Leading Edge Partnership Programme

The Innovation Unit facilitated and supported the development of the Leading Edge Partnership programme over the first two years of its operation. The work ensured that innovation in teaching and learning was at the centre of the programme and that innovative ways of working between the Department and the profession have been developed that create a culture of professional trust and high expectations. This approach has evolved into a positive and practical interface between policy makers and practitioners and played a key role in preparing the ground for the Department's new relationship with schools.

The aims of the Leading Edge Partnership programme were to:

• Establish and develop effective partnerships of schools with a focus on raising the attainment of the lowest attaining 20% of pupils.
• Support the partnerships in developing and sharing innovative approaches to teaching, learning and leadership.
• Build capacity within and between schools for system-wide improvement.
• Develop a national policy based on informed professionalism.

The Innovation Unit provided many opportunities for networking at national level and involved the profession in the development of the programme, from Innovation Exchanges to the practitioner-dominated Steering Group. The Innovation Unit was also responsible for organising two annual conferences for the programme which provided celebratory occasions for hundreds of practitioners and pupils from Leading Edge Partnerships to share their experience and progress of working in partnership.

For more information about the Leading Edge Partnership programme, please refer to www.standards.dfes.gov.uk/leadingedge.

The Leading Edge Partnership programme is now a central part of system-wide reform and will continue to seek innovation and school improvements, particularly in relation to the policy-practitioner interface.

Links to Examples of Leading Edge Partnership Websites

Below are links to some examples of Leading Edge Partnership websites from the first cohort of the programme. The majority of partnerships, particularly in the first cohort, have created websites to share what they are doing within their partnership and beyond. To gain access quickly to more of the websites there is a spreadsheet on the homepage of the Leading Edge website with hyperlinks to the sites.

• Broughton Hall High School, Liverpool (http://www.broughtonhall.com)
• Canon Slade School, Bolton (http://www.canon-slade.bolton.sch.uk)
• Park High School, Stanmore (http://www.parkhighstanmore.org.uk)
• Preston Manor High School, Brent (http://www.pmanor.brent.sch.uk)
• Valentines High School, Ilford, Essex (http://www.valentines-sch.org.uk)

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Cohort 1 Innovation Exchanges

A report from five Leading Edge Innovation Exchanges held in June and July 2003 is downloadable here.

Cohort 2 Innovation Exchanges

The Innovation Exchanges run by The Innovation Unit were an opportunity for leading edge practitioners to enter into a dialogue with each other and with policy makers about innovative policy and practice. The first group discussion at the five Innovation Exchanges run for Cohort 2 gave 445 practitioners from over 340 schools in 58 LAs a chance to review and build on the views expressed by Cohort 1 partnerships.

The full report, published in July 2004, is downloadable here. 

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Regional Innovation Exchanges

A series of regional innovation exchanges were held for Cohort 1 and 2 of the Leading Edge Partnership programme in order to develop aspects of the programme, particularly focussing on self-evaluation and using Fischer Family Trust (FFT) pupil data to explore the impact of interventions. A report from these conferences can be downloaded here (59 KB) and details the content that was discussed.

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