ARTÍCULO SÉTIMO

Power relationships in schools, particularly head teachers’ views about PSE and related decision-making, appeared to influence staff attitudes towards PSE. These differed between the participating schools. Head teachers in Meadow- and St David’s School were committed to supporting PSE within their school. They viewed the purpose of the subject as focussing on encouragement and involvement of pupils as well as fostering the development of important skills in pupils. These head teachers believed that there should be one person within the school who is responsible for coordinating the delivery of PSE and for advocating the subject to other staff. Accordingly, there was one member of staff at Meadow School who delivered the subject to pupils across the whole school on a regular basis. Her views reflected very positive attitudes towards PSE and a certainty that the themes she covers are very important to pupils’ lives. She explained that

she knows her pupils well and is therefore able to address individual needs and tailor her teaching to the diversity of abilities and skills in each class. The PSE coordinator at St David’s School was described by the head teacher as someone who is very committed to PSE and very skilled in getting other staff to contribute to the subject. This PSE coordinator saw PSE as facilitating and supporting pupils in their own development and explained that this is achieved through discussion and interaction during lessons. It was evident that she cooperates closely with classroom teachers who deliver PSE to pupils on a regular basis. In line with these findings from interviews with school staff, pupil focus group and lesson observation data presented in Chapter 7 indicates continuity of PSE provision in Meadow- and St David’s School.

These observations differed from those made about arrangements at Elmhurst- and Oakwood School. Head teachers at these schools saw PSE as a way of compensating for pupils’ negative experiences within a socially disadvantaged catchment area, a means for providing support and continuity that is otherwise not available to them, or simply as a subject that will remain at the bottom of the ‘subject pecking order’ and that will continue to fill gaps that curricular subjects are unable to address. Views of PSE coordinators at these schools were very similar to those of head teachers, re- iterating the role of PSE as compensating for inconsistency pupils might experience at home or that PSE seeks to compliment main curriculum subjects. At Elmhurst School the teaching of PSE was allocated to form teachers or other members of staff who were available regardless of whether they know the pupils they teach. Classroom teachers’ views were predominantly concerned with attendance and discipline, focussing on how lessons are delivered to ensure they retain interest and entertain pupils. At Oakwood School all members of staff were allocated to delivering sessions in a carousel-like arrangement for PSE days during which the normal timetable was suspended. The PSE coordinator at this school emphasized the importance of creating interesting lessons to ensure pupils attend. As a result of these arrangements, classroom teachers at Oakwood School did not see PSE as their responsibility and regarded it as dissociated from the

curriculum and pupils’ lives. Lesson observation data presented in Chapter 7 indicates the content and processes of PSE sessions delivered at this school seemed in line with staff attitudes.

These different patterns indicate the extent to which head teachers’ views and associated decision-making might influence the attitudes of staff and consequently practice. Thus if head teachers considered a focus on PSE as important, they arranged for appropriate resources to be allocated to the subject and provided leadership that fosters an organisational culture that encourages staff to primarily focus on pupils’ personal and social development rather than exam results.

It’s about the mentality of the leadership of the school and what their vision is and what they see as important and the way they then present it because they have to counter this kind of results culture that we have in education in this country. [LEA level PSE coordinator]

The central role of head teachers in shaping school culture has previously been acknowledged (MacBeath 2008). School culture, motivated staff and strong leadership have been identified as very important in the implementation of organisational arrangements to facilitate changes to curricular programmes (Erb 2006; Yecke 2006; Whitley et al. 2007; Viadero 2008; Weiss 2008). It appears that head teachers’ views of PSE are central to how the subject is seen within the school and the extent to which its delivery is supported. This observation is in line with previous findings, which indicated that head teachers’ decision-making can be the most important barrier to policy implementation (Abbott et al. 2011). Whilst recognising the value of what PSE lessons aim to achieve, two out of the four participating head teachers also noted that the focus of their school remains on exam performance and indicated how this prioritization affects practice, separating PSE from the main curriculum. Rather than describing it as an integral part of provision, the choice of words in the following extract implies a separation between teaching for exam performance and promoting

pupils’ personal and social development through adequate PSE lessons as proposed by the framework:

