Before You Add Another Strategy, Name the Barrier

The challenge in school improvement is rarely that schools do not have enough ideas.

Most schools have plenty.

There are strategic plans, annual implementation plans, data sets, instructional priorities, professional learning agendas, curriculum work, wellbeing work, behaviour work and all the other things that crop up in the school day.

The harder question is whether the conditions are in place for any of that work to actually change practice.

In many conversations with school leaders, we have discussed the barriers that sit underneath improvement work. Sometimes the barrier is time. Not just time in the timetable, but enough protected time for teachers to plan, practise, review student work and adjust what happens next.

Sometimes it is resourcing. There may not be enough people, enough release time, enough access to expertise or enough practical support to turn the priority into day-to-day action.

Sometimes it is initiative load or sometimes overload. A school may be trying to improve curriculum, strengthen assessment, embed an instructional model, respond to behaviour concerns, support staff wellbeing and lift student outcomes all at once. Each priority may matter, but together they can create the feeling that everything is urgent and nothing is given the time it needs.

And sometimes the barrier is behaviour. When teachers are carrying high levels of disruption, regulation needs or relational repair, the improvement work does not disappear, but it does compete with the immediate work of keeping classrooms safe, calm and ready for learning.

A good strategy matters because it helps focus and pace the work. Evidence-informed practice matters when you look at how it works within your context. Clear goals matter because they help everyone understand what you are aiming for. But if the conditions around the work are not considered and attended to, even strong improvement plans can get stuck.

For leaders, I think one useful question is "Before we add the next strategy, have we named the main barrier getting in the way of the work we already care about?"

- Is it time?

- Resourcing?

- Too many initiatives?

- Behaviour demands?

- Trust levels?

- Staff capability?

- Something else?

I’d be interested to know what others are seeing and experiencing. What is the barrier most getting in the way of school improvement in your context right now?