Resultados del Modelo de Ecuaciones Estructurales:

In September 2013, I arranged a group interview with six Church of England secondary school headteachers during their annual conference in York. I arranged the interview for just under one hour to take place in the bar just before all the conference delegates adjourned to the dining hall for their annual dinner. Just like all the auto/biographical interviews, the interview was taped, transcribed and coded using the standard proforma.

The context of the group interview, or conversation, was an article that I had published in the AASSH journal which was distributed to all delegates at the conference in the joining packs. Earlier on in the day, I approached various delegates, from a range of different schools, and asked them if they would be prepared to share their views with me in an informal style interview or conversation. At the start of the informal interview, or conversation, I asked the six headteachers for their views on the relationship between ethos and outcomes in their respective schools with a particular emphasis on the three learning habits of diligence, resilience and compliance that I had mentioned in my article.

In coding the transcript, I identified the key themes that were mentioned together with the body language, facial expressions and passion with which the views of the six headteachers were expressed. I did this from memory as soon as possible after the interview. As far as the process was concerned, the nature of the interaction was very informal, even jocular. There was no sense of the meeting being chaired or overly led by the researcher as the respondents spoke consecutively without the need for targeted questions. This empathetic style within a respondent-led discussion meant that the conversation flowed for the full 40 minutes allotted during the conference programme. At the start of the discussion I set the scene by inviting the respondents to reflect about Christian ethos and educational outcomes in their respective schools together with the possible contribution of learning habits in general and the three learning habits identified in particular. This is shown in Appendix I.

In terms of other ethnographics, the six headteachers sat in comfortable lounge chairs in the lobby area just outside the bar of the conference hotel. I offered to buy each one a drink which

178

they then brought to a small table placed in the middle of the configuration of chairs. Also on this table was placed the sound recorder. The participants appeared to respond confidently to the presence of the technology.

Given the prevailing climate of performativity impacting on Church of England schools (chapter 2), there was a further important discovery in analysing the data from the headteachers. One of the dangers, I perceived, was that the short term drive for exam results might jeopardise the school’s Christian ethos which was necessary to create the environment in which those exam results could be achieved and sustained (chapter 2 section I part d; chapter 3 section I part c and d). I was therefore delighted to note that in none of my communications with the stakeholders at Bishop Pritchard school nor in the internet survey of 100 headteachers did any of the Church school stakeholders put performance above the needs of the ‘whole child’. The same was true of the group interview with the headteachers here.

For example, in terms of gestalt, or overall patterning, one of the key themes that arose both in terms of frequency and the conviction with which it was mentioned was love. Several individuals within the group ascribed the success of their schools to a sense of love and caring for both pupils and staff. This theme recurred without contradiction through the 40 minutes. The following comment was typical:

“Our distinctiveness is that care, that compassion, that every child is an

individual, not a number, not a grade boundary and we value them ….. actually

they are loved just because they are, not because they’re clever or they’re from middle class road… So, I suppose the challenge for me and the difficulty I have as the head is to communicate that idea of success being part of loving the kids.” (Group interview of heads, PN, 19/9/2013).

Was this the headteachers saying what they thought I wanted to hear? Was there researcher bias associated with this exercise? Given the ethnographics surrounding the interview and the fact that some of the headteachers were more experienced than I was, I suggest not. In my experience of working in and with non-Church schools there is more debate about statistics, grades and targets than happened here. However more research would be needed before any firm conclusions could be made to confirm or refute this comparison.

In terms of learning habits the evidence from the group interview of the six headteachers slightly went against the results of the questionnaire that they had been invited to fill in earlier in the year. In the May of 2013 all Church of England secondary school headteachers had received a questionnaire and some of the group of six headteachers had completed it (chapter 8 section III part a). Diligence was identified as a significant factor from the internet survey with over 45% believing that children from Church families are more diligent than those from non-Church families. However, this trait was not mentioned in the group interview. For example, with regard to diligence and the work of William Jeynes (2003), one headteacher commented:

179

“I think it may be American culture, I don’t recognise it here.” (Group interview of heads, NT, 19/9/2013).

However, careful analysis of the focus group transcript revealed a sense where the

headteachers did express the spirit of diligence. There was frequent use of the phrase ‘going

the extra mile’ with staff and pupils.

“It’s about that extra bit, that extra push… and that means the staff do their best and the students do too.” (Group interview of heads, JR, 19/9/2013).

