Welcome to the launch of these two major projects; the CES’ guidance on Catholic schools and community cohesion, and the DVD and support materials, Leading a Catholic School – “The best job in the world”.

There are so many people to thank for their contributions to these projects and publications that it would be invidious to begin naming names because I would be bound to forget some.  I do, however, particularly want to thank the members of the Community Cohesion working group and also our Nurturing Future Leaders working group for their invaluable insights.  These groups typically included diocesan officers, headteachers and other practitioners and they exemplify the range of talent that characterises those who work in Catholic education and the importance of the CES’ relationship with the dioceses, and with the schools and colleges.  I thank these colleagues, and also my own staff and consultants at the CES, including those commissioned to manage these projects (details of whom you will find in the publications) for their hard work and dedication in bringing these publications to fruition.

I would like to extend a particular welcome to the many governors who are joining us today.  Without the governing bodies of our schools and in particular the foundation governors, Catholic schools would not be the flourishing places with which we are so familiar.  The foundation governors have a very special role in acting as the guardians of the school’s ethos.  In relation to both our community cohesion guidance and to the leadership materials, I look forward to governing bodies studying and discussing these resources and planning how they can make best use of them.  Governors are vital in ensuring that the school does all that it possibly can to prepare and bring forward headteachers for our schools, and indeed other schools, irrespective of whether their own school will need a new head in the near future; I would like to see all governors have a rolling agenda item on how their school provides headteachers for the Catholic community and beyond – in other words ensuring that their school makes a practical contribution to succession planning.  Similarly, governors are crucial in encouraging the school’s activities to consolidate and promote community cohesion.  The governors role goes beyond monitoring and review, they are often a particularly valuable source of networking into the immediate community, to parents and beyond, and their encouragement of what the school does and their probing, accompanied by an ambassadorial role for the school, can do much to ensure that community cohesion is well understood, and viewed positively in the school community and about the school community.  In other words, governors are partners in building harmonious communities.

There will doubtless be some who will be less than enthusiastic to hear that I added to their inspection burdens because I ‘volunteered’ the inspection of community cohesion in our schools.  I did this during the negotiations that accompanied the passage of the 2006 Education and Inspections Act.  I took the view that we have much good practice to share and build upon and that we should be willing to make this publically known.  I pressed that it should be the case that all schools, and not just schools with a religious character, as was once mooted, be inspected and evaluated for their promotion of community cohesion.  I was able to do this because I have confidence in the good work that is going on in our schools and sixth form colleges but I am also very aware of the present climate in which some sectors of society clamour for secularisation and erroneously lay the blame for disharmony at the doors of schools with a religious character.  I firmly believe that the detractors are wrong but we in the Catholic education sector also have to be transparent and to speak up in the debate, whether this be as a teacher to our professional associations and unions, or as parents, governors and headteachers to the local authorities and politicians; if we do not define ourselves others will, if we do not make transparent what we are doing in our schools then others will make (incorrect) presumptions. 

I hope that the simple materials that form our guidance on community cohesion will be useful to our schools.  The guidelines are based on a combination of case studies arising from a small survey that our diocesan officers helped carry out for us, accompanied by information on some of the criteria used to evaluate the promotion of community cohesion.  In this respect we are ahead of the game because the inspection of community cohesion in S48 inspections (looking at RE and the religious life of the school) is already becoming well established.  Schools reminded us quite forcefully that whilst race is a very important part of the concept of community and building community cohesion, there are also other important considerations such as how we show care for the elderly, or the disadvantaged, and how we care for the environment that is so crucial to the flourishing of any community.

I hope the guidance will help us to spur one another along and to review what we are doing at present so that we can build on this and live up to what I believe is an attainable goal for all of us in that pupils and young people in all types of schools should;

-       learn about one another

-       learn from one another

-       learn with one another

Some of this may sound daunting for schools, for example, in rural areas or for those who do not have the benefits of being located in an ethnically diverse area but the opportunities of electronic communications and other ways of reaching out should offer some solutions.

I look forward in the future to being able to share more case studies of the ways in which our Catholic schools promote community cohesion, via the CES’ website and other strategies.  I urge schools to send us details of their efforts and experiences.

Conversations such as “how we promote community cohesion in our schools”, would be redundant if we did not have the good headteachers who are fundamental to the leadership and running of our schools.  The DVD, Leading a Catholic School – “The best job in the world”, and its support materials offer unique insights into the joys of leading a Catholic school.  We have no shortage of people well qualified to be the leaders of our schools but we do have a shortage of people coming forward (and this is a problem shared with all other types of schools in England and Wales).  There is a plethora of national research which shows that far more people qualify to be heads than apply for headship posts, and recently through the GTC, there has been research published on the negative impact that the high levels of bureaucracy demanded have on headteacher recruitment.  Nevertheless, it is evident from the headteachers and their colleagues who speak on the DVD that there is much for us still to do in ensuring that the rewards of headship are as well publicised and celebrated as are the undoubted challenges.

Leading a Catholic School – “The best job in the world” is only one of the many strategies that the Church is deploying to encourage recruitment to leadership posts in our schools and I am pleased that Howson’s research has already noted some improvement in recruitment to Catholic schools. 

We have been very pleased to receive a lot of support from NCSL, which has enabled us to produce Leading a Catholic School – “The best job in the world”, but also to support various diocesan and other initiatives to nurture future leaders.  I am also very pleased that the CES is working with Heythrop College through ‘Heythrop Institute for Religion, Ethics & Public Life’ (thanks to funding from another charitable trust) enabling us to explore the distinctiveness of leading a Catholic school and helping to provide more support on this aspect of headteacher development. 

Finally, I would like to take this opportunity to thank all those who lead and manage in our schools and the diocesan officers and others who support them.  I am sure that with their collective talents we will be able to go from strength to strength, serving not only our own Catholic community but the good of society.

Before handing over to Archbishop Nichols I would like to conclude with a brief opportunity for reflection by reading you some lines from a prayer that I am told comes from the prayer book of the Reformed Synagogues of Great Britain:

Lord of all creation, we stand in awe before You, impelled by visions of the harmony of humankind.

Now it is time for us to meet, in memory and truth, in courage and trust, in love and promise.

In what we share, let us see the common prayer of humanity.

In that which we differ, let us wonder at our freedom.

In our unity and our differences, let us know the uniqueness that is God.

May our courage match our convictions, and our integrity match our hope.

May our faith in You, bring us closer to each other.

Amen.

Oona Stannard

Chief Executive and Director