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UNCORRECTED TRANSCRIPT OF ORAL EVIDENCE To be published as HC 84-iv House of COMMONS MINUTES OF EVIDENCE TAKEN BEFORE Environmental Audit committee (Environmental Education sub-committee)
Tuesday 18 January 2005 MR LESZEK IWASKOW and MR PETER DAW
MR BRIAN STEVENS
MR IAN COLWILL and MR JOHN WESTAWAY Evidence heard in Public Questions 349- 525
USE OF THE TRANSCRIPT
Oral Evidence Taken before the Environmental Audit Committee (Environmental Education Sub-Committee) on Tuesday 18 January 2005 Members present Joan Walley, in the Chair Mr Peter Ainsworth Mr Colin Challen Mr Simon Thomas ________________
Witnesses: Mr Leszek Iwaskow, HM Inspector of Schools and Subject Specialist Adviser for Geography, and Mr Peter Daw, Divisional Manager (Head from 1 April), Curriculum and Dissemination Division, Ofsted, examined.
Q349 Chairman: Could I welcome both of you, Mr Iwaskow and Mr Daw, to our session this afternoon. I think, if I recall correctly, you did give evidence previously. Mr Iwaskow: I did, yes, last year. Q350 Chairman: That is right; I remember. Just to kick off, is there anything in the light of what happened and the evidence that you gave previously and where we are now that you would like to bring to our attention at the very outset of your evidence this afternoon? Mr Iwaskow: I think essentially that statement was actually in our memorandum to the Committee, and I think that really covers many of the main points that we would like to draw to your attention. So, no real additions to that. Q351 Chairman: I would like to start by really trying to get your views as to where we are with the DfES, because they told us that a lot has been done to raise the profile of education for sustainable development in schools, and that there is a huge amount of enthusiasm and a huge amount of activity around this whole subject of education for sustainable development in schools. I am not quite sure how that links in with what you said to us in your memo, so just for the record it would be interesting to have your view on this, really: what is the real state of education for sustainable development in schools in England? Mr Iwaskow: In reality I think there is a general lack of awareness still in the greater majority of schools. That is quite noticeable when I visit schools and I ask head teachers about ESD. There is a general lack of understanding of what that actually means. When I then start talking about some of the things that can be done in a school they will say "Oh, yes, we do that", and I think that gives you an idea, perhaps, of the flavour that perhaps there is some good practice in schools, but in the majority of schools it is not recognised as being part of the ESD issue in that sort of sense. As a result, very often there is a lack of coordination of actually developing this whole ethos of ESD so it becomes a whole-school approach. If I were to say "Is it happening in schools?", I do not think the situation has changed very much from a year ago when I issued my report. If you were to look down on England from above you would probably see a relative desert for ESD. If you homed in there would be some oases of some excellent practice. Overall I think it has a very limited profile in English schools and it is probably better understood in primary schools than in secondary schools, where there is a greater awareness of the cross-curricular aspects of ESD and what it can bring to the school. Q352 Chairman: I wanted to press you on that a little bit, because your report was a year ago and we are a year on. I am wondering how you can make the comment you have just made. Is it based on research that you have done, or just on the feel that you get when you go into schools? Mr Iwaskow: There is no specific monitoring of ESD, but as part of my role as a geography specialist adviser - it is within the geography curriculum - I do make a point of asking teachers about it, and I do actually make a point of asking most head teachers I talk to: "By the way, is there anything going on about ESD?", and I often get rather quizzical looks as to what it means. When I start talking about schools councils with real responsibility for children, developing the learning environment and all the other social aspects of ESD, they say "Yes, we have this, we have this", and I do not think they are fully aware of what ESD is. But it is not from actual formal monitoring; it is from anecdotal visits and from general discussions with head teachers, and from when I ring up head teachers and ask "Is there anything going on?" I usually get a negative answer. Not always; and especially in primary schools I find it is better developed and there is more awareness, perhaps, in primary schools; but overall I would say the situation has not changed much at all. Q353 Chairman: I think we will be coming on to issues like self-evaluation and assessment later, but without going into the detail of that now, in respect of the monitoring, which you say is not happening - or formal monitoring - whose responsibility would you say that formal monitoring should be? Should it be yours or should it be the Department's? Where would you see that responsibility lying? Mr Daw: Obviously there is a responsibility for us, alongside others, to monitor this agenda. We would not normally repeat a survey of the kind that Leszek led on ESD last year. We would not repeat that every year; we would usually wait a number of years to see whether changes had taken place. Clearly activity is taking place, advice is going into schools, and so on, from various sources. What we have at the moment in our plans is to return to a larger-scale survey in a couple of years' time, so in our agreed plan for surveys with the Department this is scheduled to come back for a more detailed look in a couple of years' time. In the meantime there is some monitoring going on, which Leszek can tell you about as part of his geography inspection programme. So there is some monitoring, but as for a larger-scale survey we are not planning that immediately. Q354 Chairman: Given that we are at a sensitive time in respect of DfES taking leadership away from Defra on this whole subject, and given the status that there is to climate change and the European Union presidency, do you think we can afford to wait for a further two years in respect of Ofsted's return to some more formal monitoring and the take-up of ESD in schools? Mr Iwaskow: I have initiated and liaised with DfES to start a new project, literally from Easter time, which is going to look at the value of ESD in terms of school improvement. The essence of that has actually been put in the memorandum. Peter is quite right: to go back and repeat the exercise that we had would actually not really add very much to the present debate. What we need to do is to look forward and see how ESD impacts on school improvement, and certainly there is research being carried out in the United States, particularly California, which has shown that schools which develop an environmentally-focused ESD focus, there is an overall improvement in effectiveness in terms of measures of academic achievement; there are reduced discipline and classroom management problems; there is often very much increased engagement; children's ability to reason has been improved. With that in mind I approached DfES last year and actually proposed that Ofsted does a parallel monitoring visit linked to research from the university researcher who would actually look at pupils' attitude change while we look at the general leadership, management and ethos of the school. That proposal is taking place, and the first monitoring visits will start next term. Q355 Chairman: I think it would be helpful if it were possible for the Sub-Committee to have a supplementary bit of information about that, because I think that is very pertinent, if that would be possible. Mr Iwaskow: Right. I am just devising the inspection structure, and in the next couple of weeks I will get that to you. Q356 Mr Challen: It would help me a lot, just looking at the survey referred to in your memo, Learning for Sustainability, if you could say whether or not the six bullet points that are listed there are in a way your definition of sustainable development or is it simply the fact that the last bullet point is there, that you then talk about sustainability, because some of these things are not necessarily immediately obviously what I would describe as ESD. Others might disagree. Discipline, for example. Mr Iwaskow: It is the impact of ethos. If you are looking at the seven key concepts of ESD and if you look at personal responsibility, equality, respect for others, which come through those seven key concepts, we are talking about the development of a whole school culture and ethos. That has been seen to have actually impacted on overall school effectiveness, so the impact of a positive ESD culture within a school as part of that whole-school approach has actually led to improvements in these key areas. The whole object of the survey is to look at how the ethos of the school can drive forward school improvement; and if ESD is the focus of that, how does that impact on changing pupils' attitudes for the better, so the whole learning environment actually improves. Q357 Mr Challen: That is a description of means, is it not? What is the end? - if you see what I mean. Something seems to be slightly missing from it. Mr Iwaskow: The end is to show over a number of years that in fact children's attitudes and values improve and that also has an impact on their attainment and achievement in that particular school. That is why it has to be a survey that is being carried out over a number of years, to actually baseline the cohort of children that we are going to look at, and look at the attitudinal change over a number of years; but also to look at the change in the school culture. One or two schools are using this as a whole-school approach to school improvement. For example, there is a school opening in Merseyside which is going to be an academy school. They are actually using ESD as the driver for the ethos of that school, and that will be an interesting school to monitor to see if it actually has an impact on improving the quality of education for these pupils in an area which is very disadvantaged in the centre of Merseyside. Q358 Mr Thomas: Can I just follow up on that, for clarity for myself as well. We have had evidence from Estyn in Wales, where they talk very much about ESD and global citizenship as two distinct but linked concepts or values within the school. From what you have just said, I take it that from your perspective ESD actually includes the global citizenship part. Is that correct? Mr Iwaskow: Yes. Q359 Mr Ainsworth: I think the difficulty you are going to have is in disentangling the ESD agenda from all the other things that well-managed, properly-motivated schools are doing, and finding a causal link between the two is going to be quite hard, because you will tend to find within a well-managed school with a vibrant head who is motivating all sorts of people that everything will get better, including, obviously, an understanding of the global environment and other smaller local environmental issues. To what extent are you confident that you will be able to disentangle the particular from the general? Mr Iwaskow: It is something that we have struggled with and looked at, but essentially the basis of each school will be their own self-evaluation in terms of ESD, and over a number of years the schools will baseline themselves in terms of self-assessment, which actually will link in very well with the Ofsted model on self-assessment, and that should generate an action plan which should point forward ways in which they can develop this, whether it is through the social side, whether it is through the academic side or whether it is going to be from both. It is a very complex issue, I agree, but certainly, because schools will be developing this through an action plan, we will be able to mark the improvements against the actions and against the baseline, and that is the whole intention. It is linked in with the guidelines that DfES is working on at the moment in terms of self-evaluation, but they are not necessarily the only ones that are available to schools. Q360 Chairman: I think we want to move on to self-evaluation, and the legislation which was kicked off in the Lords in a bit more detail in a short while, but just going back to your initial comments about there being patchy progress, given that you said it is patchy, are you saying that the majority of schools are falling down on their legal requirement under the national curriculum to teach about sustainable development in geography, science, design, technology and citizenship, or are you saying it is not so much that they are failing, it is just that - Mr Iwaskow: I will give you the example from geography, perhaps, because that is the area I specialise in. Certainly the ESD aspect is there in the national curriculum Key Stage III. What I am finding is it tends to be an add-on to a unit on development in year nine, for example. Q361 Chairman: Are you penalising schools for that? Are you flagging this up with them, that they are doing it as an add-on? Mr Iwaskow: I have certainly raised this. I have a survey going on looking currently at Key Stage III geography. The issue was raised by David Bell in November when he made an announcement about geography, and one of the issues that was raised was the Key Stage III curriculum. He did not mention ESD by name in that sense. But certainly it is an issue which I do raise among schools, but there is a wider issue of the whole Key Stage III curriculum in geography which needs to be addressed and which was raised by David Bell in his announcement. So it is part, really, of a need to look at the whole Key Stage III geography curriculum, and that is perhaps symptomatic in other subjects, but I cannot speak for those definitively. Q362 Chairman: What do you think the implications would be for sustainable development if there is a failure right the way across the education system to incorporate this, to the extent that they should be included? Mr Iwaskow: In terms of into the teaching programme or into --? Q363 Chairman: In terms of into the teaching programme, but also the DfES's stated aims of making progress on education for sustainable development. Mr Iwaskow: That is a difficult one, in the sense that I think currently the key issue that we are faced with in schools is a lack of understanding exactly as to what education for sustainable development is. I think it is this lack