They [referring to themes to be covered in PSE lessons] are really important but as a school we also have a duty to educate and to get youngsters through exams and all the rest of it [Head teacher, Oakwood School]

Such emphasis on examined subjects and the low priority given to PSE and the challenges associated with this prioritization or ‘pecking order’ that influences resource allocation, were seen as unlikely to change:

[..] I don’t think the difficulties will ever gonna particularly go away because we will never be giving as much time to PSE as we are to the study of English or French or Geography or whatever it might be and therefore in the school environment things got to have a bit of a pecking order so you got your subjects [gesturing] at the top and then you have your other subjects and a lot of that is based on how much time gets put into those things and therefore PSE tends to come down here at the bottom [...] [Head teacher Oakwood School] Resource allocation involves not only timetabling and budgeting for certain subjects, but also the allocation of suitably qualified staff to deliver lessons. One of the four participating head teachers noted that usually, after examined subjects have been scheduled, PSE is assigned to teachers who have availability on their time table rather than to those who may wish to teach PSE and who are suitably skilled. This was noted to impact on practice:

Last thing that gets timetabled is things like PSE so if you’ve got lessons where you have to fill with certain teachers you tend to get the teachers that have got extra on their timetable rather than ones who want to do the subject [...] and this is again one of the problems we used to have is we had a hotchpotch of teachers so the PSE coordinator would have a lot of disinterested troops [Head teacher, St David’s School]

It has been noted that these ‘disinterested troops’ tend to be newly qualified teachers with more time available on their schedule, who feel less confident delivering PSE than more experienced staff. The negative impact of such an allocation on practice was also emphasized by LEA level PSE coordinators, and was related to PSE not fitting into teachers’ understanding of their professional practice. These points illustrate the impact of head teacher’s decision-making on school arrangements and staff motivation, which create an important context for the implementation of policy in schools (Erb 2006; Yecke 2006; Whitley et al. 2007; Viadero 2008; Weiss 2008). Indeed, school staff recognised the need to encourage continuing professional development to enhance PSE provision, however they were also aware that the allocation of time within the school to do such training also follows the ‘pecking order of subjects’ which predominantly supports examined subjects:

We could probably all do with a lot of training on how to deliver things like PSE effectively and that isn’t something we’ve had any training [...] which is simply due to the pressure of all the other things that we’re trying to do it gets pushed to the bottom of the list [...] where we have training in teaching methods it tends to be generic [Head teacher Oakwood School].

As noted earlier, head teachers’ decisions to prioritize funding allocation to examined subjects might leave limited resources for PSE. In some cases it might even be uncertain if there is a budget to pay for the copying of worksheets or purchase adequate resources and equipment for delivering PSE. This resonates similar resource issues as a result of head teachers prioritizing core curriculum subjects, which have been identified elsewhere (Abbott et al. 2011; McCuaig et al. 2012). Such limitations are likely to influence the extent to which teachers feel able to deliver PSE adequately, especially if they are meant to promote pupils’ development of ICT skills:

Not all classrooms have actually got access to computers and multimedia projectors and which is really quite incredible. [LEA level coordinator].

However, even if funding is limited, having a senior member of staff who is committed to the subject may be important in facilitating good quality provision. School-level PSE coordinators described ways of ‘making do’ with such very limited budgets by being creative and collaborating with other experts within and outside the school:

