Intensifying Support Programme (ISP) means more work with no support!

Submitted by Liam Conway on 13 April, 2007 - 10:08

From Workers' Liberty Teachers NUT conference bulletin 2007
Since the successful national ballot on the NUT’s guidelines on workload we have heard very little about the issue as a continuing campaign and yet it must have been clear to all involved that just voting to support guidelines wasn’t going to reduce workload.
We hear from our national executive members that the action committee is waiting with some eagerness for the first requests from schools for permission to take action against aspects of workload. This in itself indicates that ballot requests will be looked on sympathetically and supported by the Union officers.
This is reassuring but it doesn’t constitute a campaign and it doesn’t even encourage a campaign. Since the guidelines we have had no follow up material, no suggestions as to how schools or associations can implement the guidelines or develop campaigns and yet teacher turnover and workload stress and demands for planning and target setting and new initiatives etc all continue and accelerate.
One problem is the vastness of the problem. How do people take action against Workload? It’s a bit like calling for an attack on the Milky Way, a bit too daunting, but we could make progress if we took out a galaxy at a time. Can we focus on aspects of the problem or perhaps groups of members who share a problem which would enable them to support each other in a ballot.
One example might be members in primary schools in the Intensifying Support Programme.
The ISP is a school improvement programme designed to raise standards and improve teaching and learning in “schools in challenging circumstances”. The school works “in partnership” with the local authority advisers/inspectors. It is based on the cycle of audit and setting targets, action and review.
No doubt to many in the DfES this sounds like too much cakes and ale, but certainly some members in Leeds feel that being in the Intensifying Support Programme is anything but supportive, that in fact it is hugely onerous and insulting and causes a massive increase in preparation and observation.
Members in one school contacted us after a new headteacher had put them into the ISP. A few months earlier this school had been headlined in the national press as being among the top primaries for its Contextual Value Added score. It was an inner city school with more than its inner city share of problems caused by deprivation and poverty, internal stresses in the multi-ethnic pupil population, and language needs and trauma experienced by the high number of children of recent asylum seeking families.
All these issues were being confronted and dealt with by a group of teachers and support staff who showed incredible skill, commitment and care to provide a supportive learning environment for their kids. How supported did they feel by having their lessons invaded by LA inspectors who knew nothing about the traumas and needs of the pupils, who stood in their lessons with clip boards and then gave them critical feedback that patronised and humiliated? One inspector suggested that a small group of children in one lesson had not been engaged by the teacher in a question and answer session. The kids had just arrived from a war-torn corner and none of them had a word of English. They had been made welcome by the teacher and their new classmates but the inspector didn’t pick up on it.
We have asked for the list of schools in the ISP in Leeds. We think that there may be twenty to thirty primaries involved. Some may be experiencing a more benign programme but we have had contacts from members who complain about excessive monitoring and observation which wears them out and which they deeply resent. If this is a reflection of what other members feel it would certainly justify seeking a ballot over a group of schools. One successful ballot on non-cooperation over excessive observation or planning in such circumstances could encourage other groups who have other focused grievances to take focused action.
We would be grateful to hear any suggestions activists have, either of similar groups of members or types of non-cooperative action, that associations can use to build a campaign and give a lead throughout the membership.
Tim Hales, Leeds NUT

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