As the SSAT National Conference approaches, the Vision 2040 team is busy exploring the four Redesigning Schooling themes through an action research process.  Our methodology is essentially built around examining case studies of school practice where teachers and leaders are promoting approaches that echo or challenge the thrust of the four strands: intelligent accountability; curriculum design; professional capital and teaching and learning.  These are currently being explored in the excellent pamphlet series that will feed into the conference.

Our goal is to visit as many schools as we can whilst doing our day jobs, report on our own practice and trawl the vast ocean of web-based case-studies for material to inform our report.  We’re aiming to publish an interim report in June 2014 and a final report in June 2015.   The report will attempt to provide a consensual view of the profession about the possible direction of education policy and practice in the four areas, if we are to be heading for a world class education system by 2040.   However, we only have a small team - and it’s an ambitious brief.   This is where you come in.  We need your help.

If you have something you’d like to share with the Vision2040 team, we’d like to hear from you.  We’re looking for case-study materials that give an outline of a key aspect of practice, written in less than 1000 words.

A Case Study Report should have the following features:

1. An outline of the practice that is the focus of the case study, set in the school context.
2. An analysis of why the practice seems to ‘work’ – defined in a meaningful way.
3. Reference to other research, academic study or documentation and/or a plausible intellectual rationale for what has been observed.
4. Suggestions about the implications for future education policy: ie the vision for education in 2040

Ideally we want to report of case-studies of practice that represent truly outstanding practice or innovative against-the-grain approaches that could become mainstream best-practice in the long run.  We’re not interested in things that seem faddish or gimmicky and have no track-record or evidence of success. We want to see curriculum design and pedagogical approaches of real substance that seem to be having an impact; we want to hear from schools that have taken a bold approach to accountability in a way that is leading to positive change; we’re keen to learn about CPD cultures that model genuine investment in professional capital.

If you can help, please contact us through the comments box below and we will follow up.

In the final report, the case-studies will be anonymised but we will list all schools that are featured.

Tom Sherrington Chair, Vision2040

I am a teaching Headteacher, interested in developing new ideas for teaching and learning, and regular contributor to conferences and CPD events locally and nationally .. and honoured to be the Chair of the Vision 2040 group.