It certainly sounds ambitious. Eighty-one new teaching school hubs (TSH) funded with £65 million that will provide, in the Department for Education’s words, “high-quality professional development to teachers and leaders”.

Announced on Wednesday last week to as much fanfare as can be mustered during a third national lockdown, the government was certainly keen to sell the TSH’s as welcome good news.

“It is important teachers and school leaders feel supported in their career,” said school standards minister Nick Gibb. “The hubs will make this substantially easier, with expert practitioners able to give experienced advice to those schools able to benefit from it.”

This will allow schools to contact their local TSH and work with them to understand the training, support and ongoing development needs for staff to continue growing as teachers.

Or as the DfE puts it, TSH’s will be: “delivering the Early Career Framework reforms […] delivering a reformed suite of National Professional Qualifications (NPQs) including new specialist NPQs [and delivering] Initial Teaching Training and additional high-quality evidence-based professional development”.

Teaching School Hubs: Sound familiar? 

But hang on a minute, you may be thinking - isn’t this the same as the Teaching Schools programme? A check of the DfE website shows that Teaching Schools - of which there are almost 800 - are listed as:  

• Coordinating and delivering high-quality, school-based initial teacher training (ITT).
• Spreading excellent practice by supporting other schools.
• Providing professional and leadership development for teachers and leaders.

Not word for word the same as the TSH pitch - but not far off. So what’s different?

Well to Richard Gill, chair of the Teaching Schools Council, a lot.

In fact, so much that he thinks “a direct comparison cannot be made”.

This is because, he says, the TSH remit will be more focused than that of the existing teaching schools: “Teaching school hubs will no longer be involved in school improvement in the way that Teaching Schools were previously,” he tells Tes.

Instead, the specific focus will be on teacher improvement. “Ultimately, the quality of teaching is the most important factor in the attainment of pupils and in improving schools, hence the specific focus around teacher development.”

More in-depth analysis from Tes

• Do longer school days work? Lessons from history
• Will Covid really cost pupils £40,000 in lost income?
• Education and Covid-19: How other nations have fared

Indeed, Helena Brothwell, regional director for the David Ross Education Trust, which was successful in an application for North-East Lincolnshire and North Lincolnshire with the Humberston Academy, told Tes that there is a real opportunity with the model to boost teaching training, recruitment and retention.

“Long-term teacher development needs to be continuous and this is something the TSH will really invest in as teachers get this constant, high-quality development that is meaningful to them,” says Brothwell.

She notes that one of the big benefits of the TSH is that it will enable a more quality-assured approach to take place with the TSHs working with regional partners to facilitate the CPD and ITT that teachers need - something that the wider teaching schools system did not allow.

Professor Rachel Lofthouse, from the Carnegie School of Education at Leeds Beckett University, agrees that an issue with Teaching Schools was there were so many out there it was hard for schools to find what they needed.

“There was huge growth in Teaching Schools and some were valiantly doing the work as prescribed by the DfE and doing it successfully - but it also created a system where it was quite hard to find what you needed,” she tells Tes.

“With this model, it reduces that right down to a regional hub and makes it far easier to locate the support you need.”

Loss of nuance?

However, the flip side of this, she says, is the breadth of teaching schools meant there was more room for innovation and nuanced ideas to filter up and spread among schools - something that may now be lost.

“Some of the interesting and nuanced work of the individual Teaching Schools may be lost as the hub model means that the provision becomes far more tightly controlled through the DfE ‘pipeline’,” she said.

“Now some might think that it is a good thing to have a more controlled system that is top-down and delivers a truly national provision with the hubs acting as brokers of the DfE’s ambitions - but, at the same time, you might lose some of that bottom-up innovation and more nuanced ideas.”

Dr Karen Angus-Cole, a lecturing in teaching in the Department of Education at the University of Bath makes this point, too: “I do wonder if the nuance of context and setting will be lost - can a Hub school really understand the context of another school? It’s almost like adopting a one-size-fits-all approach which is a bit ridiculous,” she says.