of understanding which means that schools are having difficulty in identifying where they are delivering it. As I pointed out earlier, an effective school council I think is a very important component of developing this culture of pupils taking responsibility for their own actions, and for having an important role to play in developing that whole school environment in a very positive way. A lot of schools do have school councils, but they do not see that as part of ESD, and I think there is a lack of understanding about ESD in general which is then seen to be compartmentalised perhaps in one or two subject areas. In those subject areas it is very much dependent on how the teachers have looked at their schemes of work and implemented it into their teaching programme. Q364 Chairman: So who is letting whom down? The then Secretary of State Charles Clarke made quite an upbeat announcement about sustainable development, did he not? Why, a year on, is there this patchy - people not really understanding this on the ground? Who has responsibility for this? Mr Iwaskow: I think the communication between the schools perhaps is not that good, and I think the issue is that the communications have not been clear, the profile of ESD has not been raised sufficiently, perhaps, and as a result the schools still are not totally aware of what it is. That does vary from school to school. I do find that some schools who have worked very well with NGOs actually have a higher understanding, because that has been brought in from those outside agencies. I honestly feel that a lot of schools are still not aware of education for sustainable development and the actual plan that is going on. Q365 Chairman: Can I just try to get to the bottom of where this responsibility lies. We are about to have further evidence later on this afternoon from the Finance & Education Services, and they told the Sub-Committee that the DfES action plan is not disseminated to schools. Do you know whether or not that was the case? If it was the case, would that perhaps be one of the reasons why there is this very patchy take-up or lack of awareness amongst some schools? Mr Iwaskow: I think one of the issues is that a lot of the ESD information is actually held electronically and then it requires schools to access that; and if it is not brought to their attention it is the usual difficulty that schools face of a mass of information, and where do you actually access it? I think that is a real difficulty. Q366 Chairman: So should the Department of Education have sent something to every school, or should there have been more press announcement about it, ore more in the specialist education press? Or should it have been through Dick Topp(?) and yourselves? Mr Iwaskow: I think you are quite right; you put your finger on it. It is actually about raising the profile. I think the profile has not been high enough up the academic - or the school agenda. Q367 Chairman: The academic --? Mr Iwaskow: Sorry, the school agenda. That was a slip of the tongue. The school agenda. Q368 Chairman: The Secretary of State said he wanted that. Mr Iwaskow: Right. Q369 Chairman: Who would he expect to have followed that through for him? Mr Daw: It would largely be for the Department and for QCA, I think. It would not be Ofsted's role to propagate the particular policy or set of guidance for schools. Clearly our role is to monitor the results of these guidelines rather than to circulate them. I think Leszek is right about the electronic means. Clearly the actions and so on are made available for schools, and the Department clearly is under considerable pressure not to send large amounts of printed paper into schools now, so many things are made available on websites rather than sent across as hard copy into schools. It may well be that this is one of the areas where the message did not get across as fully as it could have. Q370 Chairman: Have you suggested to DfES how they might more effectively do that, if you have misgivings about the value of just using websites? Mr Daw: I think all of us in the different agencies share a sense that there is still some way to go in schools using available website information as much as we would perhaps wish them to do. We do discuss it, as a shared problem that we all have, really. Q371 Chairman: Do you think that the DfES have properly handled the delivery of the action plan to make sure that it does have maximum exposure at all schools across England? Mr Iwaskow: I think perhaps more could have been done in that sense. Q372 Chairman: How many out of 10? Mr Iwaskow: You are putting me on the spot here. Q373 Chairman: Yes, I am. Mr Iwaskow: I think, given the fact that perhaps there are differing groups managing this process in DfES, both as a curriculum division and also another area within, I think the communication could have been improved. If you press me to say marks out of 10 I would honestly have to say probably two out of 10. Q374 Chairman: That is pretty poor. Room for improvement, is it not? Mr Iwaskow: That was being pressed. Q375 Chairman: I think one of the things we are really trying to identify is where the responsibility lies and where the shortcomings are, in order that we can improve. Mr Iwaskow: I understand. Q376 Chairman: Can I finally ask you: are you part of the monitoring process in any way about the way in which the plan is being delivered? Mr Iwaskow: No. Q377 Chairman: Who is? Mr Iwaskow: If you look at the plan it covers such a multitude of agencies, and Defra is mentioned in there, NGOs are mentioned in there - a whole range of agencies. Many of those are outside the Ofsted remit. We tend to look at schools and related areas. To answer that question, I do not think Ofsted can answer that question - do you think? Mr Daw: Elements of the plan are relevant, clearly, to Ofsted's remit, but not the whole plan. Mr Iwaskow: Certainly Ofsted has acted on some of the recommendations from the last Audit Committee where we were to liaise more closely with DfES, and certainly the line that DfES are taking in terms of developing a self-evaluation framework was on the basis of Ofsted advice and meetings I held with representatives in DfES. That work is still ongoing, I believe. Q378 Chairman: Just clarify one thing for me. You mentioned NGOs a couple of time in your evidence, as though in a way the success of the whole agenda was perhaps down to NGOs. Do you think that is where the emphasis should be, and do you think they have adequate resources and adequate liaison opportunities with yourselves, or do you think there is more that could be done on that score? Mr Iwaskow: I think the NGOs have played an extremely valuable role in raising awareness in a number of schools, and particularly some of the work in primary schools has been front-line. They have certainly had a strong impact. One of the richnesses about the system in England is that we have this vast richness of NGOs working across a number of areas within a wide range of schools, and I think that has been a strength; but equally it is also a weakness in the sense that there is a lack of coordination sometimes, and it tends to be projects going in rather than whole-school development. The schools that I have visited which have been successful have often used the input of NGOs, but built on it and developed a whole-school approach. Certainly the successful schools in the report that I mentioned last year were schools that perhaps started from a project and it has grown and actually developed into something that takes on a life of its own in the school and starts to impact on a whole range of areas, both academic and social, cultural and personal social development within that particular school. Q379 Chairman: So you put a high value on the role of NGOs? Mr Iwaskow: I think they have had a clear impact on raising that and, yes, I think they have a role to play. Q380 Chairman: And it needs to continue? Mr Iwaskow: Yes, it needs to continue. The NGOs add a lot of variety and diversity to the projects that are impacted; I think that is the strength of the system. Q381 Mr Ainsworth: Can we turn briefly to the Tomlinson report, which was published last autumn. You say that ESD is not seen as a priority in the drive for school improvement, and you include the Tomlinson report as part of, if you like, the problem. Do you regard the Tomlinson report as a wasted opportunity? Mr Daw: Clearly the view was that perhaps more could have been done to explicitly raise this as part of the agenda. There are clearly opportunities in the Tomlinson recommendations for the development of core studies, and so on; there are opportunities that can be taken for elements of the ESD agenda to be pushed forward. Q382 Mr Ainsworth: But is not the message that if they are not specifically there it is not going to happen, because it is not actually on anyone's radar screen? Mr Daw: The opportunity to make those more explicit has probably been missed. Q383 Mr Ainsworth: That is pretty serious, is it not? Mr Iwaskow: I think if you are looking at raising the profile of ESD, yes, because this is an opportunity to raise the profile and raise awareness of ESD, and if it is not in the Tomlinson enquiry it sends a message out to schools which is perhaps negative in that respect. Q384 Mr Ainsworth: Did Ofsted have any involvement in the Tomlinson working group? Mr Daw: We were not a major contributor in the working group as such. Ofsted was represented at the reference groups which were set up by the Department in the process of the enquiry. The only working group that we were explicitly represented on was the one to do with special education needs. Q385 Mr Ainsworth: So you did not have an opportunity to stick an oar in for ESD at any point during the Tomlinson process? Mr Iwaskow: No. Q386 Mr Ainsworth: That is a pity, is it not? Mr Daw: We were not consulted on that. The representatives of Ofsted were called to a number of focus group discussions, and so on. Neither of us were involved in those. I think the opportunity to make those representations probably was not very great. Q387 Mr Ainsworth: What hope do you have that ESD will find a place in the forthcoming White Paper, given that it was not really a feature in the Tomlinson report? Mr Iwaskow: I suppose it is whether someone raises the profile and asks the question now: "Why isn't ESD in that at the moment?" I think there are opportunities both in terms of raising it through the examination curriculum, and certainly if you are looking at working with the community I think there are opportunities to raise the profile through the vocational aspects and the vocational reform that will take place through that. So there are opportunities but they need to be actually highlighted within that. Currently I do not think there is much reference to it at all. Mr Ainsworth: Thank you very much. Q388 Chairman: Can I just press you a little further on that. You say Ofsted was not really involved in those discussions with Tomlinson about this whole area. Is that because the DfES did not ask Ofsted, or is that because within your own organisation, within the powers-that-be within Ofsted, if you like, there was not the weight given to the area that you would like to see represented? Do you see what I mean? Mr Daw: Yes. I think it was just that Ofsted did not have a major role in the working group itself. Q389 Chairman: At all? Mr Daw: Yes, at all. We had opportunities to hear about the work and to participate in one or two of the sub-working groups and so on, but the Ofsted involvement in the main Tomlinson working group was not great, and I think Ofsted did take opportunities when they were presented to offer its advice. Q390 Chairman: So is Ofsted disappointed about that or angry about it? Has it been put down the pecking order on that or should you not have been shaping it? Mr Daw: I think Ofsted will always seek to be as involved as possible in discussions on educational change and development, so in that sense perhaps slightly disappointed, yes. Q391 Mr Ainsworth: Are you involved in the preparation of the White Paper? Mr Daw: Not directly, no. Q392 Mr Ainsworth: It sounds as though you have multiple disappointments piling up. Mr Iwaskow: Yes, you have said that. Q393 Mr Thomas: Just as a final follow-up to Mr Ainsworth's question, having identified the lost opportunity that was Tomlinson as regards ESD, are you now in a position, whether formally through the White Paper or in any other way, of making those representations about the future of ESD, in the White Paper? Because if Tomlinson is a lost opportunity to re-establish or establish some coherent idea about it, then if it is not in the White Paper it is damned, is it not? Mr Daw: We can certainly make representations. Mr Iwaskow: It would have to go through David Bell, I would think. Q394 Mr Challen: You have said that very few schools are aware of how ESD can support teaching in a wide variety of subjects - we did that for our last enquiry, and DfES did say that they were going to do more work on this. They are developing what they call a suite of units designed to build ESD into various subjects. Did you contribute to the development of that suite of units in any way, and are you familiar with it? Mr Iwaskow: I am familiar with it because the working relationships between Ofsted and QCA over this have been very good, and certainly I have been present at most of the advisory group meetings. Obviously the nature of Ofsted is that we do not devise units, but we have been there in a consultation role, and certainly I have passed comment. I am not sure whether those units are quite ready for putting out yet. I know they are in the process of being completed - some are further ahead than others - and certainly I have been privy to the work on that and I have had opportunities to comment. Q395 Mr Challen: Certainly your role would be to hake sure that whatever units are produced are clearly monitored, inspected, that they are clear and concise and that teachers can understand them. Do you think they are going to lead to significant improvement in this area, as they stand? Mr Iwaskow: Again, I think the issue we are looking at here is communication, and it depends on how much they are promoted as being something which can develop ESD through the various subjects of the curriculum. If teachers do not know about them - because they are essentially going to be web-based again - the teachers will have to trawl through a number of gateways to perhaps get to these. It is a question of accessibility. If teachers do not know about them or find them difficult to access they may not be used as widely as is hoped for. But in essence the quality of some of those units - there are some very good ways of developing ESD through the curriculum. Q396 Mr Challen: The web does play a greater role, obviously - and so it should - but how do you monitor the effectiveness of teachers' interaction with the web for accessing all this information if it is no longer put out on paper? Do you find that they have any problems with that? Mr Iwaskow: I think anecdotally it is clear that some teachers do not access websites regularly; others use it on a much more regular basis. I think it depends on the security that a teacher feels, or how secure they feel in actually going through these websites. One of the great difficulties certainly when I talk to teachers is there is such a mass of information out there, so many portals to enter, that in the end I think they say "When have we got the time to actually look through all this mass of information? What is going to direct us to what is really, really important?" I think there could be some work done in terms of clearly guiding teachers to these much more effectively. Otherwise they will be there but not seen. Q397 Mr Challen: I get the feeling that that mechanism in itself could lead to a patchier performance, for those very reasons, that people do not know how to prioritise things, perhaps. Just moving on from that point, you in your memo said that the overall picture is patchy, and where there is good practice it is often outstanding and can compare favourably with best practice overseas and may even exceed that of some schools in the European Union. How are you able to compare in this way? What mechanisms do you use for that kind of work? Mr Iwaskow: I have developed contacts with groups of educators across Europe, in the EU, part of the NCC network. I actually went on a visit to look at ESD in Germany, and the German structure at the moment is that I think they have about a hundred schools where they are piloting an ESD programme. I visited some schools in the Hesslande.