Introduction

Scotland has a population of around 5.46 million, the majority of whom live in the central belt, a strip of low-lying land between Glasgow and Edinburgh with more rural areas to the south in the Borders and to the north in the Highland and Islands. The country has a mature educational infrastructure which includes university provision of all initial teacher education as well as Master level provision for continuing teacher education; local authorities which employ teachers and also provide continuing professional development for teachers; a school inspectorate; an independent regulator—known as the General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS); teacher trades unions as well as other professional bodies serving the needs of teachers and head teachers. GTCS regulations for pre-service teachers stipulated that each should spend half of their course of study in schools which for the pilot cohort meant three practicums of six weeks at different points in the school year and 18 weeks of study within the university. There is no financial incentive for schools to take students; it is part of the consensus, now expressed in the GTCS standards, that the education of the next generation of teachers is a professional responsibility for the entire profession (GTCS, 2012). The country’s size and population distribution mean that it is possible to hold interagency meetings with relative ease because travel to and from major cities takes just over three hours. During the pandemic such meetings were held online. The compact nature of the education and a general sense of collegiality has been commented on both positively but negatively when it tends to the parochial (Menter & Hulme, 2008).

It is the case, therefore, that many aspects of Scottish education have long policy histories. In terms of teacher learning, A Teaching Profession for the twenty-first century (SEED, 2000) recommended that teachers should have 35 h built into their work in order to undertake further study. A follow-up report, Review of Initial Teacher Education Stage 2 (2005), recommended that greater collaboration between schools and universities would enhance the school experience of student teachers as it was becoming difficult for universities to place large numbers of students in schools.

At the turn of the millennium, in a process similar to that found in other countries, such as the USA and Australia, Scottish teacher education institutions merged with geographically proximate universities. In 1999, St Andrew’s College merged with existing departments of Education and Adult Education in the University of Glasgow to make up a new Faculty of Education. The University of Glasgow belongs to the ‘Russell Group’, a collection of 24 research-intensive universities (Russell Group, 2021). The University’s research norms and its requirements for research activity, although found difficult by transitioning staff (Menter, 2011), became the catalyst of new directions being undertaken in teacher education. The merger heralded the shift from teacher training to teacher education underlining the academic rigour required to become a teacher and the access granted to teacher education as an integral part of a research-intensive university.

As a disciplinary field in its own right, teacher education was flourishing. In 2009, AERA produced Studying Teacher Education (Cochran-smith and Zeichner) which celebrated high-quality US studies to date. Being a member of this research community directly influenced work in Glasgow. The work of the Holmes Group (1986) was discussed including the possibility of using the idea of ‘teaching hospitals’ as a metaphorical guide to a school-based teacher education. The Group argued that a professional development school, or in this case, a school–university partnership should be characterised by an ability to develop the learning of pre-service and in-service teachers in order to support research and development in the profession. The tradition of professional development schools in the US (Clark, 1999) was considered, and the US accreditor NCATE’s report Transforming Teacher Education Through Clinical Practice: A National Strategy to Prepare Effective Teachers (2010) influenced thinking in the direction of a ‘clinical’ model. From Australia, the work at the University of Melbourne which formed the basis of a study reported in Mclean Davies’ et al. (2013) also focused on clinical preparation. These influences had in common the benefits for pre-service teachers of closer relationships between school and university staff which, it was argued, provided problem-solving, target-setting support and personalised support in authentic situations of practice. Consideration was also given to Finnish arrangements of teacher education where teachers were educated to Masters level and teacher educators to doctoral level (Menter et al., 2012).

The contemporary focus on practitioner enquiry as a form of continuing teacher learning (Cochran Smith & Lytle, 2009) was also significant and was given a UK perspective in the work of Vivienne Baumfield, a member of staff at that time (2012), thus adding ‘enquiring’ teacher to ‘reflective’ teacher as the nature of the professional under formation in the typology generated through a literature review commissioned to inform Teaching Scotland’s Future (Menter et al., 2010).

