Could this be the beginning of the end for the cliché “could do better” or, indeed, the plethora of ‘hilarious’ compilations of celebrity reports? It might be, if other schools and MATs follow the lead of the Co-op Academies Trust.
Teachers across the muti-academy trust have stopped writing reports to parents, reduced marking and cut back on data collection as part of a trust-wide attempt to reduce teacher workload.
The move follows a staff-led review at the expanding MAT, carried out to identify areas of unnecessary work that could be eliminated. The MAT asked 20 members of teaching and non-teaching staff from its schools in Greater Manchester, West Yorkshire, Merseyside and North Staffordshire to take part.
The report recommended abolishing written reports to parents, reducing the number of data collection points to a maximum of three a year, lessening planning and marking requirements and introducing an out-of-hours email policy. These are now being implemented across the trust.
Teacher workload
Frank Norris, director of the trust, said: “I don’t profess that we have solved all the workload concerns that led to us setting up the review. But we’re a lot closer than we were a few years ago and I am delighted to see colleagues taking this forward.
“I now see it on the agendas at staff meetings. Schools holding staff drop-in sessions. New more relaxing staffroom spaces, and we’re talking about mental health more than we ever have. I am convinced that through co-operation we’ll see even more creative and impactful ways to reduce workload.”
Instead of written school reports, Co-op says its schools now provide parents with “all the pertinent data together with a brief template explanation of what the numbers mean, whether it be progress, attainment, behaviour or other pastoral issues”.
If the idea takes off, presumably we can finally call time on the endless stories about how Sir Richard Branson’s teachers never believed he would amount to anything.