(?) It was that visit and talking to representatives from various other countries - I will give you the example. I think there is no clear understanding across Europe what ESD is. I think this is one of the big issues that we are facing. Certainly in Germany and in Austria I got the sense that they were much more focused on the environmental issue, whereas in the Scandinavian countries and in England it is not just the environmental, it is the personal and the social development, it is the development of positive attitudes and values that came through. Also the style of teaching and where it is taught, certainly in the schools I visited I saw it very much in the science curriculum and taught as a science topic, and very much based on environmental issues. Certainly when we were at the conference a member of the Dutch ministry actually introduced the Ofsted report and also the work that has been produced by QCA and the seven concepts that were done by the panel. That raised a stir because it was really conceptual thinking that was being introduced here, and many of the discussions of the previous two days were suddenly answered by a look at this conceptual approach which actually looks at development of the whole child rather than one curriculum area. When I started to talk to others as to what was happening in their schools, I feel that where our schools have developed good practice on a whole-school basis, it is usually a very outstanding quality, because it is looking at the development of the child as an individual, developing positive attitudes and values. It is not just talking the talk, it is walking the walk, and these children are actually acting positively and being very responsible citizens, and being aware of their responsibility not just to themselves but to their colleagues and to the environment. Q398 Mr Challen: In England could you suggest a couple of good examples of that - actual schools? Mr Iwaskow: Yes. I think some of the schools I visited in my report. Would you want me to mention them here now? Or I cam send you a list. Certainly one -- Q399 Mr Challen: Perhaps a list would be very useful. Mr Iwaskow: A list of some of the schools. Crispin's School in Somerset is a very good example of a secondary school. There is Farnborough Grange in Hampshire, which is a very good example of how a school is working in a very disadvantaged area but is making very positive links to the whole community, and the ethos was extremely positive in that school. I can provide you with a list of several other schools - unfortunately more primary than secondary. I think that is because the primary culture is more based towards - I think primary teachers are more aware of the cross-curricular links and the cross-curricular way in which this can be developed, whereas in secondary schools there is more of a subject focus - "I'm a science teacher", "I'm an English teacher". Q400 Mr Challen: In your memo you referred to the new inspection process, and that is within the current Education Bill, and in fact schools can choose whether or not to include ESD in their self-evaluation. Is that something that schools are going to enthusiastically embrace as yet another aspect of self-evaluation which could be quite a burden to them? Mr Daw: It was only really to point out the fact that the inspection system is clearly changing, as you all know, and the attempt is being made to tailor each inspection to the developmental position that that particular school is in, and hence the inspection is based on, rooted in, the self-evaluation that the school itself makes. The inspections are going to be much shorter; they cannot possibly cover all the things which have been covered in the past much more extensive inspections. The idea is to tailor and focus those inspections around the development agenda of that particular school, which is rooted in self-evaluation. I think Leszek was pointing out in the paper he sent to you that this is an opportunity for those schools which are working on ESD to signal that, and for that then to be followed up by inspectors in their visit. Mr Iwaskow: I think with any self-evaluation if you look at the process it is a school identifying its strengths and where it wants to be subsequently, and if a school feels that ESD is a strength, there is the opportunity in the new framework for them to actually point this out to the inspectors. The new inspection framework is very much looking at the central nervous system of the school and looking at how effective that self-evaluation is. Certainly if it was flagged up, Ofsted would be expected to look at it. Q401 Mr Challen: Surely this is something that we should always have been doing? Despite the introduction of this new phrase, 'ESD', surely what we are talking about is what normally should have happened? What is new about this? Mr Daw: Which parts to you mean? The self-evaluation aspect? Q402 Mr Challen: All those qualities that you are currently, and presumably going back into the mists of time, what we always thought schools should be about, and were occasionally inspected, even before the days of Ofsted - what is new about this? Mr Daw: I think the major thing which is different is the move from inspectors going in, in a sense with a pre-set agenda and a large number of things to cover. For example, in the current school inspection system they have to cover most of the subjects of the curriculum, and there is a requirement for them to cover certain things, and a quite extensive list. What is new about the system I think is saying that it is not going to be comprehensive in that way. It is going to be highly selective, and it is going to build up - the responsibility for improvement is going to rest in some ways more centrally on the school, and the inspection is there to support an ongoing improvement agenda based on self-evaluation. But that thinking is much more central to the new inspection system than in the past, which was more of an external, if you like, compliance check, or external check, to a pre-set of checks. Q403 Mr Challen: Are you confident that schools will be able to self-evaluate, given the problems that we have with defining ESD? Mr Iwaskow: Are you talking about whether they can self-evaluate in terms of their own performance or specifically in ESD? Which? Q404 Mr Challen: I think specifically in ESD, because there are other forms which can be perhaps broken down to some of the questions addressing those areas, which are bullet-pointed in your memo, so it is the ESD particular aspect. Mr Iwaskow: This is one of the reasons I approached DfES last year, as part of my response and Ofsted's response to the recommendations of the last Select Committee, where we were supposed to work closely together. I did actually suggest that the way forward would be, rather than give advice, to create a self-evaluation framework which would lie alongside the Ofsted self-evaluation framework and fit into that, so that schools could use that as a means of looking at where they are in terms of their development, but also supporting improvements and giving guidance as to how they can move in certain aspects - whether it is management, whether it is pedagogy, whether it happens to be the links with the community. There are opportunities in the actual common inspection schedule, because there will be a requirement for the five outcomes for children and young people. If you think about staying healthy, enjoying and achieving, keeping safe, contributing to the community and social and economic well-being, these are aspects which do link in very effectively with the philosophy and the seven key concepts of ESD. So there is that in there; it is actually schools needing to identify that that is not just necessarily social and economic well-being, but it is actually linked to this ESD agenda. Q405 Mr Challen: Last week we had written evidence from the Wildlife Trust and last week we had evidence from Wales which suggested that really ESD should be much more firmly integral to the inspection process rather than left with this looser kind of self-evaluation and voluntary approach. Would you agree that that would be better? Mr Daw: I think there is a tension between the desire of many people to get particular elements into an inspection framework and to use inspection as a lever clearly for change and development, and so on, and the direction of the inspection in this country is now moving, because the idea now is much more to shape the inspection according to the needs of the school, rather than to set a set of compliance checks. So I think it would be against the spirit of the new inspection system and the new relationship with schools on which it is based, to move in a direction which placed a compliance check, if you like, of this kind in the framework - although clearly we in Ofsted are always under pressure from a whole range of organisations and interest groups to get more things into the framework as compliance checks. So I think we would see it at the moment that that would be moving in a different direction. Q406 Mr Challen: What, if anything, do you think Ofsted could learn from Estyn in regard to environmental education? Mr Iwaskow: I think we are looking at two differing inspection frameworks. We have the new relationship with schools in this country which is driving the new inspection forward, where in fact the relationship is now different, the school self-evaluates and Ofsted comes to monitor that. The Estyn system has not developed that far, and there is a compliance issue there where the new framework, the new inspection framework, does not have those compliance issues as such implicit in there. It is difficult to learn when you have two slightly different systems: one which is much more inspectorial, and the system that we are establishing is working in partnership with a school and monitoring their self-evaluation, and they are slightly differing systems. Mr Daw: Having said that, because it has been made central to the Estyn system the way in which they go about investigating that, we could certainly learn from that and benefit from that. Q407 Mr Thomas: Can I ask, from that, how do you envisage under your system in England doing it for the national picture, because you can see from the Estyn system, whatever else may be said about it, it can quite easily lead to a national picture about where ESD is in Wales, where it was a year ago, where it was three years ago, and so forth. How does your system, with all these schools at different levels, with different baselines and evaluating themselves from that baseline, how does that enable you to put forward a national picture here? Mr Daw: Alongside the institutional inspection system we have a system of subject and survey inspection which we are obviously now developing into a more ambitious system, because the institutional inspection will not give us some of the data that we have previously had. Q408 Mr Thomas: And ESD will be part of that, will it? Mr Daw: What we have at the moment is a three-year plan which we have just been debating with the Department, and it has just been agreed. At the moment ESD is signalled for another more detailed look in a couple of years' time on that programme. It is in fact in the year 2007/08 programme. So our idea would be on a cyclical basis to survey important issues like this and to have a representative sample of schools to look at. At the moment the work that Leszek is doing is obviously looking at good practice and trying to develop and propagate good practice in schools; but at a certain point we need to have a more representative sample and say "Let's take a rain-check on where we are on this particular topic". So that is the way in which our system in future would be addressed. Q409 Mr Thomas: You would not be taking that, if you like, if you like, temperature test of the national curriculum until about 2007/08? Mr Daw: In our current -- Q410 Mr Thomas: That is what you are looking at now, is it? Mr Daw: Yes. Q411 Mr Thomas: Then when would the cycle come up again? Do you know when that is likely to happen? Presumably for some subjects it happens every year? Mr Daw: Yes. For each major curriculum subject there is an annual sample of schools wrapped up into a three-year major report, is one plan. On the kind of issues like ESD I would envisage a similar kind of perhaps three-yearly return; but we have only done the scoping of this up to 2007/08 so we have not looked at what the next three or five years might look like yet. Q412 Mr Challen: Has the Secretary of State asked Ofsted to include ESD in the school inspection framework? Mr Iwaskow: Not as far as I know, to the best of