Instinct or reason: how education policy is made and how we might make it better

As the Covid-19 pandemic spread across the globe, schools were confronted by a period of exceptional uncertainty. Headteachers, with often minimal experience or training in crisis leadership, needed to react quickly to minimise disruption to learning. Education Development Trust (EDT) has been collaborating with UNESCO-IIEP as a thought leadership partner to consider how education leadership might be strengthened in crisis settings, as part of IIEP’s work on crisis-sensitive planning.

As the Covid-19 pandemic spread across the globe, schools were confronted by a period of exceptional uncertainty. Headteachers, with often minimal experience or training in crisis leadership, needed to react quickly to minimise disruption to learning. Education Development Trust (EDT) has been collaborating with UNESCO-IIEP as a thought leadership partner to consider how education leadership might be strengthened in crisis settings, as part of IIEP’s work on crisis-sensitive planning.

Education policymakers around the world have long shared a key priority: achieving high-quality teaching and learning at scale. This requires strong delivery systems at every level. While there is significant evidence on the important roles played by teachers and leaders, comparatively little attention has been paid to the role – and potential – of middle-tier professionals such as supervisors, instructional coaches and mentors at the regional, district and sub-district level. These actors are key intermediaries in education systems, but their role in teaching and learning improvement has often been overlooked in research and policy debates. In our latest report, together with IIEP-UNESCO and the Education Commission, we highlight the potential of these middle-tier actors as a critical part of the ‘machine’ for quality teaching and learning at scale.

Education policymakers around the world have long shared a key priority: achieving high-quality teaching and learning at scale. This requires strong delivery systems at every level. While there is significant evidence on the important roles played by teachers and leaders, comparatively little attention has been paid to the role – and potential – of middle-tier professionals such as supervisors, instructional coaches and mentors at the regional, district and sub-district level. These actors are key intermediaries in education systems, but their role in teaching and learning improvement has often been overlooked in research and policy debates. In our latest report, together with IIEP-UNESCO and the Education Commission, we highlight the potential of these middle-tier actors as a critical part of the ‘machine’ for quality teaching and learning at scale.