Meeting with Prime Minister

Prime minister, Gordon Brown, addressed a selected group of National leaders at a special press briefing today, which was

organised by the National College of school leadership. Deborah Odysseas-Bailey, Head of Babington House, Vice Chair of

ISA and Chair of the Cross Association Leadership Group, was one of the invitees and representing our sector.

The Prime Minister was initially introduced by Steve Munby, the chief executive of the college and Steve praised Erica Pinner,

the executive head who was overseeing the school in which the event was held, “Prendergast College”.

Mr Munby spoke about the “national leaders in education programme”, stating that both schools involved in the partnerships

were demonstrating signs of improvement and that pupils were achieving better education as a result.

He also spoke about the “Local Solutions” initiative and that challenges within many communities were complex and localised,

and therefore required us to look towards solutions that empower middle leaders to assist within their community and that this

was endorsed by the cabinet office last year. Mr Munby finished by saying that he strongly encouraged a spirit of generosity

Gordon Brown then outlined what he perceived as his governments responsibility to contribute to a great transformation in

Education. “Everyone remembers teachers, inspirational heros are often teachers and head teachers and this is because you

can change lives…Good teaching matters more than ever. This Global age creates more risk and opportunity than ever before

. If we are second rate businesses then our young people will not have the opportunities they deserve. If we don’t invest in the

future, we have no future”. He then went on to provide examples of how we need to invest in the Global age, e.g. post 16,

The prime minister spoke about the fact that those who will succeed will invest in their citizens and that system leadership will

allow greater leaders to innovate. That we must encourage “resilience, character and grit”. “Please look hard for our talent”, was

a comment that had been made to him by a pupil at a special school and the prime minister stated that all of us have that

responsibility, so as to identify those pupils who excel in areas other than just the purely academic and that parents need to be

To extend the reach of the government, encouraging system leadership, so that children of weaker schools could benefit
from the expertise in other establishments. (He cited the outstanding heads in federations and Executive Heads, who
were creating significant improvement, in their own, and other schools).
Modern public services, including schools, must be accountable to those who use them and that the government would
ensure that schools dispensed with their responsibilities properly and that where schools were failing the local government
would intervene.
Good parenting is crucial to pupil’s success and that therefore parents need to be more involved and aware of the progress,
attainment and behaviour of their child. He stated that the school report card was to be introduced and that from 2012
all primary schools will report on line to parents. Also “every secondary pupil will have a personal tutor”.

“We need to improve all schools and where standards are too low the local authority will be required to act, e.g. by turning it into

part of a federation. Mr Brown also said that it was incumbent on all of us to ensure that Governing Bodies were effective and that they

consisted of the correct forms of leadership, particularly pertinent to this was the role of the Chair of Governors.After the initial

speech there was time for only a few questions and John Dunford from ACSL thanked the minister for his praise of the outstanding

leaders of the sector but enquired as to why it was necessary to include yet another complaints procedure to sanction teachers,

when there were already several in existence.

Deborah Odysseas-Bailey spoke to the Mr Brown, saying:

“Prime Minister, thank you for the positive remarks that you have made regarding the teaching profession. The National College of

School Leadership has been very proactive in recent years at encouraging links with the Independent sector, particularly by acknowledging

our outstanding leaders. Therefore may I ask whether you envisage that Independent Schools will form part of the collaborative system

of leadership that you have described as being desirable for pupils success?”

The prime minister replied that he did indeed perceive that this was possible and that the government was keen to continue to explore

their partnership with Independent schools and valued their contribution.