Research School Network: What’s your priority? It takes bravery, but might de-pluralising priorities be the best path for leaders and teachers?

As teachers up and down the country return to their classrooms to start a new academic year, many will be thinking about changes to be made to their practice and how things might be done differently in the months ahead.

We live in a busy world of constant change, and schools are certainly no exception to this. We often start the academic year with training days during which leaders share long lists of areas for development, and numerous initiatives are introduced.

This is done with good intentions: I am yet to meet a teacher or leader whose actions are not driven by wanting to provide the very best education for their pupils. But taking a step back, we should question the effectiveness of a long list of improvement priorities and a rapid pace of change.

In his popular 2014 book ​‘Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less’, Greg McKeown writes:

Similarly, in the foreward to the updated EEF ​‘School’s Guide to Implementation’ guidance report, Becky Francis writes:

Teachers and leaders take note: by focusing in on a key priority for improvement and implementing this really well, we can increase the chance of making change that ​‘sticks’ – with the added bonus of reducing staff workload to boot.

Of course, this brings its own challenges: if we are going to de-pluralise our priorities we have to be sure that the area for development is the right one, and the one which has the highest-leverage in terms of positive impact on our young people.

And this is where evidence and careful diagnosis come in: with the EEF’s ​‘Putting evidence to work’, and suite of research studies and guidance reports being an ideal starting point for discussion.

So, rather than starting this year with a huge to-do list that will never be completed, try asking yourself: ​‘What’s your priority?’.