While the word diligence was not used there was a belief amongst these six headteachers that Church of England schools did, when compared with other schools that they had worked in, seem to go that ‘extra mile’.

By contrast, resilience did not score highly on the internet survey of 100 headteachers of Church of England schools. A possible reason for this was the lack of explanation given to this

term on the survey. The term might have been interpreted as outwardly ‘tough’ as opposed to

inwardly strong. Without further investigation, I can only conjecture! Nonetheless only 23% of respondents felt that children from Church schools are more resilient than children from Community schools. However, resilience was one of the significant themes emerging from the group interview exercise.

“…that sense of focus and a sense of perseverance in order to get there….they’ve got their faith in the background, and their faith helps them to

guide them in the right direction……..God has given us all a hand that we can

deal with, no matter what happens we will have a hand that we can play to the very best of our advantage.” (Group interview of heads, JR, 19/9/2013).

With regard to the attribute or learning habit of compliance or co-operation, the group of headteachers were more confident with the use of the word co-operation and, linked to this, the idea of sharing. This mirrored the results from the internet survey where a greater proportion of headteachers who were surveyed subscribed to the view that children at Church schools were more cooperative than children from Community schools, in their perception. In the group interview, there was a sense that the school community was all pulling in the same direction, not out of fear but out of a belief in a shared narrative. Such a scenario is more akin to co-operation than compliance.

“Young people will assimilate the atmosphere and…. if they see that we (headteachers) are authentic about the vision, the common narrative and that it’s real and it affects them, they will flourish almost without us.” (Group interview of heads, NT, 19/9/2013).

180 And:

“There’s a common narrative, a common rigidness, in Christian traditions that we all do it this way. This is consistency.” (Group interview of heads, PK, 19/9/2013).

Dearing urged all Church schools to be distinctively Christian (Dearing, 2001, p.9) and

suggested that all Church school headteachers should be viewed as lay ministers (ibid., p.60). Following this interview with the Church school headteachers, I reflected on whether the comments that were made were in fact distinctively Christian or, alternatively, could they have been made by the headteachers of Community schools who were not self-professing

Christians? The pre-eminence of the word ‘love’ in the conversations was significant. The love

talked about in this context was based on the Greek word ‘Agape’, or sacrifice for others. This is a fundamental concept in the New Testament and differs from the more secular words of ‘caring for the kids’ which may be heard more in Community schools. What was perhaps more significant was that the learning habits of diligence, resilience and compliance/cooperation were

not opposed by the Church school headteachers as being predominantly ‘secular’. Once again

there was the implied link between diligence and ‘going the extra mile’; resilience and faith and, lastly, cooperation based on a common narrative which we all share and to which we are privileged to submit (chapter 1 section III; Chapter 3 section I part d; chapter 7 section II part e).

181

9. Discussion of Findings

I. Introduction

In coding the data from the case-study school, the words, ideas and themes that frequently emerged to explain similar events and concepts were grouped together to make the analysis more manageable. The first group of words that predominated revolved around: a work ethic, going the extra mile, following things through and working hard. For this group of words I used the word diligence as the single best word to capture this language. The next group of words that predominated revolved around: a sense of hope, a purpose to life, a reason to keep going and the ability to cope with the ‘ups and downs’ of life. For this group of words I used the catchall word of resilience. The third and final group of words that came from coding the data revolved around the ideas of: submitting to a higher authority, following the rules and not challenging authority. Here, I used the word compliance. These three words then became the most frequently used themes on my proformas (see, as an example: Appendix J and Appendix K).

The extent to which these three themes are distinctive traits of a Christian ethos as opposed to another kind of ethos, is a fascinating question which is beyond the scope of this thesis to take further at this stage. To answer such a question would merit another PhD thesis to explore the theological and philosophical underpinnings of each theme. The purpose of this thesis is not to justify what learning habits can and cannot be labelled as distinctively Christian. The purpose of this thesis is to faithfully illuminate the perceptions of the stakeholders of one Church school as to how the ethos of their school is reflected in the learning habits of the pupils within the school and therefore its educational outcomes. However, the nature of this research cannot avoid this question altogether. Accordingly, I make a brief reference below to how Christian distinctiveness informs the Church school ethoses based on my findings. Beyond that I make no attempt at further substantial claims for this research. In what follows therefore I focus mainly on the more functional interpretations of each term.

II. Diligence