Should admissions policies be changed to help teachers who want a place for their child in their school? °Õ±ð²õ’ latest article on ethical leadership finds a head facing this dilemma - and looks at how they achieved an acceptable outcome for all.
This article is part of a series looking at how leaders can use the , developed in 2018 through a commission involving the Association of School and College Leaders and the Chartered College of Teaching, to guide their leadership decisions. This framework is based on the values of selflessness, integrity, objectivity, accountability, openness, honesty, leadership, trust, wisdom, kindness, justice, service, courage and optimism.
What was the issue?
Housing near to the popular secondary school that I oversee has become increasingly unaffordable for school staff, and social housing has huge waiting lists. Many teachers have moved further away to buy a house, but many have remained teaching at the school.
Two staff who were thinking about moving came to me with a request to alter the admissions criteria to give preference to children of current staff.
As the matter progressed, 35 staff joined the campaign, most of whom had, or might have, their children at the school.
What we did
I was initially opposed to the idea. Comprehensive schools need to admit the young people who live closest to the school in order to serve their community.
The children of school staff are likely already more advantaged in life, and so taking places in Year 7 for them could directly disadvantage children from under-resourced households who might subsequently not be offered places.
It seemed to me that justice, service, selflessness, objectivity and integrity demanded standard admission procedures without including what could be seen as a favoured category.  Â
However, when the matter was brought before governors and trustees, the majority were in favour of a change.
They argued that honesty, openness, wisdom and kindness were also important and, most importantly, all children in the school would be better served by a stable and happy staff. Â
They also said that professionals motivated by a desire for the school to be good enough for their own children could only be of benefit to others.
I investigated what policies other schools had in the area relating to admissions for teachers’ children and discovered that the majority of local secondaries already offered this.  Â
How the FELE values helped
In response to the facts and counterarguments that staff brought, I needed to have a selfless discussion with myself: was I right?
Justice also mattered to the teachers whose commitment to this school meant that were being treated differently to other local teachers.
Service required me to think of the long-term health of the school at a time of recruitment and retention challenges.
In pursuit of ´Ç²úÂá±ð³¦³Ù¾±±¹¾±³Ù²â,ÌýI looked at the projected numbers of students who could be admitted under a new criterion: no more than 2 per cent. Not a swing to skew a year group and not an amount that would disadvantage other local children at a time of falling rolls.
Integrity, however, demanded that I make this decision with governors and trustees, not just in response to a few persuasive staff.Â
I was honest about my initial misgivings to everyone and made sure that the discussions were carried out with openness. The decision was made calmly and rationally with ·É¾±²õ»å´Ç³¾,Ìýand the proposing staff were kept fully informed all the way through. Â
The outcome
Governors and trustees discussed the matter and accepted the proposal.
We worked with the local authority and the few other local secondary schools that did not already have the children of staff as an admission criterion to adopt the same policy under the same agreed wording, and the change was made.Â
Key takeaways
Senior leaders in an organisation, whether the headteacher of a school or the CEO of a trust, need to be open to changing their minds if relevant facts and reasonable arguments are made. Their opinions are not necessarily immutable!
