The post-16 sector in England refers to the diverse education and training options available to young people from the age of 16, typically after completing their GCSEs. This is a key stage in the English education system, which spans various settings such as further education (FE) colleges, sixth-form colleges (SFCs), school sixth forms, and…

Supporting high quality teaching is pivotal in improving children's outcomes. Indeed, research tells us that high quality teaching can narrow the disadvantage gap. It is therefore hugely encouraging to see a host of new initiatives and reforms that recognise the importance of teacher quality such as the Early Career Framework and the new National…

Teachers have an important influence on pupils' academic progress, yet the quality of teaching varies widely. Policymakers, school leaders, and teacher educators therefore face the challenge of designing and commissioning professional development (PD) to help all their teachers become as effective as the best teachers. In the last two decades, a…

Evaluating the impact of complex whole-school interventions (CWSIs) is challenging. However, what evidence there is suggests that school leadership and other elements of whole-school contexts are important for pupils' attainment (Leithwood et al., 2006), suggesting that interventions aimed at changing these have significant potential to improve…