“We don’t do that in the classroom any more, so it seems at odds with how we now understand how best to teach pupils. So this top-down approach does worry me a little bit.”

A consistent focus 

However, for Gill, this centralised approach with a clear focus on teacher development delivered across the country is the core strength of the TSH plan.

“This more concentrated focus for Teaching School Hubs on teacher training and development will see a return to the original vision behind teaching schools and, in doing so, recognising teacher and leadership development as the most important form of school improvement.

The CEO of Advantage School, Stuart Lock, also supports this idea: “The new infrastructure - a smaller number of TSHs compared to TSs, central investment and significant economies of scale will, I think, allow TSHs to put in place the capacity and expertise to keep quality really high,” he says.

“Overall, the remit for TSHs is really tight - they are clearly 100 per cent about providing the best evidence-based development for teachers and leaders.”

Furthermore, Gill says that with a more centralised system based on a regional approach, whereby each hub has set responsibility for a geographical area, it should remove the issues of over-saturation or underrepresentation in certain areas - a fault of the Teaching School system.

“I have spoken previously around the challenge of cold spots and, even with so many Teaching Schools, there was still a variation in access to a Teaching School with saturation in some areas and a sparsity in others,” he says.

“TSHs will have a much larger reach than teaching schools, each operating within a defined patch that serves between 134 and 360 schools.”

A broad remit 

Yet his positivity of those numbers also raises concerns, too: can a hub really be expected to service that many schools at once?

Yes, they may get some more money to help deliver this - £200,000 a year in grant funding to be exact - but it’s still a huge responsibility to take on.

Professor Toby Greany, from the University of Nottingham’s School of Education, is one who is concerned that the huge number of schools served by each TSH could become unwieldy.

“With hubs responsible for an average of 250 schools and some covering two areas with almost 500, that is a big ask - are they genuinely able to work at that scale? And how will MATs interact with the hubs? No doubt this will work better in some places than others,” he says.

Furthermore, Professor Greany, whose research has looked specifically at MATs and school improvement, says he believes there could be wariness among smaller schools to be sucked further into the orbit of a dominant MAT acting as a TSH - and other MATs may be wary of being subservient to another MAT if it is their designated TSH.

“If a hub is based with a dominant MAT, then my research has shown some schools are going to be fearful about engaging with that provision because they think it is a precursor to be taken over by the trust,” he tells Tes.

“Equally other trusts that have their own CPD frameworks could be wary of engaging with that teaching school hub. I think it doesn’t solve problems in terms of fragmentation of knowledge and expertise.”

Partnering up

On this point, though, Gill notes that a central tenet of the TSH approach is the TSHs will work with partners to ensure they have the capacity and skills on hand to deliver.

“Lead schools will not be able to deliver this alone,” he says. “They will have to harness skills and experience from colleagues in neighbouring schools and cross-phase and thus the expertise that has been developed over the last 10 years must still contribute to the future.

“The contribution from a TSH is not just about the lead school but is also in the strength of their strategic partners.”

This, too, is how Gill addresses a concern raised that of the 81 hub schools there are only two special schools - one in East of England and North East London (EENEL) and one in Lancashire and West Yorkshire (LWY)  - and one alternative provision setting, in Poole in the South West region.

“All hubs are expected, through strong networks, to deliver training and development to schools of all phases and settings across their hub area, including special schools and alternative provision, and the department will be reviewing hubs’ success in reaching the full range of schools.”

However, Simon Knight, the joint headteacher of Frank Wise School - a special school and current Teaching School - says this plan will need to be backed by strong oversight and accountability to ensure it happens in reality.

“It will be essential that the DfE keeps a close eye on the extent to which SEND is woven into the work of the new Teaching School Hubs, to ensure that the good work done by the Special Teaching Schools and others is not lost amongst the incoming changes,” he tells Tes.

