Place matters. Challenge Partners is a national network of local partnerships precisely because we understand the power of place when it comes to collaborative school improvement. It matters to schools, to communities, to opportunity.
I’m not ignorant of the charms and challenges of the North East. My grandad drove an engine shifting coal at Seaham Docks, my parents met in a nightclub in Whitley Bay, and I have abiding childhood memories of collecting sea glass on Seaham beach.
But I didn’t grow up there, and I wouldn’t presume to know what it’s like for the children and staff in the region’s schools. I wanted to find out, and - as we prepare for our North East SEND Conference in April - I am hugely grateful to the school and trust leaders I spent time with last week for generously sharing their insights.
What did I learn?
I learned that familiar challenges have a different hue here, but similar to elsewhere they are being tackled by passionate educators determinedly doing their best for their pupils and communities.
I heard how poverty is shaped by a low skill, low wage economy, and Thatcher’s industrial and housing policies cast a long shadow over former pit villages. A school leader explained how groups of families go to a different person’s house together each day so they don’t have to pay to heat their own. Trust leaders noted how many students don’t believe the skilled opportunities and cultural riches of cities like Newcastle, Durham, Sunderland are open to them. Even if they did, public transport is so limited they are literally out of reach; an unwelcome flipside of the breath-taking beauty of a landscape shaped by countryside and coast.
Like everywhere, there are long waits for CAMHS. A headteacher reported that up to 80% of appointments are missed – because families move, needs move on, parents can’t explain when clinicians finally call, some won’t answer a call from the ‘unknown number’. Schools do all they can to support them, but are crying out to host key services onsite to make it easier for families in need to access them.
Community is strong here, shaping identities and curricula. Two schools I visited had developed curriculums designed to help pupils find their place in their neighbourhood, wider society and the world. At Wheatley Hill Primary School, pupils learn about the Romans of the North East and also visit Pompeii. Trips are funded by every child being granted a virtual account credited with £400 in each of Y5 and Y6, with a choice of visits to spend it on.
St Helen’s Primary School in Hartlepool is a ‘beacon in the community’, committed to nurturing its pupils to become good members of society. Their community cooking classes and collaboration with local foodbanks teach cooking on a budget, encouraging people to access the help they need without judgement. Pupils hosting events for the elderly and the lonely provide enriching experiences for all involved.
The school is part of Northern Lights Learning Trust, who are working on a compelling twist on the classic ‘pupil passport’. In addition to identifying key experiences and visits for pupils across the trust, they aim to use their version to give pupils something more enduring than a trip to the theatre - the confidence and self-belief to feel they belong in any environment, from galleries to universities.
Given the theme of our April conference, I was particularly keen to hear how schools and trusts are approaching the growth in complexity and number of students with special educational needs and disabilities. As we’ve also found through our national SEND Developmental Peer Review programme, North East schools are setting up their own discrete provisions to meet need. Some are commissioned by local authorities; others established without LA support. Some serve the range of special needs presented by their local pupil population; others draw wider and cater to particular special needs. It is an area where some strategic planning and central guidance could help, but - in its absence - school and trust leaders are doing what they can to learn from each other and figure it out for themselves. The difference they make to children is clear. In the Enhanced Learning Provision at Greenland Primary School, I met previously non-verbal pupils contentedly communicating and learning in a purpose-built environment with thoughtful opportunities to join in classes and activities with the rest of the school.
Leaders at Bishop Chadwick Catholic Education Trust are busy developing a vulnerability index. Working with a local tech developer, they’re aggregating pupil data into question-provoking trust-wide dashboards, and building profiles capturing the intersectional vulnerabilities of individual pupils. At trust, school and student level the purpose is clear: to provoke insight and action, with plans to integrate AI to shape tailored responses.
So what did I learn across four days immersed in the education landscape of the North East? An old lesson really about the determination and ingenuity of educators battling the socio-economic odds to boost pupil’s prospects and enrich their communities. But, like the sea glass on Seaham beach, the texture to familiar problems and responses is different, worn by local histories and environments. Place always matters.