my knowledge, no. Q413 Mr Challen: So that request has not been made? Mr Iwaskow: No. Q414 Mr Challen: Is the DfES providing Ofsted with leadership on ESD, in that case? Mr Daw: I think -- Q415 Mr Challen: Is it giving them a good steer? Mr Daw: I think representations have been made by the Department to Ofsted concerning ESD, but I do not think a formal request has been made. Q416 Chairman: It would be helpful to have sight of the various representations which have been made to Ofsted. Mr Daw: Yes, I can try and find that. Q417 Mr Challen: How do the DfES activities on the ESD front compare to their activities in guiding you on citizenship or health, for example? Is it comparable or is it much less? Mr Iwaskow: It is similar. Mr Daw: I also think as well, if you look at the citizenship agenda that is very high profile; it is now an established subject in the national curriculum. It is taught in all secondary schools; it has a much higher profile as such because it is a distinct subject. ESD is less clear; it is not a subject, it is a sort of theme that is supposed to permeate various aspects of both curriculum and school life, and therefore, like many cross-curricular themes, it is more difficult, shall we say, to pin down. Mr Challen: Thank you. Q418 Chairman: I think we are coming to the end of this part of our inquiry. Just before you go, we have the Education Bill which is going through the House of Lords at the moment, and when we are talking about inspection frameworks and all the points that you have been making about self-evaluation, I seem to get the feeling that what you are talking about is schools or head teachers looking at ESD as a kind of add-on extra at the end. Should there not be something on the face of the legislation in the same way that I believe there is in Wales about duties and powers in respect of sustainable development, in which case that would then surely inform everything that the school is doing? Mr Iwaskow: I think it certainly informed the debate in Wales, and certainly that is in the actual legislation and it has then permeated down through and into the inspection system; but that is the situation in Wales. Q419 Chairman: Should it not be in the Education Bill currently going through Parliament? Have we not got a legislative opportunity to write this in as it goes through Parliament as we speak? Mr Iwaskow: I think the powers to do that rest with the House, surely, in that sense, to bring the attention of that to the powers-that-be. Q420 Chairman: I note your answer on that. Mr Iwaskow: Thank you. Q421 Chairman: I just wanted to ask you about training for inspectors. Is there any training in respect of inspectors in ESD? Is that carried out? Mr Iwaskow: Currently no, but I have been in discussions with some material that is being filmed at the moment, linked to some of the self-evaluation framework that is being developed, and the potential of that is that when it is completed it may well be used for training inspectors at some future date to make them aware of ESD and how it can be identified in schools. Certainly the inspectors that I use on my sample visits do get training in the instruments that we are using and they get access to the documentation they are expected to understand, so they get a much better picture of ESD. Certainly out there in the section 10 inspections which are finishing shortly there is no training for ESD, but it can be built into the new training if it is required. Q422 Chairman: Thank you for that. On that note we will perhaps look forward to inspectors having some bedtime reading of the EAS and the Committee proceedings. Thank you very much indeed. Mr Iwaskow: I will certainly do my best. Thank you. Witness: Mr Brian Stevens, Director, Finance and Education Services, examined. Q423 Chairman: Good afternoon, Mr Stevens. I think you sat through the previous session so I think you are aware of the direction of our enquiry. Can I welcome you and begin by saying we have received your evidence, and thank you very much indeed for that. It would certainly be helpful for me and for the Committee if you could perhaps just give us a little bit of background about your business, really. It would be very helpful to know where you fit into the overall scheme of things in respect of this agenda that we are pursuing in terms of our enquiry, so perhaps that might be an opportune moment for you to allow us to catch up with where you are at. Mr Stevens: OK. I have brought some packs for you so that you have some information afterwards as well. I set FEdS up as a company in 1996 and we act really as a small catalyst company between some 56 multinationals in our business forum on lifelong learning and the government on a whole range of issues. In the realm of learning the government means Edinburgh, Cardiff, and from time to time Belfast as well now, these days. Those issues are not all to do with schools, necessarily; they are to do with corporate universities as well; so it is both learning issues within companies and the companies who manage their programmes in the education sector. Where I became involved in this particular area - two reasons. One, Sir Geoffrey Holland works with me for 20 or so days a year, and of course was deeply involved in the early part of this. Secondly, when I read the development plan that was published in September 2003 I read with considerable interest that the DfES did not mention in the development plan anything to do with the private sector being engaged in this, and yet virtually all the companies I work with, from Marks & Spencer through to Microsoft to BP, are working with schools. So I approached Michael Stevenson and his team at the DfES and said "Surely there's an opportunity here to look at the way those private sector companies, for whom this is a hugely important area, as part of their work with schools, might be able to share some of their thinking". I put forward the suggestion of developing an alliance on sustainable development amongst companies. We had a seminar in July of last year, and I think you have the paper arising out of that; I put it in the packs for you just to make sure you have it. I have not really taken it very much further than that, partly because, as I think you know, I have been very closely involved in the Tomlinson report, and I am beginning to get the other part of my life back now, and partly because at that seminar the companies there were slightly reticent about moving forward very much because it became terribly clear that this was not an awfully high agenda in the schools. They did not feel like coming forward, taking a major initiative of their own. That interest remains very strongly and I am still talking to the DfES about this. I still think there is an important area of partnership to be developed. We were a little taken aback that there was not a strong lead coming from the school sector to respond to what we were trying to say. Q424 Chairman: That is helpful. Just so I can understand a little bit more about this, are you saying that the response from the schools was linked to the way in which DfES educated or failed to educate schools about the content of the actual package? Do you happen to know, for example, why it was not disseminated in the way you might have expected? Mr Stevens: I am fairly certain this document never reached schools. Q425 Chairman: That is an amazing statement, is it not, because it was sent to the schools? Mr Stevens: That was what I thought. I think probably it was not sent out to schools. Q426 Chairman: Have you asked if it was? Mr Stevens: I checked with the person I was working with who did not come into the unit at the DfES when this was launched. If I can go a little broader than that because you have been talking quite a lot about this with Ofsted. I think right at the centre of the problem is a communications one. There is a very strong injunction almost, on civil servants not to overload schools with paper, which one understands. A great deal of weight is now being put on the possibilities of technology. That is fine, but the impression I have - I am not as closely involved in all of this as Ofsted, obviously - is that frameworks are established and papers are put on the Web, but that does not constitute communication. For communication to take place there has to be a receiver of the message. Q427 Chairman: Is it not called leadership? Mr Stevens: You are putting words into my mouth. It is strange because Charles Clarke had this very, very strongly in his wish to move on this. I am not quite sure why it did not go through, to be honest, because the organisations, which you have not mentioned this afternoon yet which can be quite important in this, are organisations like the Secretary Heads Association and the National Association of Headteachers, which can pick up a number of these things. I think there are other ways of approaching schools. Looking at it from a different point of view, if a headteacher in a secondary school either receives this through the Web or in the post, he needs to know what its status is also. Does he or she bin it or do they do something about it? It is not part of their accountability programme - we have just heard about that earlier this afternoon - and they have got an awful lot of other things they have to be accountable for. If you are running a system for which you are accountable, those are the things you put your mind to and if this is not part of it - it may be part of your personal agenda, in which case, fine - then you do not do it. I think there is an issue here, it is rather like financial literacy. Everyone says financial literacy is hugely important, probably as important in a different way as this, but it happens sporadically. It is yet another one of these issues, it is not accountable, it is mentioned in the Education for Citizenship, but it is not required. It is one of these very, very broad areas unlike financial literacy, it is very broad. As I said in my statement, I doubt this term of Education for Sustainable Development has any resonance in the public, let alone in schools. There is a huge interest in it in a vague sort of way, but it is mighty difficult when you are trying to pin it down to precisely what do you as a driver for your daily exercise of running a school when you have so many other things to do. Q428 Chairman: In view of what you have just said, I wonder whether or not you would expect organisations like the Headteachers' Association to be falling over backwards to contribute to this inquiry? Mr Stevens: I think probably it says quite a lot about the position of this whole issue, that they are not. Probably it says quite a lot about this issue that Ofsted inspectors are not being trained to do it and it says quite a lot about this issue that there is not an Ofsted inspector who has this as his primary duty. I think you ought to draw your own conclusions from that. Q429 Chairman: In the memorandum we have had from the DfES, they talk about this process of change already being underway with the Action Plan. We are looking at achievements against the Plan like, for example, the Global Gateway and the Healthy Living Blueprint. Are you aware of these initiatives and do you think they might succeed where others might not succeed so well? Mr Stevens: Those are some and there are a lot of other initiatives, for example, the initiative of Eco-schools, of learning through landscapes. There are a lot of organisations working and I think I am right in saying that 45 per cent of Scottish schools have already signed up to the Eco-schools programme. Q430 Chairman: Do you know what it is for English schools? Mr Stevens: I do not know. There are a lot of these initiatives and in some ways the way the DfES is operating now, since the Gershon Report, and the new relationship it is establishing with its schools is an important one here because it is establishing, as you heard from Ofsted, a framework rather than being involved in the micro-management of what goes on in schools. An awful lot of us are very pleased and we think that is right. It is very much part, as well, is it not, of the crucial management problem we have in any organisation - business, NGO or others - at the moment - of how you properly manage a devolved organisation? You can provide a framework and if you are insisting on the details being done in parts of the organisation in a sense it is no longer devolved, so you have got a real issue here. Q431 Chairman: You are saying this is as much a failure of new management techniques, the new ways of doing things? Mr Stevens: Yes, I think it needs thinking through a great deal more. On the other hand, it would be wrong to say it is entirely ineffective because the framework is there. I think I said in my submission it is a well written document. I like the way the four objectives feed together and form a circular momentum, I think that goes really well. It gives a framework for the Eco-schools, the Forum for The Future and lots of other organisations to work within, but there is no driving necessity for them to do so. The issue we have not worked through is how does the framework becomes live so it is driving action as well. There can be business reasons developed here about simply saving on budgets over issues to do with electricity and waste disposal. I do not think this is about the curriculum entirely, this is about people living this and not just learning it. There is not much point in having 30 minutes on learning the finer arts of waste disposal if the school is in a tip, there has to be a bit of both. There is a huge opportunity for that, which is what Forum for The Future and others are engaged in and most successfully engaged in. At the moment we have got a lot of ponds, it would be very nice to make a lake. Q432 Mr Ainsworth: Whose job is it to make the business case which you just referred to? Mr Stevens: I do not think there is one area for blame. That is what I was hoping we might be able to do through the alliance with the private sector working with the Department. We have not done that yet, but we might still do so. I think it can be something that the Department can do as an additional part of the framework and it can be done at a lot of different levels. There is an organisation called HTI, which you may have come across - Heads and Teachers Into Industry - which works with Severn Trent Water and they have produced a very interesting training pack for schools and teachers which Severn Trent Water are running. Like me they work on the interface between business and schools and they have been putting together some evidence of two secondary schools in the Midlands which