Ash Grove Academy, a state primary which sits in Moss Roe, a poor suburb on the outskirts of Macclesfield, is an excellent school. Recently, its team won a local debating tournament, besting fancier rivals; its pupils are exposed to William Shakespeare and Oscar Wilde; lessons are demanding and there are catch-up sessions for those who fall behind. Most important, teaching is based on up-to-date research into what works in the classroom. It is the sort of school that ministers dream of replicating countrywide. But how to do so? When the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition came to power in 2010, it set about freeing schools from local-authority control. International studies suggest that such freedom improves results. But giving teachers autonomy doesn’t automatically mean that all will make good decisions. So in 2011, the government provided a grant of £135 million (Rs.1,270 crore) to establish the Education Endowment Fund (EEF), a laboratory for education research which would provide teachers with the information to make smart choices. In the seven years since its foundation, EEF reckons it has commissioned 10 percent of all randomised controlled trials ever carried out in education research. In doing so, it has turned the English school system into a giant test-bed, with a third of all state schools involved in at least one of its trials. Its work has been used in other parts of the world, like Australia and Latin America, and other countries are considering copying England’s example. But at home, its efforts have raised difficult questions. Does providing teachers with evidence of what works change their behaviour? And if not, what next? Teachers claim to pay attention. A report by the National Audit Office, an official spending watchdog, found two-thirds of head teachers say they turn to EEF evidence for guidance. “But EEF has come to the realisation that the passive presentation of evidence is not enough”, says Sir Kevan Collins, its boss. Naturally, it did this by testing its approach. Results published last year found that providing schools with high-quality evidence about teaching led to no improvement in pupils performance. The study didn’t investigate why this was the case. One possibility is that teachers did not take up the ideas. Another is that successful strategies are hard to replicate. Thus the EEF is increasingly focused on working out how to change behaviour. “One thing we know”, says Sir Kevan, “is that teachers really trust other teachers. The EEF has joined with officials who work with groups of schools, either in academy chains, local authorities or charities, to spread the evidence-based gospel. It has also increased its meetings with head teachers and has provided extra funding for trials of promising schemes in poorer parts of the country. As ever, all approaches will be scrutinised to see if they work”. The most ambitious shift is the recruitment of 23 ‘research’ schools, of which Ash Grove is one. As a research school, it gets money to help around 150 other local schools, by putting on events to spread…