The Oxford Internship model (established in 1988) suggested that teacher education achieved greater effectiveness when the connections between university and school were strong, and the sites of pre-service teacher learning were perceived taking place on both sites (Benton, 1990a, b). It was not enough to provide a curriculum for pre-service teacher learning in the university; a curriculum in school was also required along with a broad responsibility across schools, local authorities and universities (Zeichner, 2002). Finnish teacher education placed a high premium on the intellectual challenge of teaching. Programmes of study are structured on the basis of a systematic view of education; all teaching is based on research; learning activities are structured so that pre-service teachers can come to professional decisions justified through problem-solving, and pre-service teachers learn research skills (Toom et al., 2010). One of the benefits of moving from a college of education to a university was a shift in mindset of teacher educators, which manifested itself in a growing understanding of the link between a student teacher’s academic engagement with what was already known about learning in teaching as expressed in research and their ability to better support and educate the pupils within their charge.

During 2007, there was a growing research-informed sense within the Faculty of Education at the University of Glasgow, that reform of teacher education was needed. Two key changes characterised this change: the process of recasting teacher education as a Masters qualification and the establishment of a school–university partnership. The shift to Masters level provided the space in which school university links could be explored. Moving teacher education to Masters level qualification was more straightforward to achieve as the change was internal to one institution and its accreditation by the university paved the way for acceptance by the regulator.

However, any change to the pre-service teachers’ curriculum in schools required partnership with local authorities and schools as anticipated by Zeichner (2002). In 2007, the Scottish Government funded the pilot of the partnership model of teacher education at the University of Glasgow. It was called the Glasgow West Teacher Education Initiative and comprised a steering group which oversaw the pilot in primary and two secondary schools and eleven primary schools and made provision for an independent evaluation of the pilot. The steering group drew its members from university, schools and the local authority. In the initial phase, the university, local authority and schools were self-selecting because of geographical proximity to the university who mooted the idea in the first place with the local authority. Once agreement was reached at this level, schools were selected by the local authority on the basis of their capacity to undertake this work. This membership demonstrates the complexity of teacher education and the number of stakeholders who have to be involved if decisions which may lead to cultural change are to be implemented. As Feiman-Nemser (2001) put it, “No single institution has the expertise, authority or financial resources to create the necessary structures and learning opportunities” (p. 1037).

The local authority was interested in improving the quality of pre-service teachers and ways in which the partnership could embed lifelong professional learning within the school context. Schools were focussed on ways in which their staff were supported and educated in the role of mentoring and assessing student teachers. Universities were keen to improve the consistency of student experience when pre-service teachers were working in schools and also to embed an interdependent partnership between schools and universities around the complexity of becoming a teacher. All stakeholders could see a benefit to themselves if they collaborated. Each institution recruited or selected staff through their own procedures. University tutors were recruited through expressions of interest and interviews. Head teachers selected staff to act as tutors who had a previous interest in teacher learning or supporting students. Students were made aware of the new support in schools, and those who were randomly assigned to schools in the geographical area were asked if they wanted to be part of the project. No student refused. The reform was shaped on the principles of cooperation and equity between schools and universities. The role of the local authority was significant in the partnership as it had oversight of the schools with which the university worked and authority to make changes needed for the pilot. Funding from the pilot was allocated to support the release of teachers from school to attend collegiate meetings, and a local authority officer to planning workshops in the university where the content and scope of a curriculum for the practicum was co-constructed. The aims of the pilot were.

  • To co-construct and implement a new collaborative school (and community)-based partnership approach to supporting the professional learning and development of student teachers, teachers and tutors;

  • To establish closer communication, shared understanding and relationships;

  • To build capacity in the profession to engage with effective practice-based and evidence-informed models of professional learning and development and support the development of professional learning communities across the continuum of teacher education;

  • To identify and evaluate the particular benefits for partnership, for learning and professional development and ITE/CPD policy which emerge from an integrated and structured approach to student placement and support;

  • To identify and evaluate the benefits of the co-construction, co-learning and co-inquiry approach from the point of view of the professional and scholarly development of the tutors and teachers, as well as from the point of view of student learning;

  • To identify the methods by which scholarly output and learning opportunities (for teachers, tutors and other education partners) about teacher education policy and practice can be increased, and with what impact.

(Menter et al. 2012).

To meet the first of these aims, the student teacher, the School Experience Tutor (SET) and the class teacher worked collaboratively for the duration of the practicum using formative assessment, seminars, learning rounds and joint summative assessments. The curriculum for the practicum comprised both classroom experience, intellectual engagement with appropriate literature, peer and staff observations, learning conversations and a holistic assessment of student performance over the full 18 weeks school practicum. The School Experience curriculum honoured the expertise of school teachers and university lecturers as academic knowledge was considered one appropriate knowledge alongside professional knowledge which was also necessary and appropriate (Zeichner, 2010). School teachers were viewed as experts in classroom pedagogy while university lecturers were seen as having access to contemporary research on issues relating to classroom practice.

