The new children’s commissioner for England is envisaging a “massive role” for teachers in her plan to ensure the Covid crisis does not result in a “lost generation”.

Dame Rachel de Souza, who was chief executive of an academy chain with 14 schools in Norfolk and Suffolk before taking up the post this month, told Tes that she will be asking teachers to help her deliver the largest consultation ever held with children in England.

Titled “The Big Ask”, it will be at the heart of a “once-in-a-generation” review intended to reach every child and identify any barriers preventing them from reaching their full potential amid the pandemic.

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The consultation, which will take place after the Easter break, will comprise an online survey - sent to all schools, as well as youth custody organisations, Camhs inpatient units and children’s homes - plus face-to-face interviews and focus groups with children who are harder to reach.

It will aim to ask every child in England how the pandemic changed their lives, what their aspirations are and the barriers to reaching them, how things are at home, how their communities could be improved, and how they feel about the future.

“I’ll be asking teachers to help me actually deliver The Big Ask because they’re the trusted adults, so that’s a massive role,” Dame Rachel told Tes.

“We’d just really like teachers to put it on in class and get kids to fill it in.

“Teachers will really understand this [consultation] because, as teachers and headteachers, we’ve been working remotely with children and looking into their lives, and we’ve seen how they’ve been affected, how their mental health’s been affected, how they’ve not been able to spend time with their friends and family. 

“We’ve seen issues around family strain and the issues around their parents’ and carers’ work, and their worries about their future, so I think teachers will understand that. 

“I hope they will agree with me that we cannot allow this generation of young people to be seen as the lost generation.”

The wider review, titled The Childhood Commission, will aim to address policy shortfalls that have held back the lives of children for decades, as well as problems that have been amplified by the pandemic, the commissioner said.

It will be inspired by the ambition of William Beveridge’s report in the 1940s, which laid the foundations of the country’s welfare state.

Dame Rachel said she was “absolutely determined” to make sure that children are prioritised so they do not become the “lost generation” as a result of the pandemic.

She said: “If we think about it, those children have, in many ways, made the biggest sacrifices for the least return. In terms of their experience, they’ve been stuck at home, they’ve not seen their friends, they’ve got worries about their exam results, they’ve got worries about their next steps.

“Now it’s time for us to give something back and put them first. I really believe that.”

Education secretary Gavin Williamson has said a change to the summer holidays and longer school days are being examined as part of long-term recovery plans for helping pupils catch up with missed learning.

On proposals to change the school calendar, Dame Rachel said: “I think it’s really interesting. When I was running a trust myself, it was the children themselves who wanted to come back to school and wanted to come back to school early in the summer holiday so they didn’t miss out.”

She added that lots of schools already run “longer school days in ways that work for their communities”.

“So I think we should be exploring these ideas with headteachers, with parents, with children. But for me, as children’s commissioner, my job is to ask children and young people what they think and to share that. So hence, that’s why we are doing The Big Ask,” she said.

Mark Russell, chief executive of The Children’s Society, said: “The scale of the challenge is huge and we need to be big and bold.

“Ultimately, it’s up to the government to deliver change through an ambitious agenda for children and young people, and we hope their intentions for putting children’s wellbeing first as we emerge from the Covid crisis are not just warm words but lead to tangible action.”