SKEIN>Momentum

Schools that take part in the leadership enquiry will be supported in making improvements and collecting evidence of impact. We also offer a follow-up service, which involves us visiting the school after two and a half terms to track your progress and offer advice.

Each SKEIN Momentum school receives its own report which is fully confidential to them. It’s up to each school to decide whether and how they want to share the findings internally or otherwise. For example some school leaders chose to share excerpts from their report or report summaries with their staff while others just use them to inform their organisation’s strategic development. Some schools use their reports during Ofsted visits; others publish a sentence or two about their particular strengths on their website or other marketing materials or e.g. when recruiting new staff.

The service is based on research that was carried out with Teach First. You can read one of the reports highlighting the evidence here.

SKEIN momentum is not simply a mock Ofsted but it does support schools in fulfilling Ofsted expectations. The service focuses on enabling schools to increase their capacity to accelerate school improvement leading to improved pupil outcomes. Skein Momentum give schools practical strategies to move forwards which align with Ofsted. 

We understand that your time is very precious and endeavour to ensure that the process is as efficient as possible. We will use documents that already exist within your school, so you will not have to create any paperwork. We will send links and instructions for completing the survey as an email that simply needs to be circulated. During the visit we will mainly work with other colleagues but do ask you to participate in an interview of approximately one hour. Schools find that participation in the interview is a valuable way of supporting you and your SLT to reflect on key aspects of your school improvement practices.

We recommend that you involve emerging leaders/ administrative colleagues in e.g. assembling the documents and preparing a schedule for the visit day.

None!

We will use documents that are already in existence within the school. We will send some clear guidance about what we need so all the documents will be easy to assemble. Schools often find it valuable to involve an emerging leader/ administrative colleague in compiling the information.

The overall process tends to take about 7 weeks.

We try to allow for around 3 weeks before the visit to collect and analyse school documentation, agree the schedule for the visit and provide pupils with an opportunity to respond to our on-line survey. After the visit, it takes us 3-4 weeks to analyse the data and prepare the draft report which is then sent to the school leadership team for validation. Where schools wish to proceed faster than this in order to align SKEIN Momentum with their timelines for strategic planning and development we will always try to accommodate.

Unlike (superficially) similar services, Skein Momentum;

• is rooted in international evidence about effective school improvement that is associated with accelerated pupil progress;
• is NOT simply a validated self-assessment. The assessment is undertaken by trained experts using benchmarks derived from research;
• does not make the school do all the work, fill out any forms or provide standard answers to questions;
• builds capacity in the client school and leaves them with additional capabilities and resources; and
• includes follow up support in driving forwards developments from highly skilled and knowledgeable consultants.

Skein Momentum is fully aligned with the Professional Standard, and CUREE’s CEO Philippa Cordingley is a key member of the expert panel that developed the Standard.

The process includes consideration of your school’s professional development environment so giving you an insight into how CPDL (continuing professional development and learning) can be further strengthened. This will help you use the Standard to support your school improvement.

Schools that take part in the leadership enquiry will benefit from ongoing support that is in line with the Standard’s expectations of providers. 

The full price is £4,350 which includes the full evaluation and a developmental feedback meeting to support you in making use of your report. 

We highly recommend that you take part in our supported leadership enquiry process which empowers you to carry out action planning, implement developments and develop leadership capacity and is available at additional cost.

Prior to the visit we will send you a link to an online survey and ideally this will be completed by all students. Many schools find it helpful to assign a designated slot e.g. part of an ICT lesson for students to complete the questions.

We will need to visit the school for up to a day. We will do whatever we can to fit in with your timetable to carry out the following activities:

• meeting with the SLT (for 1 hour)
• holding individual interviews with 4 colleagues (each interview 30 minutes)
• carrying out an interactive and developmental focus group with 6-10 colleagues (1 hour)
• observing any other teaching and learning/CPD activities as appropriate. This might include sitting in on a CPD session, observing a SLT meeting or doing a learning walk.