they have looked. Q433 Chairman: Which ones are they? Mr Stevens: I do not know offhand, but I would be happy to tell you. This is where there is a deliberate policy on saving electricity - by turning computer screens off, turning lights off and so on - has amounted to £25 per head, per child, per year in savings. If that happens, it will start getting quite interesting. Q434 Mr Ainsworth: The business case you referred to in your memorandum and spoke about is effectively an agenda to do with saving costs at individual schools? Mr Stevens: I would not like to give it just a cost because in the business of schools part of it is costs, but it seems to me there has to be a driving rationale for schools to pick this up voluntarily if it is not going to be part of a statutory requirement. Obviously it becomes even stronger if there is a statutory underpinning of the thing. For governors of schools, £25 per pupil, per year saved is significant. Q435 Mr Ainsworth: Do you approach this issue as, essentially, a business proposition or do you have personal feelings about the merits of environmental education and sustainable development? Mr Stevens: Both. The Prime Minister is making it very clear in the Presidency of the G8 and he spoke very clearly at the tenth anniversary of the Prince of Wales Trust in November about this. I drove from the M1 up to Bedford on a business visit last week, and that is about ten miles of landfill. I was absolutely staggered, there was plastic everywhere and that cannot make sense. The use of raw materials, fossil fuels, cannot make sense for us to go on at this level. There is a hugely strong issue there and I think the public is aware of all of those things. After the terrible events in Asia and the equally terrible events for the individuals involved in Carlisle, which was partly because of the drainage of farmland as well as unusual weather, you cannot have those things happening without being aware that we have a responsibility somewhere, but it is so big, it is how do you get hold of it and I think that is what we are trying to get to the schools. Q436 Mr Ainsworth: I think you had some involvement in the Tomlinson issue? Mr Stevens: Yes, I did. Q437 Mr Ainsworth: Including chairing the Employers Group? Mr Stevens: Yes. Q438 Mr Ainsworth: You said that neither of the two groups you were involved with, the Unified Qualifications Group or the Employers Group, dealt at all with Education for Sustainable Development. If you are committed personally to this agenda, as Chairman, why did you not ensure that at least the Employers Group looked at the issue? Mr Stevens: Because I am committed also to about six other big agendas, this is not the only one. Apart from anything else, the Tomlinson Committee, and the discussion you have just been having, was off-balance with Ofsted. The Tomlinson Committee was not looking at this sort of detail, it was setting a learning framework. As I put in my submission, we do not know what will happen to the Committee, we are waiting for the White Paper which is due towards the end of February. The opportunities through core learning, as opposed to main learning, are very considerable in this area as with financial literacy as well. The Tomlinson Committee did not have Ofsted on it, but it did not have the Adult Learning Inspectorate on it either. The members of the Committee were invited by Mike Tomlinson, they were not put there by the DfES. Mike Tomlinson was given a completely separate remit. Those of us working with him were working to the very clear remit which was set by the Secretary of State and that was about frameworks of learning. Q439 Mr Challen: You do not agree with Ofsted and others who have given evidence here that Tomlinson was a lost opportunity to promote the ESD agenda? Mr Stevens: No, I do not think it was a lost opportunity. Q440 Mr Ainsworth: You do not think it was an opportunity at all? Mr Stevens: I think it is wrong to think of it as a specific opportunity for sustainable development. It was no more specifically for financial literacy either. It was setting up a much, much broader framework. Q441 Mr Ainsworth: Would it be possible for you to write to us giving us a little bit more information about the work of the Unified Qualifications Group and the Employers Group within the Tomlinson Framework? I think that would be helpful. Mr Stevens: Yes. Q442 Mr Thomas: Following on from the questioning, if you felt Tomlinson was not in any way an opportunity for Educational for Sustainable Development - I think you suggested it was too strategic, in a sense it was not down at that level - do you think the White Paper should be an opportunity for ESD? Mr Stevens: I do not think the White Paper will touch this, no. The White Paper will be looking at the learning patterns which have been set out and, much more, will be looking at the implications of those. Q443 Mr Thomas: You see the White Paper as implementing Tomlinson? Mr Stevens: Yes, absolutely. I have said that the Core Learning Programme within Tomlinson opens a tremendously fine opportunity because the Core Learning Programme opens what is not available now, which is for young people to understand that learning is not just about being taught and the projects they get involved in have an important learning component which will become part of the diploma system which at the moment it is not, it is lost. Q444 Mr Thomas: How do you see that potentially happening? I am not quite sure to what detail you and your company get involved in the curriculum, for example. You suggest, in the evidence you have given us that the past history of us trying to establish ESD in a piecemeal fashion across the curriculum has failed. Can you say a little bit more about how you would see that working? How would you see ESD fitting into this core learning, the new opportunities you foresee coming from Tomlinson so-called White Paper? Mr Stevens: I will take the cross curricula bit which you were talking about first of all. When the National Curriculum was brought in at the end of 1980s/early 1990s, there was a tremendous move to have cross curricula themes. They were almost entirely unmanageable in the school. The problem is how do you have a coherent learning programme which is set in different parts across the curriculum at a year level and progresses as the child goes through the years, so they do not do dinosaurs five times. It is incredibly difficult management. There is no curriculum structure which I am aware of, not just in the UK, abroad as well, where this has had any success. I do not think that is what we are talking about here, coming back out of cross-curricula themes. Yes, there are important parts which can come into geography, history or whatever in main learning, but within the core learning, which I am talking about, the opportunity there is very, very high under the development and skills. For instance, if a young person became, which they can do, terribly deeply engaged in this sort of thing, then the pursuance of that as a project is already allowed for in the core learning. Also, it becomes part of that very, very important set of three questions of non-tested learning: what have I been doing; what have I learned from what I have done; and what evidence have I got. For the first time ever, Tomlinson puts that opportunity for learning into a formal diploma system. At the moment it is lost, unless someone puts it into a CV. Q445 Mr Thomas: In effect, you are saying we are not going to get anywhere with EDS, at least in England, until we have Tomlinson implemented? Mr Stevens: I think Tomlinson will be enormously helpful to it. Q446 Chairman: Although it does not mention sustainable development? Mr Stevens: No, it does not, but it does not mention financial literacy either. It is very helpful to all of these areas. If the issue is that you are saying 100 per cent of young people need to do this rather than 100 per cent of young people need to be part of a community that is thinking about this, which I would champion more strongly, I do not think the first will or can happen because it is very, very difficult to manage. Q447 Mr Thomas: I want to turn to the Government itself, which you suggest also has a burning view on this matter anyway, you referred particularly to the need to bring together an alliance. Indeed, as you opened with your remarks you talked about what you were trying to do as far as the business community was concerned. You left it hanging, in a sense, about what has happened since you had that meeting with the business community. What sort of response have you had since from Government? Are they making overtures to you? Mr Stevens: Yes, they are very, very keen. Q448 Mr Thomas: Is it the business community that is a little bit concerned because they are not sure what way it fits in? Mr Stevens: As I said, the business community held back at the seminar and were slightly surprised that it was not coming back at them. They came very enthusiastically and funding was put into the seminar. Q449 Chairman: Funding from the DfES? Mr Stevens: No, from two companies. Q450 Mr Thomas: If the DfES are making overtures to you, and they seem quite keen, why is business not getting that signal that the DfES would be very interested in business getting involved in this now? Mr Stevens: They might well do, but as I said to you, I have run out of steam a little bit between July and now. That is my fault, that is not the DfES's fault or business. The issue is not lost by a long chalk. There is an important issue to take forward if we can. Q451 Mr Thomas: There is one level of education where business also gets directly involved and that is on governing bodies. What sort of role have governors and national governing bodies had on this? Mr Stevens: A crucial role. Again, this is one of the points I mentioned. I run the governors Forum for Unilever as well as a number of other companies. We have a summer conference every year where about 120 Unilever governors come together at the National College for School Leadership together with their headteachers. Last year Michael Stevenson came up to talk to them about this issue, and for them probably they responded much more quickly than the headteachers - because this is a key issue for a major food company like Unilever - and wanted to find out how to respond. It is not a high issue in the schools of which they are governors. When they have their hat on as governors, they have got all sorts of other things they have to deal with. Q452 Mr Thomas: I appreciate that, but do they not bring this from their business background, knowing that their work involving corporate social responsibility is increasing environmental responsibility and demands of climate change? Mr Stevens: I agree with you and that is a very big area where we can take this forward. I think that is absolutely right. I am just putting a "but", but I am not saying, therefore I do not want to do it. We do have to remember the position of governors. It is an extraordinary situation that our schools are run by 480,000 part-time, partially-supported unpaid governing bodies and it is amazing it works so well. To bring an issue like this is quite a big one, but there may be some companies - the big ones, the smaller ones cannot afford it - such as, Unilever and Exxon Mobile who all have governor networks, who might well begin to pick into this. Q453 Chairman: What do you think the Government is looking for from companies like these? Mr Stevens: The support of thinking. If I can give you an example of that. One of the things which, again, we have not mentioned this afternoon is the Building Schools for The Future. There is a massive programme which must impact on this in a big way. The team at the DfES have an enormous job to do. Basically, they have to put five billion pounds' worth of bricks in the mud, but how much bandwidth have they got to think about what those bricks are going to be for? We had a seminar with that team to look at how can business be helping them in the thinking process of what is the design of these things going to be for. I have put in the packs there - in case it is of interest to you - the paper that came out of that. Q454 Chairman: That is very helpful. Mr Stevens: One of the issues which came out of that is the team are taking a lot of trouble about materials being used in the schools. With sustainable development in mind, however they are built like that, we have a considerable problem of making sure the people that then go and populate these buildings understand what they are about. The link to us seemed to be to the National College for School Leadership, is it becoming part of what the headteacher does, which it is not yet. Can you see what I am trying to get to? This is a broader issue than just a curriculum one. I think the Department have set an important framework, but it is not buttoned into things yet. Q455 Mr Challen: When we asked about resources for delivering the Government's commitment to ESD, you gave us a very short answer which was partly encouraging perhaps. You said that this is not so much about resources, it is about attitude, willpower and focus. Where do you think there is a lack of willpower, focus and attitude which is diminishing the delivery? Mr Stevens: At the risk of repeating myself a little bit, I think if there was a leadership, management wish to do this on the broad spectrum, which I have been trying to put before you, I think it would happen. There is a super little example, Whitbread have an environmental award and the winner of the Whitbread Environmental Award for 2003 was a 15-year old girl in a secondary school - you are going to ask me for the name of the school, I will need to get that for you - who persuaded the senior management team and the governors of that school to consider solar energy, which they did, and they are now exporting to the National Grid. I find those sort of stories terribly exciting and that is the sort of thing I have in mind. I go back to this point about the business case which I was trying to explain to you which I think is more than just about cash but it can be that. I think an awful lot can happen by simply re‑thinking what has already been done but done in a different way. All the primary schools in Fife now have wind generators on their roofs. A local company has developed a special small‑scale generator. That has not taken up a huge amount of resource but it changes the attitudes of the young people working in that school who are seeing for themselves what this means. Q456 Mr Challen: How is that good practice disseminated? What is the most popular route for getting that information out? Mr Stevens: I think that is a very important point you are making. In Scotland or Wales it is relatively easy because it is a small community. It is very difficult in England but I do not think it is at all impossible and I think that could be part of the leadership programme of deliberately having dissemination seminars or whatever. There are ways of doing that, I think, and one of them probably is not through the web unless the web is being very, very closely used as the back‑up. People do not access the web unless they have got a reason to do so. Q457 Mr Challen: But within government from your experience would it be the DfES's job to do that for schools? Mr Stevens: I think the DfES could well do that. I am not quite sure how it fits into the way they now wish to operate. It could happen at LSE or LEA level too, but it could also happen across the private sector working in partnership because we do have a community interest in all of this. That is what I was trying to get at. I do not think it is a matter of putting a lot of money in. I think it is a battle of hearts and minds much more. Q458 Chairman: Okay, on that note can I thank you very much indeed for your time in coming to the Committee and also for the fact that you have supplied this information. Mr Stevens: I hope they are helpful. Chairman: Mr Stevens, thank you very much indeed. Memorandum submitted by QCA Examination of Witnesses
