Leadership models vary dramatically between schools. There is no single accepted model and every school is, rightly, free to create their own structure based on their needs.

But, after doing some digging around, I discovered that most Ofsted inspection reports that grade a school as “requires improvement” will vilify middle leaders for being ineffective. As a headteacher, this made me really question whether middle leadership was an effective leadership strategy for schools.

Middle leaders generally have a full or almost-full teaching commitment. They are good or outstanding teachers who have a whole-school perspective in possibly one subject. It is incredibly difficult for them to be able to see the bigger picture of the school, as they lack the necessary knowledge-through-monitoring insights. Their understanding of the vision, leadership skill or authority required to really create change, despite their best moral purpose or dedication, is often not yet developed. What’s more, they do not have the time to develop it.

When a school is struggling, change needs to be rapid and decisive. When I arrived at our school in 2015, it was in great difficulty: it had last been inspected in 2006 and I was the third headteacher within a year. After a frustrating first year, it became apparent that I needed to accelerate the approach to raising attainment to ensure that the children received the quality of education that they deserved.

So I decided to trial a very different leadership model: I made the rather unorthodox decision that if middle leaders were consistently identified as an issue in failing schools, then I wouldn’t have any. I would just have a large senior-leadership team with an in-house teaching and learning consultant role.

It was an affordable model if we reduced some frivolous staffing expenditure. In time, as I accepted resignations, I ensured that I didn’t replace like with like. I restructured to remove all teaching and learning responsibilities (payment protected). I then employed two non-class-based assistant heads.

By January 2017, we had four non-class-based leaders in a two-form entry school. These were great appointments. All four of us supported teaching, taught groups, supported planning, developed curriculum, moderated and analysed assessment.

Planning for succession

When devising the planning, preparation and assessment schedule, it became apparent that we had 45 minutes of additional cover time from 8.45am to 9.30am. This cover time allowed for us to set up weekly/biweekly raising-attainment meetings with the assistant head who led the phase. These sessions were focused on what the teacher could do to raise attainment by looking at pieces of work, planning and considering possible interventions.

But as staff moved on, we struggled with recruitment, like all schools do. Would the model continue to work?

We started to fill posts with graduate trainee teachers and, actually, this leadership model has been perfect for developing high-quality teachers and hopefully future leaders. They have a senior leader to guide, mentor and coach them rather than a middle leader. Our first trainee who qualified was outstanding.

The model we now have allows teachers to concentrate on teaching, unburdened by additional requirements. So, what about leadership responsibility for when they want to step up?

There is no better preparation for leadership than a secure understanding of great teaching. They don’t miss out on training: our experienced teachers are offered leadership sessions and projects to lead, but I hope that this model is offering them the chance to be highly successful teachers with a developed understanding of coaching, in order that they can progress to become highly effective, knowledgeable, skilled leaders.

Now that the school is stable and rapidly improving, we are thinking about succession planning. Our more experienced teachers now have the capacity to develop a more traditional subject-leadership role, mentored and coached by the senior leaders, and are being provided with time to do that.

We are working together on the creation of a language and experience-rich curriculum. That is one of the things the model has facilitated: a truly collaborative way of running a school. Decisions on curriculum, planning and assessment are made collaboratively.

If you want to turn a school around, you need every teacher to be a leader in what they do, not a few with the leader badge trying to do it alone. Removing middle-leadership roles helped us do just that.

Nicola Forster is headteacher at North Primary School in Southall, London

This article originally appeared in the 22 March 2019 issue under the headline “Vacating the middle ground”