While on practicum, pre-service teachers had a single identified School Experience tutor from the university. This tutor accompanied students into schools during their practicum. Students were part of a learning community made up of primary and secondary students, school and university staff. Significant time was given to the process of reflecting on the role and work of the teacher in the school during the practicum. This happened in three ways. Firstly, all students attended weekly seminars on topics of high relevance for pre-service teachers, such as behaviour management, planning, communication and reflection. A tutor with a specialism in that area would work with the pre-service teachers on that issue. Academic readings used in the seminars formed the frame through which students reflected on their classroom practice. Evaluations of classroom lessons written by students had to demonstrate engagement with academic reading. Secondly, learning rounds (where students observed their peers’ teaching and used the observations as a context for non-judgmental peer discussion facilitated by school and university staff). Thirdly, the final assessment of the students was a joint report agreed by both school and university staff. This journey to becoming a teacher depended heavily on frequent formative assessment from school and university staff and was intended to eradicate the ‘crit’ lesson when a student’s assessment would depend on a 45-min observation of the student teaching and a post-lesson discussion. This single observation and discussion were the only basis on which a student teacher was evaluated to be satisfactory or not. In the partnership model, no student was assessed on a single ‘crit’ lesson, nor by a representative of only one institution, but on the full period of their school experience by representatives of both institutions so the student did not receive mixed messages where one partner ‘failed’ the student and the other thought they deserved a pass.

These then were the three pedagogical pillars of the partnership model. Teaching Scotland’s Future was published in January 2011. The reform of teacher education within the University of Glasgow anticipated the report and had already embedded many of the principles and final recommendations within its reforms. TSF commented on both strands of previous reviews. There was focus on initial and career-long teacher learning as well as a desire to mine the potential of school–university links as a means by which career-long learning could be achieved. Partly, this was envisioned in so-called hub schools, an idea which had similarities to European ‘normal’ schools. No structure for such partnerships was mandated and the idea of a ‘hub’ school was rejected by the Scottish teaching profession through its various agencies because of a fear of it leading to a two-tier profession (Menter & Hulme, 2011).

Changes in Views of Knowledge

The partnership model radically reformed the recognised areas of expertise within university and schools. University-based teacher educators took the role of the academic expert in learning and teaching applicable across all age ranges within school. School-based teacher educators took the role of curricular experts with the specific classroom in which the pre-service teacher worked. Although areas of expertise could exist across teacher educators based in both university and school, this acknowledgement of the expertise created parity and partnership between university and school, rather than the previous view in which university tutors were perceived to embody arcane knowledge of little relevance to the classroom and were distant from the site of practice, thus intending to reduce the attitudes to different types of knowledge (Stoddart, 1993). School teachers’ knowledge was affirmed as being crucial to the pedagogical conversation with pre-service teachers and university-based staff.

Changes in Site and Nature of Teacher Education Roles

The partnership model reconsidered the role of the classroom teacher who hosts the pre-service teacher and the university-based tutor who supports the student during the practicum. The establishment of a working relationship between university and school staff was the foundation on which the partnership rested. University staff led seminars in school buildings, hosted learning rounds and jointly assessed students with teachers. The presence of SETs on site meant that they were familiar figures in schools who could be contacted with everyday questions, thus inhabiting the role described in teacher education studies as the ‘boundary spanner’; even though that term can have various detailed out workings (Burns & Baker, 2016).

The evaluation of the pilot was based on four elements. The narrative account was based on minutes of meetings, professional journals and researcher observations. This provided a coherent account of a wide-ranging series of actions with numerous actors. Pre- and post-project surveys were conducted along with interviews and focus groups with key actors who included students, schoolteachers, school managers, local authority staff, university staff (programme leaders, etc.). The evaluation found that school-based seminars and learning rounds had increased the pre-service teachers’ willingness to undertake academic reading and relate it to practice. There also seemed to be more pedagogical work done with pre-service teachers by university staff rather than assessment work which characterised the previous model.