Witnesses: Mr Ian Colwill, Director of Curriculum, and Mr John Westaway, Consultant for ESD, QCA, examined. Q459 Chairman: Welcome Mr Colwill and Mr Westaway. It has been quite a long afternoon session. I know that you have heard some of the exchanges that we have had. Can I first of all welcome you to the select committee this afternoon and thank you for the contributions that you have made. I think one of the issues that we are really trying to get to grips with is whether or not Education for Sustainable Development is still relevant, and we are very interested in what you had to say in your evidence to us. You talk about a gradual improvement in recognition of the term. Do you have any evidence to say there is that improvement? Is it just a feeling that you have or is it something that is more structured than that? Mr Caldwell: We have an annual monitoring and evaluation programme which picks up evidence from schools in both a quantitative way across 1,000 schools and also through qualitative mechanisms which involve meetings with teachers, visits to conferences, visits to schools, and so on, and in that sense there is a degree of an evidential base but I think it would not be a particularly strong evidential base because it is picking up evidence across the whole system. There is therefore some basis from our monitoring that there is a gradual improvement but things do not happen rapidly, as you know, in education and it is a case of noticing changes in schools that have picked up on things that they have not before, and such like. Mr Westaway: The evidence that I would base it on would be more anecdotal. In my dealings with schools and in meeting teachers there is less often a glazed look when one mentions the phrase ESD or Education for Sustainable Development than maybe five years ago. I think our statement was probably more a rebuttal of the notion that it might have lost its currency rather than there was any staggering growth. I was a little surprised that there was a feeling afoot that it has lost currency. Q460 Chairman: Do you think it is still something that is worth pursuing in terms of its currency? Mr Westaway: I certainly do. I think QCA's view would be that there was something there that was worth pursuing. Q461 Mr Challen: You sort of give the impression that where ESD is being given an emphasis in schools it is the environmental strand that tends to be dominant. Why do you think that is? Mr Westaway: Again it is based on visits to a relatively small number of schools but when schools come forward and say, "Oh yes, we are engaging with ESD," the sorts of things that they are normally describing or showing you as evidence for that are the recyclings, the concern about the school environment, the litter, reducing energy usage, and so on. It tends to be on the environmental side rather than on the social or economic side or even sometimes not making the links between environment and, say, health or inclusion, and in a way they are picking off the bits of the ESD agenda which they are probably most familiar with and most comfortable with because it is a difficult concept to get your head round. Q462 Mr Challen: So it is almost easier to point at really, is it not? Mr Westaway: It is easier to point at. Q463 Mr Challen: If you have somebody coming round to look at a school? Mr Westaway: I think it is at an early stage in the ESD journey, if you will. I think if you go to schools that are at a more advanced stage of development of Education for Sustainable Development, they have certainly got those environmental elements in place but they are also beginning to make links across the whole curriculum, across the fabric of the school, linking in things like anti‑bullying with changes they are making to the school grounds and so on, and they are doing the same sorts of things but they are adding to them. I do not think it is an alibi for any wider action. It is really a dipping a toe in the water of ESD. Q464 Mr Challen: Obviously that is a very incremental process, it is a learning process for the teachers and the students and everybody else, clearly. Mr Westaway: Yes. Q465 Mr Challen: But is it also a way perhaps of avoiding wanting to teach ESD? You mentioned the word "alibi". Is this eventually going to get to some kind of plateau-ing where they have reached their saturation point, if you like, and feel they cannot go any further because they have ticked all the boxes and done the job? Mr Westaway: If it does lead to a plateauing I do not think will be a conscious decision that they will go that far and no further. I think it is probably more a reflection of the fact that they are not sure where it is they need to go next and they do not feel that there is any great encouragement to take that particular area of learning further. Q466 Mr Challen: You said in your memo "the term used for the new development" ‑ I am assuming that you are referring to the single development framework mentioned in a previous paragraph - "may suggest an emphasis on sustainable schools rather than schools that educate for sustainable development". Would you agree that it is quite a problem that these two things should be working side‑by‑side? Mr Westaway: I think the two things should most certainly be working side‑by‑side. I think it was just a feeling that with the dropping of the "Education for" bit of ESD, that the danger was that schools might think all they needed to do is fit low energy light bulbs and change the taps and in a way see the environmental activities as being an easy and quick fix. If that was as far as they went in making their building more sustainable a) they would not be going as far as I think it would be valuable for them to go b) they would not release the value of integrating teaching, learning, the curriculum, and the way they run the school. It seems to me it is only when you bring those four things together that you get the value added. Q467 Mr Challen: So you have got this dual approach which is teaching and practice of a good environmentally sound school perhaps. What are the barriers to taking that forward, if you can envisage any? Mr Westaway: When I visit a school and ask them what the main problems they faced are, time and money are always the two that first come to mind. Normally time because there are ways of acquiring money but they take time to do. I think it is partly that. I think it is also partly ‑ and this harks back to the earlier evidence ‑ that there is a lack of feeling that they are being pushed in this direction or a lack of feeling that they are being inspired to move in this direction. Q468 Mr Challen: Do you have some good examples of schools that are making best use of this dual approach? Mr Westaway: There are some excellent examples, yes. We have gathered together some case studies for our web site, again taking all the limitations of web sites on board. There are some excellent examples of schools that have taken this on and they are integrating the development in the way they manage the school with what the children experience in the classroom. Q469 Mr Challen: Could you mention one example of good practice? Mr Westaway: A school in Suffolk, Sir Robert Hitchams (?) Primary School was one very good example. Raglan School in Bromley was another where there is a genuine integration of the process. By their own admission they have been doing this for a long time and one of the lessons they have learned is that patience is necessary and it does take an awful long time to get to where they have got. Q470 Mr Challen: How long a time would that be? Mr Westaway: In those two particular cases they would say they have been concentrating on environmental approaches, or more latterly ESD, for 15 or 20 years probably. Q471 Mr Challen: That is very deeply embedded in the school ethos? Mr Westaway: Absolutely central. Q472 Mr Challen: Is that that going to be quickly translatable to other schools because I think there is an urgency about this whole subject? Mr Westaway: I do not think it is easily translatable and I think it would be distinctly worrying to many schools if they were to be confronted with those examples of schools at the frontiers as saying, "Here is what you ought to be doing." We need to show schools a variety of case studies of schools at different points along the journey so they can see how they might relate to schools which are just beginning or which are midway along or those which are at the frontiers. Having said that, even those schools which are very well‑developed could look at what the best schools are doing and say there are things there either that we are already doing or that we could do quite easily. Q473 Chairman: Just before we leave this one can I ask for a bit more of a response from you. I do not know if you were here when Ofsted earlier on were talking about the reputation England has for conceptual thinking in relation to ESD but would you say that post the Action Plan that this thinking is still taking place? If so, where is it taking place? Is it taking place somewhere with the support of the Department or is that conceptual thinking going on somewhere where the Department are not even in touch with it? Mr Colwill: We missed Ofsted so I am not entirely sure of the point you are making. Q474 Chairman: Irrespective of not having heard them, where does this reputation for conceptual thinking come from? Where is it taking place from your experience, from where you sit? Mr Westaway: From where I sit most of the conceptual thinking about ESD is taking place in the universities. There are one or two universities which are very actively engaged in conceptual aspects of ESD but, by and large, I would say that probably there is not a great deal of conceptual thinking going on in my experience and if it is going on somewhere then I would like to know where. Q475 Chairman: If it is the case that it is going on in certain universities, how is that then being rolled out so that other stakeholders could learn and build on it? Mr Westaway: It would certainly be the university departments which are at the forefront of thinking on ESD and have links with the NGOs. I know that the Council for Environmental Education, for example, links very closely with some of those university departments and I guess they are part of that sort of dissemination. As far as I am aware, there are no formal channels by which that sort of thinking gets into the system other than through learned journals and the usual academic means. Mr Colwill: On a more positive note, can I give you an example of one way in which we have been trying to stimulate this. Sara Parkin who is Programme Director of Forum for the Future has been approached by us to write a think piece to contribute to an initiative which we have just launched which is about a Futures Challenge, which is challenging people in schools and in society more generally to think about how the curriculum should evolve in the future. Sarah has written a think-piece, which is very much about sustainable development challenge or opportunity, which focuses very much on the importance of sustainable literacy. That is one example, if you like, of somebody who is doing some conceptual thinking and an opportunity for that person to put that thinking into the broader public debate. The think-piece that she has produced, along with other think-pieces on other aspects of the curriculum will be part and parcel of a series of summits that we are holding with representatives from various subjects to debate how their subjects and how the curriculum in general needs to evolve in future. That is one example of trying to tap into that conceptual thinking and harness it towards thinking about how the system might evolve. Q476 Chairman: If I am reading you both right, you are both saying that the NGOs and the partnership organisations like Forum for the Future are essentially taking the lead in where this debate is taking place? Mr Westaway: I think that would be my general perception, yes. Chairman: Thank you. Mr Thomas? Q477 Mr Thomas: In the evidence we have received so far - and you might have missed a little bit of it earlier - it has been quite clear that the DfES Action Plan was not communicated to schools. It may be available on a web site but it was not communicated. Could you say whether you had any role in the dissemination of that Action Plan and if you did whether you think somebody should have had a role and what impression have you gathered of the impact of that plan on schools? Mr Westaway: Taking your questions in reverse order, I do not perceive that the Action Plan has had a tremendous impact on schools. I would maintain ‑ and this is not based on a firm evidence base ‑ that there would be many schools blissfully unaware of the Action Plan. QCA had no formal involvement in the dissemination of the Action Plan. Q478 Mr Thomas: Is that because it is not part of the curriculum? Mr Westaway: I think the Action Plan was much wider than the curriculum so it may well be that they would not perceive the QCA as being the obvious vehicle for dissemination. As an individual adviser for ESD within QCA I took it as part of my responsibilities to mention the Action Plan whenever I spoke to schools or addressed wider audiences during the last