Best Practice

Challenging schools: Five recurring themes

Every school is different and must tackle its challenges in a way to suit its own circumstances. However, Daniel Sobel has seen some generally recurring themes in schools that could be classed as ‘vulnerable’ or ‘challenging’

All schools face common challenges, but that does not mean that the same solutions work for all schools. Much like people, schools have individual characters and function best when they are themselves; any plan for a school must take into account not only the common challenges but this individual character.

In “looking under the bonnet” of now approaching 800 schools, my team and I see patterns emerge, both of success and of failure.

I am sceptical of nationwide initiatives because they often disguise rather than illuminate the unique problems schools face, encouraging the application of “one-size-fits-all” solutions.

Given this, it is with some trepidation that I set out here five common negative cycles that my team and I have identified. These should be taken as very general mechanisms, the specifics of which will vary hugely from context to context. I shall share with you approaches of how to best tackle these large-scale problems in my next article.

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