers it is surprising that more than half the heads in this national survey named another external professional (typically a colleague headteacher or a LA adviser) as their most valued source of support and challenge.

The reasons for headteachers’ varied opinions of SIPs, including in some cases quite negative perceptions, fell into four main categories:

SIPs’ remit and prescribed agenda;

the requirement for SIPs to report to governors and the LA;

SIPs’ experience and professional credibility;

individual SIPs’ interpersonal skills and manner.

These are discussed in turn.

SIPs’ Agenda

SIPs’ prescribed agenda limited their flexibility and responsiveness. In theory the SIP’s brief was quite wide ranging, but the emphasis was upon performance data and targets, far removed from teaching and learning and the reality of the children represented by the figures. There was a feeling that the overconcentration on data per se distorted the agenda between SIP and headteacher, emphasizing the quantitative at the expense of the qualitative, privileging results above learning, and focusing on meeting school and LA numerical targets rather than developing learners. No doubt most, and probably all, SIPs would have declared themselves to be working in pupils’ interests, but some of them appeared to have been caught in the counter-productive ‘education by numbers’ paradigm depicted by Mansell (2007). It is unclear whether the dissatisfaction with their SIPs’ concentration on data expressed by some headteachers in this study was more widespread, although Cowen (2008) reported differences among SIPs in their balancing of effectively challenging the school and helping to build capacity.

The extent to which SIPs were active beyond scrutiny of data and documentation such as the school’s self-evaluation report was influenced by the specific agenda set by the LA, and also by how rigidly the SIP adhered to that schedule. Interviewees maintained that school improvement partners could, and indeed some did, move away from the set agenda but that both the SIP and the headteacher needed to feel at ease doing so. Questionnaire data indicated that the school improvement partners valued by their headteachers did much more than examine data and documentation in a mechanistic way. Collectively SIPs helped heads focus on important issues and think through developments, asked challenging questions in the context of a constructive dialogue, offered advice and ideas drawn from local and national knowledge, listened and acted as sounding boards, and provided feedback and reassurance.

Reporting Requirements

The requirement for SIPs to report to the LA and governors was in tension with trustful and open relationships with headteachers. The lines of reporting under which SIPs operated (DfES, 2004, 2005, 2006) conditioned and framed their relationships with headteachers. In Schein’s (1997) terms, SIPs had multiple ‘clients’ as they worked with the headteacher, reported to the governors and LA, were employed by the LA, indirectly affected teachers in the school, and should have been mindful of pupils as the ultimate beneficiaries of their labours. SIPs had to keep all these ‘clients’, with their different needs and priorities, in mind. Some pairs of heads and SIPs worked together very productively, each apparently understanding and respecting the other’s position and accountabilities. For others, the tension generated by the SIP’s reporting responsibilities and the headteacher’s consequent guardedness appeared to be a significant factor influencing the trust and therefore the interactions between them.

SIPs’ Background and Credibility

The survey results showed headteachers’ clear and equally strong preferences for their SIP to be the previous link adviser or a serving head from another LA, even though this was always not the case. In interview heads gave different reasons for their preferences from those put forward by Cowen (2008). She pointed to the constraints on serving headteacher SIPs’ time, whereas in this study headteachers’ preference for their SIP to be another headteacher was strongly influenced by the understanding and credibility that came with the SIP being a practising head. Of survey respondents 30 per cent preferred their SIP to be a serving head from another LA, a particular combination of background factors explained by the necessity for openness, confidentiality and absence of competition, and by the rapidly changing nature of headship. However, many headteachers were presumably disappointed since only 6 per cent of them had SIPs with this background. Several interviewees referred to the limited length of time for which a head’s experience remains current and relevant; this probably explains the quite large gap between the 19 per cent of headteachers whose SIP was a retired head, and the 4 per cent who stated this was their preference.

Interpersonal Skills

A few heads were full of praise for how their SIP operated: drawing on a repertoire of professional skills; showing empathy and understanding; and demonstrating commitment and care, for example by turning up out-of-hours at a time of crisis. However, more heads were vocal about what they perceived as shortcomings in their SIP’s behaviour and conduct. Among them they criticized SIPs who appeared to be working through a tick list rather than engaging in a professional dialogue; they resented SIPs who adopted a fault-finding inspectorial stance; they felt let down by SIPs who were uninterested; they derided SIPs who were easily manipulated; and they regretted the lost opportunities represented by ineffectual SIPs. It appeared that some school improvement partners did not demonstrate the interpersonal skills necessary for the role. Aspect (the Association of Professionals in Education and Children’s Trusts), in its written evidence to the Children, Schools and Families Committee (House of Commons, 2010b) argued that there were two distinct elements to the SIP role, a line management responsibility and an external developmental function, each of which required different skill sets. ‘The latter requires modern “soft” influencing and negotiating skills’ (House of Commons, 2010b, Ev 174). However, the skills required by SIPs were not part of the National College’s accreditation programme as they were assumed to be already in place: ‘as candidates are all highly experienced professionals, the programme does not seek to train them as SIPs’ (House of Commons, 2010b, Ev 210). Data from this research cast doubt on this assumption.