Although not one of its final themes, the evaluation did find that ‘the logistics of the scheme were complex’ (Menter et al., 2012, p.72) and the report noted that communication was crucial to any ongoing work. The pilot found that although there was an enhanced professional experience for pre-service teachers, the goal of transforming schools into learning communities for all staff had not occurred, an omission again thought to be related to the complexity, newness and logistical load of the project. The changes required to achieve such a goal would have required sustained leadership among all institutions and would have involved workload and contract negotiations with teaching unions. The evaluation found that the project had not changed some deeply embedded cultural norms—some participants still talked about ‘crit lessons’ although this form of assessment had been explicitly rejected by the discussions. There was an overall enthusiasm for the work which had been undertaken and the way in which it had been done.

The partnership model evolved after the publication of TSF to which the Scottish Government responded with Continuing to Build Excellence in Teaching (2011). The document accepted all the recommendations proposed by TSF. The SG established the TSF National Partnership Group; their remit was to support the development and implementation of TSF which required “new and strengthened models of partnership” between universities, local authorities, schools, teachers and national bodies (Donaldson, 2011). The group was to ensure the partnership development not only strengthened initial teacher education but the full spectrum of career-long teacher education. Of particular importance is the consensus across the professional bodies (unions, regulator, inspectorate and local authorities) that the recommendations for teacher education were not only sensible and visionary but necessary and would be, in general, supported.

SG strongly supported the move to Masters level qualification for teachers within Scotland, and this funding continued to support the partnership model as the University of Glasgow ensured that all its teacher education students could graduate with a Masters degree if they chose. The Scottish Higher Education Funding Council in partnership with universities created the context and circumstances in which teacher education qualifications at the initial stage would be Masters level. University fees for teacher education at undergraduate level and at postgraduate level had always been funded by the Scottish Government as teaching was seen as a national priority. From 2011 onwards, SG fully funded Masters level qualifications for newly qualified teachers. The school–university partnership was thus indirectly funded as the programme which it supported at the University of Glasgow used the partnership model.

As changes to the level of qualification were taking place, the partnership model grew and developed, becoming the only model of teacher education in the University of Glasgow. Staff responded to the findings of the evaluation of the pilot in three key ways. Firstly, the curriculum of teacher education in the university and in schools continued to develop. No longer was the university curriculum created by university staff, it was co-constructed between school staff, university staff and local authority staff. The content of the curriculum was rooted in theoretical perspectives on teaching, in classroom practice in order to form the dispositions in pre-service teachers that they needed to become lifelong learners and researchers into their practice. Using practitioner enquiry as a pedagogy aimed to move the profession closer to the aspirations of Stenhouse where teachers are able to become researchers of their own practice and developers of their own curriculum (Stenhouse, 1975).

Secondly, the School of Education invested in the recruitment and training of school experience tutors by the university. These tutors had a specific and sophisticated set of skills—an in-depth understanding of learning and teaching within a classroom context; they were educated to Masters level; thus, they had a strong grounding in education as a discipline; and a career history which demonstrated leadership within Scottish schools.

Thirdly, the changes were being explicitly and systematically embedded in the minds and practice of university and school-based teacher educators. The slow, yet steady, evolution of the model gradually ensured that the assessment of a pre-service teacher was no longer predicated on a 45-min snapshot in a classroom. It was based on the entire period of the practicum and included constant conversation with the host teacher; feedback from the school experience tutor; engagement with peers and written reflections framed by a theoretical lens as pre-service teachers interacted with what was known about learning and teaching in order to develop their own classroom reflective classroom practice.

New Challenge

In 2014, Ellis and Sosu wrote an influential academic article which demonstrated that an attainment gap existed and had existed for many years in Scotland between children who were born in more affluent areas and their fellow citizens who were not. According to the Scottish Government, the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD) is the national measure of deprivation. It is a relative measure of deprivation across seven domains: income, employment, education, health, access to services, crime and housing. Children who live in SIMD 1 and 2 live in areas which are the most deprived; the lower the ranking, the greater the deprivation. In order to address this stubborn difficulty, the Scottish Government launched the Scottish Attainment Challenge (2015) which aimed to ensure equity for all and improve achievement in literacy, numeracy and health and well-being, the overarching themes of the Scottish curriculum. The Scottish Council of Deans of Education (SCDE) was invited to develop a research agenda in teacher education to provide support for the Attainment Challenge. In early 2018, funding was secured from the Scottish Government for this research programme.