year and a half. Q479 Mr Thomas: I just wondered in an imaginary situation in a scenario where, say, the Action Plan had been delivered to every school in the country and every headmaster had put it in the bin, would that have made a material difference to where we are now? Mr Westaway: It would have to go in the recycling bin! Q480 Mr Thomas: If they had put it in the recycling bin they would have learned something from it, would they not? I am trying to see if they learned anything at all. Mr Westaway: I think the form in which the document went into schools would have been largely immaterial without some statement or some expression of the importance of this from government. I remember back at the sounding board meeting before the Action Plan was launched that the Secretary of State said that he thought this was a gradual evolution with the occasional dramatic moment. I think we have had the gradual evolution but I do not think we have had many dramatic moments. Q481 Mr Thomas: Looking at the Action Plan itself you do, however, point to some things that you say have been progressed under the plan. One of the things you mention is your own ESD web site and you report that as part of the progress. However, you also say that this is likely now to cease in March this year and be subsumed into the larger TeacherNet - I presume that is a portal - and that that may in fact have an adverse effect of reducing the visibility of ESD. How did it come about that the decision was taken that a dedicated web site for ESD be subsumed into a larger portal? Was that your decision? Mr Westaway: No, you are asking the wrong person. Q482 Chairman: Who is the right person? Mr Westaway: It was a Department decision. Q483 Mr Thomas: It was the DfES? Mr Westaway: Yes and our understanding as of the beginning of December ‑ and clearly there have been changes since the beginning of December which may have influenced that ‑ was that there was a plan to remove content from the current ESD web site, to reformat it, and to include it on the TeacherNet site, or whatever the successor to TeacherNet site will be. With all these things there is a balance between the visibility of a small, separate site and the much larger traffic that a site like TeacherNet would get but it may get buried and lost, that is right. Q484 Mr Thomas: Can I just press this question a little bit. It is still a dedicated ESD web site at the moment. Who is responsible now for maintaining that web site? Is that a Department or QCA responsibility? Mr Westaway: QCA maintains it on a day‑to‑day month‑by‑month basis. Each year we put a work programme to the Department who approve that work programme and provide the finance for running it. Q485 Mr Thomas: What will happen when it goes to TeacherNet? Will that then become a departmental responsibility? Mr Westaway: I do not know. Q486 Mr Thomas: Do you expect to have any on‑going role in that? Mr Colwill: I would expect our expertise would still contribute, as indeed DfES and other bodies contribute to the steering group of our current web site, and I would be surprised if we do not have that continued involvement in looking at the various materials on that site, and indeed possibly continuing as we do now to generate some of those materials by gathering case studies and so on. It is worth noting in this context that quite separately from the Department's decisions about the bigger sustainable development site we have been looking more broadly as part of our own communication strategy at the variety of satellite sites which over the years we have developed as stand‑alone sites. We have been looking at a strategy of how we bring those more centrally into the QCA site, so again you do not have people going into the QCA site and then going out to look for other sites. So we were looking at the Education for Sustainable Development site and it is quite likely that we will continue to have a presence on our web site in relation to education for sustainable ethics which will link into any larger site. It is quite clear that the sustainable development site that the Department is looking to develop will be much broader than the current ESD site, and there are advantages and disadvantages to that. Then, as you were asking Brian Stevens, there are also issues about the value of sites per se being the main means of communication, and that is another key issue that we have been grappling with. We have evidence on the use of the site but also the level of awareness of the site. Q487 Mr Thomas: I want to ask about that in a second but before we leave the TeacherNet site - this is my ignorance - is this a new site or is it an already established site? What sort of traffic does it have? Mr Westaway: I think it must go back a couple of years and it certainly has plenty of traffic. My younger son who has just started primary teacher training swears by it as being the source of all his good lesson plans. Q488 Mr Thomas: It is well‑known? Mr Westaway: It is well‑known, yes, but whether he would have found the Education for Sustainable Development section of it I do not know. Q489 Mr Thomas: To go back to the point you just raised, if I may, which is whether these web sites are a useful way of communicating when you are talking about something that people do not have much base knowledge of and how it compares to other methods of communication, what you are doing to look at that at the moment? Mr Colwill: Over the last six years in line with Government policy we have been putting more and more information on the web rather than putting it in print form and sending it out to schools. As I said, we carry out this annual evaluation and one of the things we ask them about is their awareness of our resources and the support that we provide and the one thing that that shows is that where people are aware of our resources they find them very useful but more people are unaware of our resources than are aware of them. That is an issue not only about Education for Sustainable Development. It is a general issue, whether it is a history innovation site or whatever. It is something we are looking to address. We are looking to address it through a variety of means by drawing these things to attention by mailings into schools, possibly by book marks, or whatever, by links on e‑mails and so on, but it is quite a significant issue because there are lots of advantages to developing a web site in the sense that it is not a one‑off, it is something that can evolve, you can add to it, you can provide depth to it, you can allow people to pursue it to whatever depth they want to go, and they can customise it. As a way of communicating, if this is not the way forward in future then we have a serious problem. However we are also increasingly looking at horses for courses and saying is this particular piece of information that we have to put out the right way of doing it? Q490 Chairman: I want to come in on that point, if I may, just before we leave it and ask Mr Westaway a question because I understand however many years ago it was you were part of the Panel for Sustainable Development which preceded what we have at the moment. I understand then ‑ and correct me if I am wrong ‑ that there was a recommendation from that panel to the DfES that there should be some communication with schools so that schools could be made aware of what wider resources were available. What happened to that recommendation and would you say that it is as much needed now as it was then? Mr Westaway: I do not know what happened to that recommendation. I think it is as relevant now as it was then. I am just trying to think which recommendation it was. Certainly when we developed the web site we also produced a leaflet that went to all schools telling them about the web site. At one level we could say we probably did more with the ESD web site more than some of our other web sites ‑‑‑ Q491 Chairman: Given the debate we are having at the moment, is there some kind of circular to all schools that this is needed now given the way in which throughout the whole of this evidence session one of the complaints has been that schools have not really been aware unless they have been the converted, as it were, of what is available and what resources they can tap into? Is that needed now? Mr Westaway: It is needed now but I think it would have a limited effect unless it was accompanied by a letter from the Secretary of State saying, "By the way, we are expecting you to be doing Education for Sustainable Development by the end of this school year," in which case traffic on the web site would increase phenomenally. Chairman: Sorry, Mr Thomas. Mr Thomas: I have finished. Q492 Mr Ainsworth: Can we try and put this in the context of the Government's review of the sustainable development strategy. You indicated that education should be a key feature of the sustainable development strategy. Did your organisation have any role in the development of the new strategy? Mr Westaway: No. Q493 Mr Ainsworth: How is that compatible with making education a key part of the new strategy? Mr Westaway: I am not sure that that is an area we would be proactive in. You mean we should be saying, "We should be part of your sustainable development strategy"? Q494 Mr Ainsworth: No, the Government has been reviewing the sustainable development strategy. You said that education should be a key part of the new sustainable development strategy and yet your organisation appears to have had no involvement in the review of the strategy. Is that not odd? Mr Westaway: In the sense of QCA standing up and saying, "We think we should be part of this Government review; here we are"? Q495 Mr Ainsworth: If, as you say, education is a key part of the sustainable development strategy --- Mr Westaway: I suspect that we have been waiting to be asked is the honest answer. Q496 Mr Ainsworth: Too many organisations are waiting to be asked and then come along here and say that they believe in Education for Sustainable Development and all that goes with it. Mr Westaway: I suspect we have been a bit guilty of tunnel vision in that we have seen our remit as being Education for Sustainable Development rather than the broader sustainable development strategy. Q497 Mr Ainsworth: I am sorry, it was you yourselves that drew attention to the new strategy in your memorandum. Mr Westaway: I was reflecting a view, going back to the panel days, of the panel but if education was perceived by the Government to be an important part of the sustainable development strategy then the headline indicators should bear more connection to Education for Sustainable Development than the current headline indicators. Q498 Mr Ainsworth: You were sufficiently aware after the review of the sustainable development strategy to say that it needs to contain "a headline indicator focusing on ESD rather than ‑ or to compliment ‑ the more general current educational indicator." You expressed that opinion but you obviously have not expressed it to anyone who is going to take a decision about what the now strategy is go to look like. Mr Westaway: Mea culpa. Q499 Mr Ainsworth: It is a pity, is it not? Mr Westaway: Yes. Q500 Mr Ainsworth: What do you think the headline indicator should look like? Mr Westaway: It is easier to say there should be one than to actually come up with one because I think any headline indicator that one thinks about that would encapsulate children's experience of Education for Sustainable Development in the course of their school lives or even more ambitiously looking at the outcomes of that process, would be very, very difficult to measure. Q501 Mr Ainsworth: How important do you think it is that the strategy should contain this headline indicator? Not important enough obviously to have mentioned it to the Government? Mr Colwill: We have already put our hair shirt on on that one. Mr Westaway: I am not sure whether it is a consultation which you are invited to contribute to. As an individual officer of the QCA I am not sure I can send a submission into the sustainability development strategy saying, "I speaking as QCA feel this ..." Q502 Mr Ainsworth: I do not know whether either of you are betting people but what do you think are the chances that such a headline indicator, as you say you favour, will end up in the strategy? Mr Westaway: Very low. Mr Colwill: I think one of the key issues on headline indicators is the tendency to go for what you might describe as hard indicators such as five A*s to Cs or whatever. What you really, I suggest, want to look for in terms of headline indicators in terms of Education for Sustainable Development may not be something that reflects necessarily on academic achievement but what it needs to express is something of the experiences and the aptitudes that students have developed. The point that John is making is that it becomes very hard to identify exactly how you would assess that, but the value of an indicator which identified certain experiences that all students had an entitlement to as part of their education in sustainability would be one way forward. In recent work on the RE framework, for example, one of the things that we thought it was very important to include was the fact that there were certain experiences that were part and parcel of any RE education as opposed to simply knowledge, skills and understanding. I think there would be an opportunity to put some emphasis on experiences and attributes and aptitudes as opposed to simply on the hard indicator, and that may well provide a kind of target and goal that would focus policies within schools. Mr Ainsworth: But it will not be in the strategy? Thank you. Q503 Chairman: Just going back to Mr Ainsworth's question ‑‑‑ Mr Westaway: Not again! Q504 Chairman: --- about whether or not people are invited to comment on consultation and proposals that are out for consultation. Who within your organisation within QCA would have the leadership role to say, "We are going to contribute to this and we are going to make sure it does contain sustainable development." If it is not you or whoever is at the head of the organisation who does it, who is it? Mr Westaway: That is a very good question. Mr Colwill: It works two ways. If a consultation came into QCA addressed to the Chief Executive it would then be directed down to me as the Director of Curriculum and I would then work with people in QCA to formulate a response. That is in a reactive situation. Q505 Chairman: If it was just on somebody's web site and you did not happen to pick it up you would not respond, you would wait to be asked to do it? Mr Colwill: This is where we talk about where you are with initiatives if they are only