A Broader Interpretation

This empirical research was limited to a particular place at a particular time, but the findings can be interpreted with a broader perspective, drawing on other research and theory to extend their relevance.

Support and challenge, the essence of the SIP role, can be viewed as dualities, but they are not mutually exclusive. Rather, in any situation each may be present to different degrees, as was made clear by the originator of the model Nevitt Sanford (1966) who, through studying college students’ development, advocated a balance of challenge and support to promote personal growth. Daloz (1986) offered a four-quadrant representation of support and challenge in relation to mentoring, as did Barber (2007) in relation to school improvement, each presenting a combination of high support and high challenge as the ideal. However, these depictions ignore Sanford’s essential third element, that of ‘readiness’, which referred to the individual’s psychological state, a product of both maturity and the environmental conditions. The support and challenge approach to school improvement, embraced by the then Labour government, was very much a top-down strategy that took little note of recipients’ ‘readiness’ – their individual circumstances or propensity for engaging with the prescribed approach. Indeed, it could be argued that the accompanying performativity culture created conditions that were antithetical to school leaders’ genuine growth.

The support and challenge required of SIPs were similar to advice and inspection, another duality wherein the tension has long been recognized (Blackie, 1970; Earley et al., 1996; Matthews and Sammons, 2004). In the case of SIPs and headteachers, some individuals’ professionalism and interpersonal skills enabled them to establish productive and valued working relationships despite the inherent difficulties.

However, no matter how expert individual SIPs were in positively and productively melding support and challenge, there is a fundamental irreconcilability in the requirement to report information gleaned in a supposedly trustful situation. SIPs were described by the government as ‘critical friends’ (DfES, 2004), a role that is absolutely based on trust (Costa and Kallick, 1993), yet they were obliged to report to the LA and school governing body. Headteachers were well aware that the LA and governors had powers to categorize a school as in need of intervention, to change its status and ultimately to dismiss the head. Using Winter’s (1996) classification of dilemmas, the duality of support and challenge is an ambiguity that can be accepted or a tension requiring judgement, whereas a critical friend reporting to outside agencies with potentially dire consequences is a contradiction and a fundamental problem. The terms of reference for any role should never include an irreconcilable contradiction, and if there are internal tensions then it is imperative that the incumbents are of the calibre to exercise judgement productively.

One interpretation of SIPs and their role is that they were a practical expression of a commitment to the entitlement for all school leaders to be supported and constructively challenged by an external professional, regularly and frequently. However, an analysis using Foucault’s tools of disciplinary knowledge and disciplinary acts of power (Foucault, 1980; Jardine, 2005; Kendall and Wickham, 1999) reveals another interpretation. SIPs operated in, and as agents of, the essentially managerial and bureaucratic context of English schooling that has become firmly established since the Education Reform Act 1988. By following the LA agenda (itself a reflection of government policy) they helped normalize its values and assumptions and thus were powerful agents of the state. Ball (1990) used Foucault’s work to critique the application of management approaches in education, and although this was many years before SIPs were created it is easy to relate them to his analysis. The one major difference is that Ball referred to the intervention of ‘the expert, the authority, the consultant, the moral disciplinarian’ (Ball, 1990: 163) only when self-examination by the school had failed, whereas SIPs were ubiquitous which further strengthened their power. SIPs’ at least termly visits to every headteacher in England meant that each school’s performance and its headteacher’s leadership of improvement were continually under scrutiny. Foucault (1980) referred to Bentham’s Panopticon (a prison designed to render every inmate in view of a central overseer) in relation to cultures of surveillance, a metaphor adopted by Perryman (2009) in analysing school inspection. Certainly headteachers in this study were very aware of being under constant scrutiny and indeed in a modern parallel with Bentham’s physical structure, one head said ‘there is a control room at the [government department] where your light goes on if you hit key figures’. He was referring to ‘the relentless pressure on exam results’ and not his SIPs per se, but SIPs were a key part of this performativity culture. Significant as this pressure is, according to Foucault the ultimate power of the principle of visibility is its effect on the observed: ‘An inspecting gaze, a gaze which each individual under its weight will end by interiorizing to the point that he is his own overseer, each individual thus exercising this surveillance over, and against, himself’ (Foucault, 1980: 155). While the pressure was undoubtedly present, not all headteachers in the study succumbed to this tendency, variously exercising compliance and subversion (MacBeath, 2008), and as with the two principals in Niesche’s study (2011) demonstrating different responses to the disciplinary power regime in which they found themselves.