One of the research questions set by SCDE was ‘What relevant inputs are students and early career teachers given in their Teacher Education curriculum to support effective work with pupils from SIMD 1 to 40 backgrounds?’ The University of Glasgow was able to use a key component of the partnership model—the practitioner enquiry—to explore this research question (Doherty & Boland, 2020). The University of Glasgow research reflected on whether the sharing of practitioner enquiries undertaken in disadvantaged communities could contribute to the professional growth of teachers. The study followed two cohorts through their final stage of their teacher education programme. Cohort A participants provided a copy of their practitioner enquiry assignment and were interviewed by the researchers twice. The first interview focused on the interviewee’s background, their practicum context, the nature of their professional enquiry, its origins and the learning they planned to take into future contexts. The second interview conducted eight months later when the participants were in their first year of teaching explored how they were faring in their first teaching post, the nature of their new contexts, what, if any, aspects of their professional enquiry were they able to transfer to this context and would they have done differently in hindsight on the practicum on which they were first interviewed. Cohort A were asked if they would share their practitioner enquiries with their peers on Cohort A and B. Due to COVID-19, cohort B had an interrupted placement. The unprecedented circumstances impacted negatively on the recruitment of Cohort B, and the project had to be suspended. The analysis of the interview data and the professional enquiry documents was context-driven with qualitative analysis reflecting on participants’ meaning and theoretical vocabulary. In addition, the analysis sought to identify dispositions of teachers highlighted when describing the variety of contexts and ways in which participants accounted for consideration of the context in relation to their professional thinking.

Theoretically, the research was based on Bernstein’s theory of knowledge which enabled a framing of the knowledge generated during practitioner enquiry. Commonly treated with scepticism by professional researchers, this theoretical framework enabled the finding that although the knowledge generated was not generalisable, it was important in developing teacher and pupil learning among children in SIMD 1 and 2 where some of Cohort A was working. By posing a problem or question, pre-service teachers critically reviewed their own practice in the social conditions of the school context. This generated knowledge which pre-service teachers used to enhance their own practice in the classroom which in turn enhanced their professional practice at a critically important stage of their development as a teacher. It was also found that participants were able to take their knowledge into a new teaching context where they were able to re-contextualise it, using it as a perspective from which to understand and adapt practice. Teachers’ context sensitivity to the specificity of each setting was important in developing their professional practice.

The research found that practitioner enquiry enabled pre-service teachers to support the learning of the children identified by Scottish Attainment Challenge. Participants who embarked upon a practitioner enquiry in a school serving a community of high deprivation produced meaningful work that demonstrated understanding and the nuanced complexity of the community they served. Pre-service teachers acknowledged the lower levels of literacy and numeracy in their classes and, in frank evaluations of their lessons, noted that using active pedagogies enabled pupil learning, did go on to highlight the challenges of transitioning from active learning to desk-based pedagogies.

These pre-service students were exposed to the challenges, practices and expectations which the Scottish Attainment Challenge was seeking to identify in order to break the link between deprivation and attainment. By sharing enquiries and experiences with each other, pre-service teachers who were not placed in disadvantaged communities had a vicarious experience of serving communities of deprivation through reading the enquiries of their peers and discussing the emergent points. Wyse et al. (2020) refer to the benefit of both academic ‘research’ and practitioner ‘enquiry’, and the partnership model was able to host both these forms of enquiry in order to respond to a current policy initiative, one of the three hallmarks of a school–university partnership.

In summary, the school–university partnership demonstrated the intense complexity of learning and teaching within a classroom. The structure of the partnership which required high-level strategic collaboration among senior managers across institutions which each had their own goals and own ways of working as well as comprehensive work from individuals within these organisations on roles, responsibilities and the intense logistical detail of practicum organisation, is only one expression of this complexity. Yet the partnership ideal present in academic literature had to be shared by all participants irrespective of role or institution. The partnership model shone new light on the potential of reformed relationships between university and school-based teacher educators for the benefit of pre-service teachers. In addition to reflective practice, the use of practitioner enquiry as a pedagogy occurring on the site of practice enabled pre-service teachers to develop an enquiring disposition at a period where their professional identity was being formed (Doherty & Boland, 2020). Because of the complexity and scope of the partnership, the cultural changes entailed take time to become embedded with both sites of teacher learning. The focus of funding on individual teachers will take time to reach a tipping point where it is recognised that all teachers should have the opportunity to learn and develop their professionalism in the context of their own classrooms and schools.