on web sites. Q506 Chairman: It is a bit like when I ask my local authority why they have not responded maybe they have not picked it up on the web site? Let's move on to Tomlinson then. Did you contribute to Tomlinson? Mr Colwill: We were very much involved both in terms of being part of the management group that was supporting Tomlinson and also through our officers in providing technical support to the various working parties that Tomlinson set up. Much of that technical support was about details of assessment, which you can imagine, on how a diploma might take place and so on. Q507 Chairman: So what is QCA's view on the ESD content in the report? Mr Colwill: The point has already been made that there are no specific references there. Our view was ‑ and we put this in our response ‑ that the opportunity for developing elements of that would be through the common knowledge, skills and attributes that need to be developed to create the core, and I think Brian Stevens talked about the levels of detail within the report. There is quite clearly a lot of work going on now as the report is translated into the Government-response White Paper which is looking at those elements. We have been, for example, commenting on the common skills-set and trying to make sure that aspects of social responsibility in terms of national, local and global responsibility are an element of that. Q508 Chairman: If I am right, your Chief Executive gave this a gold star. I think he said, "I congratulate Mike Tomlinson and the 14‑19 Working Group on their thorough and wide‑ranging report." If it was thorough and wide‑ranging should it not have adequately represented ESD in terms of the final report? It does not seem to be in there. Mr Colwill: As I say, I think the potential is there for the negotiation in that sense. There are quite a number of other things. There is no reference to individual subjects in there either. The report was setting out a broad framework for publication and that is what Ken was commenting on, and indeed we do endorse the report in its entirety. We feel it is important that the report is dealt with in its entirety because what this provides is a whole framework for taking forward curriculum development over the next ten years. It is a very broad picture report as opposed to detail. Q509 Chairman: But how would you respond to the contributions that we have heard from other witnesses to our inquiry where we have looked at the comparable situation, for example in Wales, where what goes on within the Welsh education system is very much, if you like, informed by the presence of a duty of sustainable development because that is totally lacking, is it not, in terms of how we are taking it forward here? I do not see how we are going to get ESD into whatever the outcome of the White Paper is. Mr Colwill: There are other equally key lobbies, for example RE and citizenship. I was chairing the RE framework group and they were concerned that there is no explicit recognition of the statutory nature of RE within that report. As I say, it is not simply ESD, it is citizenship, whether it is RE or other issues, that is concerned about that kind of absence of detail. Those things were raised with the groups. As I say, I think the thrust of what Tomlinson was aiming to do was to create the broader framework. Q510 Chairman: Okay, so we have got the broader framework, we have got the White Paper coming out imminently. How likely is it that it is going to say something in the White Paper? Mr Colwill: I think you would have to ask the Department that. As I say, we have been looking at various developments coming through, one of which has been looking at a common skills-set which would go down from 14 through to lower secondary. We have been looking at that with a view to making sure that various skills that are already embedded in the National Curriculum are there. Q511 Chairman: Does that cover sustainable development? Mr Colwill: It would certainly cover social skills in terms of local, national and global responsibility and pick up on citizenship skills. There would be an opportunity there for that. Mr Westaway: My personal view would be that it is unlikely to be explicitly mentioned as Education for Sustainable Development. Going back to your comparison with Wales, although I do not claim to have a complete understanding of the situation in Wales, it seems to me that there is a much higher level of commitment to Education for Sustainable Development lying behind any developments in the curriculum assessment than would be true in England. If there were that same degree of political will lying behind Tomlinson in England then it seems to me there would be a higher probability of it appearing. Q512 Chairman: What I am really asking myself is we know that there is nothing in Tomlinson so it is a question of what might be in the White Paper and you say that is a matter for DfES, that is a matter for the political will, but it seems that you are not showing leadership ‑ not just you but other organisations as well ‑ and banging the table and saying ESD must be in there. If there is some kind of a void and lack of any conceptual thinking that is advising the delivery mechanisms that we need, is there not a need to have some, I hardly dare mention it, panel as a way in which we need to have somebody who is able to provide that input which just seems to be lacking? Would you agree with that? Mr Westaway: I personally would agree. Q513 Chairman: You would? That is a personal opinion. Mr Westaway: I am not sure whether QCA would agree. Mr Colwill: Our contributions to the White Paper are varied and some are accepted and some are not accepted and how it finally turns out will ultimately depend on the decisions that ministers make about the text they want to put in there. We are very conscious of that. We have not yet seen a first draft of the White Paper. Q514 Chairman: Can you not see it is a vicious circle that is going to depend on what comes forward. If what comes forward is the question of people waiting to be asked to put it forward and not putting it forward we are individually and severally not taking the responsibility for getting this agenda seized. Mr Westaway: I agree with you but that is not to say even if we were jumping up and down and saying these things they would necessarily lead to the outcomes that we want. Mr Thomas: The DfES do not listen. Chairman: We can perhaps ask them tomorrow and decide the extent to which they are listening. Mr Thomas? Q515 Mr Thomas: That takes us on to the curriculum because one of the disappointing aspects of your evidence to this Committee is the fact that you say there has not been a discernable improvement since we last reported on those matters. You say there has been no evidence there of real progress in looking at Education for Sustainable Development. Why do you think that is? Mr Westaway: I think it was in relation to the embedding of ESD into specific curriculum areas that we were talking about. I think it is partly as Ian said the relatively slow pace of change. This is one area where there have been developments by the Department. They commissioned subject associations to develop some schemes of work units with a higher profile for ESD. Q516 Mr Thomas: Do you know if they are near to completion? You are involved in those, I presume? Mr Westaway: We have an involvement at the end of the process. They will come to us for checking before adding to the web site and I received in December a scheme of work units in the four subjects that the Department commissioned and they are now being computated and will be on the web site within the next month or two. Q517 Mr Thomas: What are those four subjects? Mr Westaway: Design and technology, citizenship, geography and science. Q518 Mr Thomas: Is there any intention to carry on from those four or is that where they are going to get to? Mr Westaway: The words of the Action Plan were initially in those four subjects, so again you might wish to ask the Department whether they plan to widen the net or not. We have commissioned the Historical Association to develop some units just this month and we are hoping to do the same with ITC. That is QCA working within the web site development. Q519 Mr Thomas: You mentioned web site again. Mr Westaway: That is what we do. Q520 Mr Thomas: If you are just going to put them on the web site, are they going to have any effect at all, whatever else you are going to do with them? Mr Westaway: The first stage is putting them on the web site. We mentioned when we appeared before this Sub-Committee before that we are very much dependent on resourcing from the Department for the work we do on ESD, and we do not have the remit or the funds to disseminate this more widely much as we might like to do it. The web site is what we can do now. Q521 Mr Thomas: So you are saying you could not do anything else without further resources? Mr Westaway: Not on the sort of scale that would be needed. Mr Colwill: Can I just return to something I mentioned earlier which I hope is something that is proactive on our part as opposed to waiting to be asked and which is really trying to focus on the curriculum of the future. The five‑year strategy talks about a review of key stage three. We have talked within our board about the value of looking at key stage three. We need also to look at key stages one and two. It is now, after all, something in the region of five years since we last reviewed the curriculum. We have therefore launched a fairly public debate designed to ask hard questions about what should the curriculum of the future be, and we have identified five particular dynamics of change - changes in society in its broader sense, changes in technology, the global dimension, personalisation, and also changes in our understanding of learning. We are challenging various subject communities and assessment communities to look at those areas and say what does this mean in terms of what students' needs should be in the future and how should they be addressed in the way in which we take the curriculum forward. We are doing this quite deliberately out of the context of a specific review because once you get into a specific review it becomes more about what changes do you make to programmes of study, et cetera, et cetera. This is trying to get to a much higher level of thinking about when we start turning this into the mechanics of what we give to teachers in terms of a statutory curriculum, what should be driving the thinking behind it? How does it change? How are the aims and purposes that we set out in the last curriculum (which are very explicit about sustainability and Education for Sustainable Development) translated at the moment into what is and how should they be translated in the future to what is? I think there is a potential within that debate for us to re‑visit a whole range of areas, one of which would be Education for Sustainable Development, and to ask that broader question about its role in a curriculum for the future. As I have said, we have commissioned a number of think pieces, one of which from the Department is looking at the global dimension and the international strategy. I have also referred to the particular think piece from Sara Parkin on sustainable development. There are similar think pieces from Tim Brighouse and Stephen Hepplewhite on technology and such like. So the aim is really to have a broader debate and get people thinking about where should the curriculum be going before we suddenly get to a "we are now going to change it" and we get into the statutory consultation process. I see that as a proactive opportunity for us to be picking up on ESD again. Q522 Mr Thomas: I am sure you are right in that sense. One of the concerns I still have is how an opportunity like that actually delivers change. You yourself in your evidence have referred to the patchy support for Education for Sustainable Development at the regional and local level. We have had a lot of evidence this afternoon and indeed over the last couple of weeks about what to my mind boils down to a lack of leadership. We have compared and contrasted what happens in Wales and where it has come from is a statutory duty which is driving a different process which is to know it is going to be better and change people's attitudes. Of course we do not know that but it is a different process and it is a more observable process. Do you agree with the conclusion that there is a lack of sufficient leadership at present on this issue? I am not asking you to point the finger of blame. Mr Westaway: I think there needs to be more leadership on this issue. Mr Colwill: Again, you have to look at this in the context of something Brian Stevens said in that there is a whole range of initiatives which are all well‑meaning which at the school become a whole series of competing initiatives where resource and time become important and also where there are different elements of leadership and sometimes the people leading on an initiative are somewhere along the line leading the other initiative. Q523 Mr Thomas: Until a school is told that this is as important as the literacy hour they will not react in terms of designing the curriculum around that. Whichever information regime Ofsted use, they will not inspect along those lines and the whole educational community will not respond in terms of delivering the support and materials necessary to deliver Education for Sustainable Development. Mr Colwill: And indeed strategies will not include this as a key element in their delivery mechanisms in changing schools. Q524 Chairman: On that note, I think we need to end the session. Thank you for coming along this afternoon. Can I just say that we did talk about consultation and we did talk about people taking the initiative in response to consultation. You mentioned the consultation in respect of the future of the curriculum and it would be very helpful to have the deadline and any supplementary information on that. Mr Colwill: It is not a consultation as such, it is an initiative, but I will certainly send you the materials. There is going to be a web site with materials on which will invite people to comment on the material Q525 Chairman: Other than the informed, how will people know that they will have an opportunity to contribute? Mr Colwill: Ian made a speech at BETT last week at which he launched it, and we were hoping that there would be some press coverage. Unfortunately, the league tables for GSCE results came out the same day and cake‑making was far more important than the Futures Challenge, it turned out. Chairman: Such is the way of the world. Thank you very much indeed. |