Conclusion and Lessons for the Future

Overall Evaluation of SIPs

The demise of school improvement partners was not due to any evaluation of their work but rather was part of government policy reducing the reach of LAs, and a consequence of financial constraints. SIPs could be viewed as a brief experiment that did not have long enough to develop or mature. The reduction in headteacher satisfaction with SIPs reported by Cowan (2008) may be attributed to an implementation dip that might have been overcome if research findings had been acted on. Even though the initial high levels of satisfaction dropped off, all the studies, including this one, indicated approximately half of all headteachers as appreciating their SIPs’ contributions.

The strength of the SIP programme was that every headteacher of a maintained school in England had an accredited professional dedicated to providing them with support and challenge, a service two-thirds of heads experienced as evenly balanced. However, it may be that the initiative was fundamentally flawed – by the underlying model of support and challenge, in its narrow focus on attainment data that did not match headteachers’ concerns with students’ education more broadly, and because the SIPs’ accountabilities to the LA and school governors conflicted with the necessary condition of trust. Despite these tensions, the fact that so many headteachers highly valued their SIPs was testimony to the skill and professionalism of the individual school improvement partners.

Lessons for National and Local Leaders of Education

NLEs, first identified in October 2006 (Hill and Matthews, 2008), are ‘outstanding headteachers of outstanding schools’ (DfE, 2010: 27) who along with other colleagues from their own schools support weaker schools and heads in England. LLEs, whose role is more limited, are ‘successful head teachers who offer support to head teachers of other schools through coaching and mentoring’ (DfE, 2010: 28). Together they were presented as replacements for SIPs: ‘We will end the requirement for every school to have a local authority school improvement partner…instead, [we will] increase the number of National and Local Leaders of Education’ (DfE, 2010: 14).

Even though NLEs and LLEs are not an exact replacement for SIPs since they focus on weak and failing schools and the majority of headteachers will not come into contact with them, the research reported in this article indicates some lessons for NLEs and LLEs. Most of these also apply to others in similar roles, and are summarized in the next section. Some though relate specifically to NLEs and LLEs.

As serving headteachers themselves, NLEs and LLEs should be well attuned to the day-to-day realities and demands of leading a school, one of heads’ strong preferences for those who support and challenge them. However, their substantive job may also be problematic as there could be perceived threats to confidentiality and trust, so NLEs and LLEs would be well advised to consider how to alleviate such perceptions. They should also ensure that their efforts to help improve student attainment are broadly based and do not focus exclusively on test results.

Lessons for Providers of Support and Challenge for School Principals

The research reported in this article indicates important generic lessons:

School principals are likely to welcome an external professional who provides constructive challenge and asks questions that provoke their thinking and support their work.

Even though educational systems may privilege narrow measures of success, principals understand the complex interrelationship of factors that lie behind numerical indicators and want to engage in dialogue about learning, teaching and related matters rather than focus exclusively on quantitative data.

The provision of support and challenge must acknowledge and be well matched to the school principal’s expertise, needs and readiness.

External professionals should have and demonstrate appropriate experience and expertise to be credible in the eyes of school principals.

Trust is essential for supportive and challenging relationships to be valued and useful: attention should be given to the pre-requisite conditions and on-going affordances and hindrances to trust.

Conflicts of interest, competing accountabilities and potential breaches of confidentiality are particularly injurious to trusting relationships.

Well-developed interpersonal skills, personal commitment and professional attitudes and conduct help the development of rapport conducive to valued supportive and challenging relationships.

Time is necessary to develop trust, contextual understanding and for reflective conversations.

While eponymous school improvement partners are no more, headteachers’ perceptions of them remain relevant to anyone carrying out a similar function of providing support and challenge for school principals, not only in England but also throughout the world.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

With sincere thanks to all the headteachers who participated in the study, and to Ann Curtis and Katie O'Donovan for administrative assistance with the survey and the interviews. Also to my colleagues John MacBeath, John Gray, Mary James and Megan Crawford for comments on a draft of this article, and to two anonymous reviewers.

Funding

The costs of the survey were covered by a research development grant from the University of Cambridge.

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