Reflections

In Scotland, as in the rest of the world, the policy landscape is influenced by the political agenda which within democratic countries can change every four to five years. By contrast, the partnership model of teacher education, rooted in research and professional experience, was not designed using contemporary policy only, but was designed over a sustained period of time with a clear focus on how best to educate pre-service teachers. Bearing this in mind, the model strived to ‘policy proof’ itself ensuring sustainability over an extended period of time. Some researchers have found that the idea of ‘partnership’ was left dangling when the policy gaze (and funding) shifted to the National Improvement Framework (Bain et al., 2016) and subsequently to the poverty-related attainment gap. However, it can be argued as Bain and colleagues do (2016), that because of the time and resource given to partnership work in Scotland, it had become a crucial space in which teacher educators could develop new thinking about classroom improvement in order to provide a rich response to policy goals.

Structure

The structure of the partnership was complex and dependent on sophisticated communication, strong professional relationships and the need for robust bureaucratic structures to enable all stakeholders to understand and carry out their roles and responsibilities (Dickson, 2020). The challenge of creating and enabling bureaucratic structures was not the sole responsibility of the university. At the strategic level and at the operational level, it involved national bodies such as the Scottish Government and the General Teaching Council of Scotland as well as local authorities and schools. At times there was tension when the bureaucratic systems seemed to dictate the experience, yet the co-creators of the partnership worked exceptionally hard to prevent this from happening by ensuring the vision of the model was the key driver for the bureaucratic structure rather than the other way round.

Tensions

Others have reported tensions between partners (Breault & Adair Breault, 2012) when schools and universities are unable to make common cause in order to create the optimum conditions for educating teachers (Breault, 2013). The partnership model discussed here worked to reduce suspicion among partners because of the deliberate co-construction and the language of inclusion and equity used between partners. Any ideas around intellectual superiority of academic knowledge were replaced by the values of trust and empathy which were explicit in the day-to-day interactions, the written documentation and meetings of staff. Underlying this culture of trust was the fact that no financial gain was made by schools if they accepted students as in Scotland every school and every classroom is notionally available to host students.

Values

This shared culture of educating the next generation of teachers is further strengthened in the GTCS Standards for Scottish teachers where it is expressly articulated that the education of the next generation of teachers is the responsibility of all teachers (GTCS, 2012). The Standards articulate the professional values and personal commitments expected of teachers and teacher educators, and trust, integrity, and respect are core values. These values provided the framework and foundation of this partnership model; they were the values all pre-service teachers were expected to embody (thus in constant use by staff when assessing pre-service teacher development) and the values all stakeholders exhibited throughout the complex and sometimes challenging process of co-construction.

Depth was a discernible component of the partnership model (Breault, 2013). One of the biggest threats to achieving depth is the constantly changing landscape within schools and universities: changes in personnel, in strategy and in policy. In addition, changes in government policy add another layer of potential contextual change. The strategic and operational relationships on which the partnership rested, arguably, did change the views of pre-service teacher assessment in the schools where the model operated. The shared reporting system articulated a pre-service teacher’s development as a journey over their programme in school and university. It was not solely dependent on either the school’s vision or the university’s vision.

Claiming ownership comes from an investment of time, energy and shared vision. The process of forming the partnership created the conditions for ownership. That process took place over a sustained period of time; it was complex and afforded all stakeholders the opportunity to contribute to its construction ensuring that the all-important sense of shared ownership was embedded within the model. The sense of shared ownership enabled all stakeholders to invest in the model because all stakeholders benefited from the formation of confident beginning teachers. An example of the ownership and professional commitment to the model can be seen in practice when a struggling pre-service student is identified rapidly, and a support plan, created by university and school staff, is put in place.

Of the Holmes Group’s three-aspect description, the partnership model demonstrated development of initial teachers’ experience and a space for research and development. However, the missing area of the work is the inclusion of in-service teachers working on enquiry in schools. Models from New Zealand and Wales have demonstrated how this could be achieved (Furlong et al., 2021; Timperley, 2011). Given the capacity of dedicated resources in schools to generate means of dealing with stubborn problems, there is much to be gained from an ongoing conversation around the evolution of the model.