Teacher Pay ReformNo-one would have believed, in the last years of the 20th Century, that performance-related pay for teachers was about to move from rhetoric to reality…Then, late in 1998, the Green Paper ‘Teachers – Meeting the Challenge of Change‘ heralded what Prime Minister Tony Blair described as: “…the most fundamental reform of the teaching profession since state education began” For the first time, high quality teaching and school leadership was to be encouraged and rewarded by linking pay to performance, in an effort to retain and motivate professional staff. The mechanism for head teachers was to be performance review by the school governors, who are not – in the main – education experts. For other teachers, the performance threshold would require them to provide evidence of high professional standards in return for a jump to a higher pay scale. In 2000, Cambridge Education was awarded the contract to implement this controversial policy on behalf of the (then) DfEE, via a huge national programme that became known as Teacher Pay Reform (TPR). Our remit seemed deceptively simple; to recruit, deploy and manage: - high quality external advisers to support the Governors of every state school in England in agreeing and reviewing performance targets for the head teacher; and
- high quality threshold assessors to verify the consistent application of the national threshold standards in every school in England with eligible candidates.
The scale of this project was perhaps the biggest challenge: to deliver hundreds of thousands of advisory and verification visits to more than 23,000 schools required around 3,000 advisers and assessors. Leading and managing this team to deliver the high standards of both consistency and timeliness the Department rightly expected, was a full-time job for more than 60 staff at the height of the six-year programme. Our effectiveness in delivering the TPR programme is attributable to many factors, not least of which is our ability to combine the expertise and insight of our experienced education professionals with high levels of capability in process and project management, underpinned by leading-edge ICT. In doing so, we were able to provide exceptional service to teachers and schools, partner the Department in policy development, and reverse the initial opposition of the teachers' professional associations. The culture of the profession at that time made it difficult for teachers to embrace a policy which shifted the focus of rewards to those who could evidence their teaching skills and demonstrate positive outcomes for children and young people. A measure of the success with which we addressed this issue by our policy of deliberate positive engagement with the teaching unions is that, by the end of the contract, the body which had delayed the start of threshold assessment using a High Court injunction was expressing dismay at our departure. Feedback from the Department was also excellent:
"CE have maintained a positive and professional attitude even at times when policy changes have potentially threatened or impacted on the future of the contract. They have always worked with us through our period of uncertainty and been patient whilst the department has worked through solutions." "Always delivers to deadline. On many occasions have had to provide response to a very tight deadline. Options and considerations fully explored and presented. Proactive and timely in presenting forthcoming issues or concerns." (Elaine Barr, DCSF Contract Manager: November 2005) Find out more
For more information about Cambridge Education’s ability to deliver large programmes successfully by combining professional expertise with robust process management, please call Tracy Brown on 01223 463966 or e-mail tracy.brown@camb-ed.com |