It was wonderful to see so many of you at our National Conference last week, a day which contained so many ideas and challenges they have stayed in my thoughts throughout the week. Lemn Sissay was an enchanting speaker and his vision of children who are the ‘least served but ask the most of school’ powerfully evokes the importance of teachers in children’s lives. He was a real champion for the transformative potential of education.
The sessions led by our partner schools and the debates with speakers were so strong that it certainly feels, as our Chair Jon Coles said, that the wisdom is here in our network and we need to continue to focus on how we move it around.
We can’t do it all ourselves but we can be catalysts and it’s important we provide opportunities for people to come together and tackle wicked problems as our CEO Kate Chhatwal said.
Our young people have been so resilient through all the challenges and it was good to have Justine Greening share her ideas and lead a debate about how we build back better. Ensuring alignment between practitioners and policy makers as we look to Better Futures is a great challenge. But, as we share here in our Annual Report, partner schools excelled at innovation through the upheavals of last year and our collective achievements inspire optimism.
We are delighted to be able to share recordings of the knowledge exchange sessions, which include recruitment and retention; providing stretch and challenge; wellbeing and embedding thinking skills. Partners can catch up on any you missed, here.
Thank you for your feedback:
‘Such a powerful national conference-well done @ChallengePartnr uplifting, emotional and highly challenging.’ - @BeryceNixon
An insightful masterclass from @hm_hashi today. As always, incredibly challenging and humbling, with lots to take away in terms of the challenges surrounding social mobility. - @MissOBrienGBS
Interesting thoughts from @JustineGreening on how we can ‘build back better’ at the @ChallengePartnr annual conference. What are we trying to accomplish? How can we level the playing field? - @ChilternTSH
What an inspiring and thought provoking session with @lemnsissay as part of the @ChallengePartnr conference today. Lemn, you provided such affirmation for me on many of my own beliefs and what I strive for each and every day for our children. Thank you so much! - @Harrysec
“Immense desire to remain connected and to learn” - great point from @ChallengePartnr Chair @JonColes01 from @UnitedLearning - the feeling of better connections, new relationships due to the new ways of working. #BetterFutures2021 - @Steven_Berryman