[...] our budget in the school is very very small and we’re struggling big time at the moment. Sometimes you get free stuff on the internet but I’m quite new doing that so I have had, I’ve got packs there now that they’ve sent me which is free, I’m always looking for something that’s free and I’m always looking for people that don’t cost me any money to come in. Sometimes they do charge like the RNLI, I mean we’re going to pay him cos he’s freelance. So otherwise we pay very very few. We have got a programme that’s called cascade for year nine, they actually go on there looking at careers choices and we have to pay hundred pound a year to have that licence, so with the PSE money I’ve got to be very very careful cos it is small, very small. If I need new DVDs they’re expensive and there’s lots of teaching resources out there but once again you’re talking about big money. So I sometimes, well I sometimes look for free stuff, look for things I’ve got and change them. Debbie6

now, the lady in charge of ICT, to save on money instead of having five CDs to be played she’ll actually put them on the net so you can access them through PowerPoint [...] [PSE coordinator Elmhurst School]

It has been explained in Chapter 5 how the ambiguity related to the delivery of PSE not being statutory leaves the organisation and delivery of PSE at the discretion of schools. Staff at Oakwood- and Elmhurst School appeared to retain their focus on examined subjects and regard PSE as add-on that is being delivered in spare timeslots such as a series of morning assemblies or dedicated PSE days to be able to ‘tick boxes’ to indicate PSE is being provided. Staff at Meadow- and St David’s School, however, seemed to try and fully implement the framework by covering all recommended aspects. The commitment to PSE seemed to reflect head teachers or leadership teams

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considering the subject as centrally important to their learners’ wellbeing and as a pre-requisite for learning. This observation is in line with previous arguments suggesting head teachers might have a significant influence over the success of implementation processes by shaping an organisational culture and context that is in support of the policy (Kasili and Poskiparta 2004; Watkins et al. 2008). However, the main barrier for PSE was seen as the hectic life in schools which hardly leaves time for considering PSE, a view that was evident in views from across all stakeholders:

Life is just at a gallop in a school and you know you just go from one day to the next thank God that you sort of managed to survive in many respects [laugh] [LEA level coordinator].

Such time limitations are likely to influence teachers’ views of their practice and pupils’ experience. In order to accommodate large numbers, secondary school arrangements usually require pupils to move from subject to subject, room to room, teacher to teacher. If such arrangements are disconnected, teachers are unable to collaborate with one another and rotating timetables are poorly coordinated, there is a likelihood that pupils will experience a repetition across their school day, not only in terms of topic coverage but also in terms of the pedagogic approaches used. Therefore, such arrangements could potentially lead to pupils’ disengagement:

I think the danger is in secondary [schools] is as the children are moving around you’re only planning for your class so if a young person makes five changes over five lessons they might end up with the same teaching styles throughout the day they could have a chalk and talk lesson in English one in Maths one in Science and it’s no wonder young people can become disaffected. [LEA level PSE coordinator]

The recognition that fact-focused lesson talk might negatively impact on pupils’ perceptions of lessons reflects earlier findings (Bernstein 1990). It demonstrates the interaction between policy requirements, school organisational arrangements, and lesson processes which are shaped around exam performance. It also suggests that such arrangements might provide few opportunities for teachers to engage in social sense-making by

collaborating with colleagues, an important process within school policy implementation (Brown and Campione 1996; Spillane and Zeuli 1999). Spillane et al. (2002) explained that such ‘egg-carton’ structures in schools can isolate individuals’ work, separate subject specialists from one another and lead to structures in which goals and priorities vary between different elements of the system (Hayes et al. 2006). According to Pedder and MacBeath (2008), such arrangements can create a key barrier for schools implementing innovative pedagogic approaches, an argument which has been illustrated by findings from school staff interviews. The findings from school staff interviews demonstrate how the practical implications of prioritization, that shaped head teachers decision-making, emerged in timetabling and budget allocation within the school. These determine structuring and organisation of a context within which teachers make sense of and implement PSE policy. Placing PSE at the bottom of the ‘pecking order’ within the organisation is likely to influence staff attitudes towards the subject, and consequently the proportion of effort and time dedicated to preparing for the delivery of PSE. The extent to which policy priorities re- emerged in intrapersonal influences on policy implementation will be examined in the next section.

6.3.Policy context influences on intrapersonal determinants of policy