Headteacher Florence Rostron and her colleagues spend a huge amount of time dealing with social problems facing their school community.

Calcot Infant and Junior schools serve one of the most deprived and diverse areas of West Berkshire. There is a mix of cultures, there are many vulnerable families, and the schools have among the highest number of children on education, health and care plans in the district.

Rostron and her team make a point of building relationships with families and working with parents who need support. This may involve helping them find, for example, health and financial support, passports and references. Staff have accompanied families to personal appointments, including GP and hospital appointments, during times of crisis.

This level of involvement is something I saw time and again while visiting a range of schools in researching my new book, From Hyperturbulence to Hope: Creating a healthy society, about how we can create a society that works well for all of us.

My background is in health, and I was interested to learn more about education and to see the similarities with and differences from the NHS.

I could see why the teachers I met paid so much attention to parents and families. They are the biggest factors in how well children learn; the home environment matters.

However, this level of attention puts extra demands on an already stretched system and, just like health workers, teachers must often feel they are picking up the problems of society.

Top-down targets

This is happening in an education system that is focused on academic activity. It has become very constrained in recent years, with exams, Ofsted and the national curriculum providing a very tight framework.

I have read articles in Tes describing policy churn, but I was nevertheless surprised at just how much the government tries to control what happens in the classroom – and how much gets left out as a result.

We have top-down targets in health and clinical algorithms telling us what best practice looks like. However, clinicians still have a lot of discretion and can mainly make decisions based on the physical and other needs of the patient in front of them.

Health and education are fundamentally about these relationships and professional judgements.

Despite all these pressures and constraints, I met many passionate and committed people in education – just like in health – who are determined to do their best for their pupils. A teacher friend told me that it’s the best job in the world.

Constant improvement

I also saw a great deal of creativity when I visited Calcot. It had recently introduced a new “soft start” to the day.

The idea is simple: the first 20 minutes of each day is given over to quiet activities in small groups in classrooms – colouring, perhaps, playing with Lego, or doing a jigsaw together – while the form teacher circulates, talking with each child, checking how they are and registering their attendance.

The soft start is about building relationships, listening to the children and creating a calm atmosphere for learning.

Another example of this constant search for improvement was the way in which Veronica Armson and her colleagues at Phoenix School, a large specialist school in East London, provide specialist support to local schools, even running classes on their sites.

This is a local initiative driven by local professionals who see a need and are willing to try something out, learn by doing – the scientific method in action – adjusting plans as they see what works best.

This is how real innovation happens, led by people who are immersed in their subject, not by dictat from above. Too much pressure to conform inhibits innovation and discourages independent thinking and creativity.

Reasons for hope

Perhaps the biggest difference between health and education is the lack of a vision of what the future looks like.

In health, despite all the problems, there is a broad consensus that we need to move towards delivering most services in homes and communities, and need to focus much more on preventing disease and creating health in the community.

It is a community- and society-based vision: meeting people where they are.

I don’t yet see a shared vision in education. The heavy focus on exams of the last 40 years seems to be breaking down. Even the prime minister says it must change. Where is the vision? What would a good education system look like in 20 years’ time?

Despite this uncertainty, I think there are good reasons for hope. As my book describes, there are many people across the whole education system who are innovating and improving services, and there is a strong professional workforce.

Last month, I attended the launch of the KS3 Alliance in which a group of experienced leaders are tackling a serious and important problem.

This must be the way forward. This is a time of change, and it's important that teachers' voices are heard and that they shape the future.

Nigel Crisp is an independent peer. He was chief executive of the English NHS and permanent secretary of the Department of Health from 2000-06. His new book From Hypertubulence to Hope: Creating a healthy society is published by Salus Global

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