“It’s made staff think about why we're doing what we're doing and that there's always more to learn,” says headteacher Sarah Hughes.
Sarah has created a culture of continuing professional development at Beecroft Academy, using the National Professional Qualifications (NPQs). As well as completing an NPQ herself, Sarah has supported colleagues through their NPQs and has seen the impact of these programmes throughout the school.
There’s no limit on how many teachers and leaders from a school or trust can take an NPQ at the same time. They can be the same NPQ or different ones – all specialist NPQs are open to everyone from classroom teachers to heads of department, phase or subject to the senior leadership team. The leadership NPQs are available to current or aspiring leaders.
These are four things Sarah has discovered about how learning together increases the impact of professional development:
1. Staff can support each other
Multiple teachers and school leaders completing NPQs at the same time means they can support each other and share learnings and good practice. Sarah says that this approach “worked really well as they were able to discuss what they had found out and learned after the sessions.”
Sarah has completed the NPQs for Leading Teacher Development and Headship, while colleagues have completed others including the NPQs for Leading Behaviour and Culture (NPQLBC) and for Leading Teaching.
One example where Sarah used the NPQs purposefully was having two colleagues complete the NPQLBC together. They provided each other with collaborative support around behaviour management and ensured that they were both aligned on the same key learnings and practices.
Additionally, Sarah used her own experience to provide staff with the tools they needed to help them succeed. She explains how her knowledge of “the clinics, the communities and the workbooks” enabled her to ensure “they had the time that they needed to get those things done”.
2. It builds a shared mindset
From supporting each other to team collaboration, completing NPQs across a school encourages shared ways of thinking and working together.
Sarah says it was beneficial for the staff to have like-minded approaches to implementing change and improvements. “It meant my development, the curriculum lead’s development and the behaviour lead’s development were all coming from the same ethos and therefore all fitted together much easier.”
This shared perspective was felt across all staff who had completed an NPQ, making them "as a whole reflective but also [able to] understand that everything we're doing has theory behind it. It’s made staff think about why we're doing what we're doing and that there's always more to learn.”
3. It creates a shared language
NPQs also provide staff with common terminology, helping to improve communication and understanding among colleagues. This can be helpful for example when explaining decisions and changes.
Sarah found this shared language invaluable. “When my deputy came to me presenting his findings from the NPQLBC, I was able to understand the context of what he was saying.” Having this shared understanding “helped the jigsaw pieces fit together.”
It also helped Sarah support her colleagues when communicating with others. “I think if I hadn't completed any of the NPQs, it would have taken longer for the deputy head to get everybody else to understand where he was coming from and embed it in the school,” says Sarah.
4. It positively impacts the wider school culture
The benefits extend beyond the staff. Working better together didn’t just lead to “improvements in the behaviour, relationships and culture in the school,” says Sarah, of the teachers taking the NPQLBC together. “It has also fed into what the children understand is our schools’ behaviour, relationships and culture as well. You can really feel it in our school now.”
Sarah believes the NPQs helped the school achieve a 'Good' Ofsted result by helping them implement a number of changes. She explains how “we significantly developed our curriculum and the outcomes that we see for the children; not only in our data, but the work they produce has vastly improved.”
NPQs are for everyone
Having invested in continuing professional development (CPD) herself, Sarah believes this commitment has motivated her colleagues: “our staff were saying that as I was doing one, they were going to do one as well. We're all on the same journey, just at different stages.”
One way Sarah champions CPD is in assuring her staff that “we're all learners, all the time.” She acknowledges that “none of us are ever going to say ‘I've got it now, I know what I'm doing, I don't need anything further’. That's from the head right through to teaching assistants.”
“That's why I really like the NPQs: there are NPQs for everybody.”
Want to find out more? Discover what NPQs are available for you and your colleagues on our NPQ programmes page.
