In recent years the current system of high stakes accountability in England has come under increasing scrutiny, and demands for Ofsted reform have intensified.
There is growing interest in rethinking narrow school accountability metrics and moving towards more supportive and developmental ways of evaluating the performance of schools and colleges. Parents in particular are supportive of this approach – see Parents and teachers want a more transparent, well round and less high stakes accountability system in schools.
One idea that has come to the fore is for a school / college level ‘Balanced Scorecard’ or ‘School Report Card’ to be introduced, which provides a more comprehensive and richer view of success, and demonstrates the impact that schools and colleges make in their communities and to the populations that they serve.
The new Government has committed to “replace headline grades with a new system of school report cards, that tell parents clearly how well their children’s school is performing” and which “capture the breadth of school life”.
This idea of a Balanced Scorecard bears similarities to our work at Rethinking Assessment on a comprehensive learner profile that recognises the full breadth of a young person’s strengths and achievements. Many of the schools and colleges we are working with are keen to extrapolate this model to an organisational viewpoint.
The two concepts are closely connected as a system of broader national success metrics would unlock changes in curriculum and assessment practice. As Phil Avery, Director of Education at the Bohunt Education Trust, writes for us in this blog, to rethink assessment, we also need to rethink school accountability.
In response to this growing consensus, Rethinking Assessment and the Edge Foundation led an action research project to explore the Balanced Scorecard idea in more depth with education leaders, sector stakeholders, practitioners and policy makers.
Our new discussion paper Balanced Scorecards: Towards Broader and Better Measures of School Success presents the findings from this project.
What could a Balanced Scorecard look like?
We started by looking at what was already happening across the education sector – what areas of qualitative and quantitative data education providers were capturing, in addition to statutory requirements, and how this information was being used to support improvement, collaboration, and demonstrate success. Areas such as student and teacher wellbeing, careers provision (Gatsby Benchmarks) and enrichment, skills development (e.g Skills Builder Framework), student destinations, and inclusion, were common themes.
The paper proposes the development of a comprehensive evaluation tool that draws together these metrics, and we have created three Balanced Scorecard visuals which show how this information could be presented for different audiences.
The visual below presents a fictional front page ‘dashboard’ of measures, across a range of components that we know schools / colleges / Multi Academy Trust (MATs) are already gathering data on.
The paper presents three visualisations for how this expanded dataset could be used for different purposes, across different layers of governance and accountability. For example:
1. Internal Data Dashboard: Comprehensive views of school / college performance across various metrics.
2. Parent Report Card: Simplified versions of the dashboard tailored for parental use.
3. Government Dashboard: Subsets of data relevant to policymakers, aimed at fostering developmental conversations and system wide improvements.
There are around 20 metrics that we have chosen to define and showcase in the Prototype Scorecard, but we would not envisage that all should be used for the purpose of national accountability.
In line with ASCL’s recommendations in their recent paper, An accountability model based on school report cards, we envisage a small number of national performance standards (metrics) against which schools / colleges are held accountable by regulatory bodies. This might include new areas such as skills progression, careers provision or student destinations, where there are already robust frameworks and benchmarks to do this in a standardised way.
A broader range of indicators would then be available for schools / colleges to draw upon to populate different areas of the Scorecard which demonstrate their unique strengths, impact, and contextualise the information conveyed through national performance standards. Measures could ‘flex’ between years to reflect changing priorities.
How could a Balanced Scorecard be used in practice?
Through this project we found that many schools, colleges and MATs in England are already experimenting with Balanced Scorecard style systems and a range of indicators to evaluate and improve their educational practices, and tell their own stories.
The paper includes six case studies from different education providers which show how – in addition to metrics such as pupil progress and attainment – broader measures such as student and teacher wellbeing, student engagement, essential skills progression, enrichment provision, and parent engagement are being used to drive organisational development, school improvement, professional learning, and strong cultures of collaboration.
The case studies show the feasibility and benefits of a more comprehensive performance evaluation system. One which could grow organically out of existing school self evaluation and school improvement processes. The schools / colleges showcased in the paper highlighted improved decision-making and quality assurance, curriculum planning and personalisation, higher quality community engagement, and more engaged and involved stakeholders, that has resulted.
We heard from educators how broader data measures and narratives can drive different conversations and different ways of working across a system. One participant noted that a Balanced Scorecard would “shift the lens on what is discussed and valued, it pushes schools and leaders into different ways of thinking.”
The discussion paper also explores potential implementation approaches for a Balanced Scorecard, which would support schools and colleges to become better learning organisations engaged in continuous cycles of improvement and collaborative development at a system level. This includes existing system wide models such as the Careers & Enterprise Company Careers Impact System maturity model, and regional models such as the #BeWell initiative, which could be drawn upon.
The introduction of a Balanced Scorecard could represent a significant shift towards a more inclusive and equitable system of school evaluation that recognises and values the diverse contributions of schools to student development and community wellbeing. Whilst maintaining the importance of an agreed set of minimum national standards. This approach not only supports school improvement but also aligns with the evolving expectations of parents, teachers, and policymakers for a well-rounded education system.
What next?
The paper concludes with recommendations for further research and development, including:
1. Creating a national database of existing Balanced Scorecard style pilots.
2. Compilation of the full range of national datasets and measures that could be included in a Balanced Scorecard / School Report Card.
3. Consulting with parents and other stakeholders to refine the metrics and their presentation.
4. Piloting and evaluating different Balanced Scorecard models – via different types of partnership approaches.
5. Exploring how these models can complement and potentially evolve current Ofsted inspection processes, and support a move towards stronger forms of local and regional collaboration.
