Walking to the station yesterday, I overheard two teachers coming out of school, discussing the state of the world. One exclaimed to the other: “What hope is there?”

It’s a good question when there seems to be so much despair. There are conflicts around the globe, a climate emergency and shortages of resources to meet the needs of communities both in the UK and beyond. The Doomsday clock has been set at 90 seconds to midnight.

The geopolitical landscape is decidedly gloomy. As the Archbishop of Canterbury will tell our Church of England national education conference today: while there is much to celebrate and give thanks for, we are facing enormous challenges.

Finding hope

So what hope is there?

Well, there is plenty to be found in the wonderful work that goes on day by day in our schools.

On occasions such as today when we come together, we will focus on the hope that sustains and enables us to shape the schools system for the future so that our children and young people can transform the world in which we all live.

There are around 5,000 Church of England schools, accounting for a quarter of all primaries in England and around 230 secondary schools. We educate one million children every day, and 15 million people who are alive today went to one of our schools.

But our vision for education goes beyond even these schools and people, as we seek to serve the whole community - that includes people of all faiths and none. We believe we have lots to offer schools across the whole education landscape, and we want everyone to share this journey with us.

Crossing divides

That is why we are launching Difference for Schools, a student development programme that equips young people to build good relationships with themselves, their peers and the world around them.

We have heard from the schools that have piloted the programme about how great the need is for children to be supported to develop these skills, particularly after enduring periods of isolation during the Covid pandemic, but also to have the confidence to deal with the situations they will encounter in their lives.

We are offering this programme because we recognise that all schools have a huge role to play in equipping young people to cross divides, navigate disagreements and encounter others well, so together we build richer communities and find more hope together.

For us, leading schools with hope is not merely wishful thinking, an optimistic outlook, or a positive attitude towards the future. It is a deeper, broader, richer concept that is rooted in God’s love and compassion for all people and for the whole of creation.

SEND and supportive structures

As we look to the future shape of the school system amid all the political uncertainty of our time, we are also making recommendations for ourselves and for the government, including:

• Prioritising the individual needs of the most vulnerable through a once-in-a-generation re-imagination of SEND funding, provision, training and development
   
• Reducing anxiety in the system by empowering school leaders through creating structures and processes that release genuine professional autonomy, trust, agency and support
   
• Working collaboratively with school leaders to develop intelligent and compassionate accountability through the wise re-imagination of inspection processes and comparative school performance measures
   
• Developing broader curriculum models that balance academic, technical and vocational pathways to enable children to develop as global citizens, who understand the vital role that religious literacy plays in the world

Through all this and more, we are deeply committed to continuing to promote an education for wisdom, knowledge and skills that enables our children to be afforded the dignity they deserve rather than be used as proxies for ideological arguments.

And if we can do this, we can provide education that brings hope and aspiration and offers the sector a broader, deeper, more expansive hope of what our school system could become, should we as a nation be bold enough to take that journey together.

Reverend Nigel Genders CBE is the chief education officer of the Church of England