“Given that there are only two Teaching School Hubs being led by special schools, we need to be really careful that, after many years of special schools being strategic leaders within the schools-led system, we are not relegated to being delivery partners with limited influence on the direction the reforms take.”

There are, though, accountability measures for the hubs that will ensure primary, secondary, special and AP schools receive appropriate support and training that should ensure this concern is allayed.

Furthermore, as Brothwell outlines, many of the trusts that have been successful will likely have special schools within their fold that can be used to help with these areas of delivery.

“We have an outstanding special school in our trust - Eresby - and they were named in the bid and we can now offer that expertise as a TSH. We will also be looking to get support from AP providers, too, for that element of our provision,” she says.

“I’m glad people are raising this as a concern because we know how important it is that good training is provided in these settings as they have maybe been overlooked in the past.”

Universities in the cold?

Talking to academics about the TSHs, another issue that bubbles up is the role of the universities themselves.

Dr James Williams, senior lecturer in science education from the University of Sussex, says he is concerned that the hub model, driven by a top-down, government-dictated approach, appears a move to further remove the university sector from the training and development of teachers.

He says this could have a negative long-term effect if teachers stop engaging with new pedagogical research.

“It could become quite insular with teachers just teaching teachers and saying, ‘This works for me so it will work for you,’ without ever really understanding why what you are doing does work, or that you could do it in a different way,” he says.

“If that happens, where will new ideas and engagement with research come in? I think it could be a flaw in the system and where I think the input of university would be a crucial element.”

He notes, too, that with the development of the National Institute for Teaching, this means a new teacher could never directly engage with university research as part of their development at all.

“I’ve been involved in ITE for 23 years and I cannot remember a time when we have been so integrated in terms of research, evidence and professionalism in teaching, and building up a culture of high-quality excellence in teaching and excellence in research,” he says.

“Surely that is what is going to make the best training for all teachers? It is difficult to understand why you would want to cut out the research side of it.”

Dr Angus-Cole - a former teacher - also raises this issue: “I worry about this idea that they [the TSHs] will deliver ITT. It’s not clear what the government is planning with ITT but there is a seemingly increased exclusion of universities from that provision and towards a more school-centred ITT,” she says.

She adds that in doing this she is concerned that the opportunity for teachers to engage in and understand how academic research is carried out, how to do it themselves and how to properly engage and act on research will be lost.

“Teaching is a tough job but you often have teachers who want to do research and if you have universities partnering with them to help that can make that a lot easier.

“Overall, I would argue we need choice, university or school-centered, so for those that want the academic route and become the educational researchers of the future, they can develop a good understanding of academic research and teaching practice.”

However, the rules for the TSHs mean they are free to choose who they partner with for ITT or CPD, which should mean universities remain centrally involved if the TSH chooses to do so.

Indeed, Brothwell says they fully intend to keep a strong existing partnership with Bishop Grosseteste University going as part of what they deliver because the university has much of the expertise it requires. 

“They are the experts at what they do and we are not going to do a better job than them so we will keep that relationship just as we always have.”

Quiet optimism

Overall, despite the issues raised by some above, there is a broad consensus that the concept of TSHs is a strong one and coming at the right time.

Dr Williams says: “I definitely support their focus on the first three years of teaching as a crucial period of development - it is an incredibly important time and so their recognition of CPD is itself a good thing.”

Dr Angus-Cole adds: “There is a real teaching recruitment and retention crisis, so it is good this is being acknowledged”.

For the TSHs themselves, there is little time to rest on their laurels - September 2021 may seem a long way off but we all know how quickly time moves - and come launch, there will be a lot of people keen to see how they proceed.

For Brothwell, though, the key is that the TSHs offer an opportunity to really drive teacher training and development forward with the hope of boosting recruitment and retention - an area that few would disagree needs addressing.

“We are absolutely delighted to have this opportunity,” she says. “When you believe in something and see it succeed in your school and then have a chance to spread it more widely...we are really invested in this.”

Dan Worth is senior editor at Tes