A distributed leadership approach to evidence-informed practice: How one school widens staff engagement with teaching and learning research

Emily Giubertoni, Bishop Challoner Training School Alliance SCITT

The aim: To develop an evidence-engaged and informed culture 

In this case study, we will see how one school puts the components of distributed leadership into practice and how, in doing so, it builds a sense of equity and community among the staff body around the use of evidence-engaged practice. In the context of this case study, ‘evidence-engaged and informed’ is taken to mean that teachers are readers of research and are critically evaluating and identifying research relevant to the contextual issues of the school, and that staff are routinely making decisions underpinned by reference to research.

In 2024, the drive for schools to become research-informed institutions is increasing, as policy-makers and training providers alike buy into the idea that ‘a desire to use evidence to inform… teaching practice is key to improving schools’ (Gibb, 2017).

Tomsett (2015) argues that a research-engaged culture will exist if the headteacher is driving it forward. However, while a headteacher may in principle be committed to creating a research-informed teacher culture, there are often many barriers to making this a reality. A headteacher working alone is unlikely to be able to truly embed a research-engaged culture across a school; by utilising a distributed leadership approach, it is possible to engage many more of the staff body with research in a meaningful way. Moore et al. found that ‘School leaders’ involvement and engagement of staff in decision-making processes has been strongly associated with acceptability, buy-in, and sustainability of implementation.’ (2024, p. 240) A deliberate strategy for creating meaningful engagement of staff in the decision-making process can be seen to have immediate and long-term benefits.

Hargreaves and Fink point out that the ‘heroic leadership paradigm is a flawed and fading one’ (2006, p. 96); leaving leadership of research-engaged practice in the hands of a single designated leader is simply too complex and heavy a load for one person to effectively perform. Instead, ‘adults seem to achieve and improve more if they are involved in shaping the processes and practices for which they are responsible’ (Hargreaves and Fink, 2006, p. 101). Contemporary research supports the efficacy of this shared approach (Moore et al., 2024; Wilhelm et al., 2021). 

Gunter explores how a traditional model of the transformational leader is ‘overcome by the realisation that labour is actually and necessarily distributed’ (2001, p. 134). While to an outside observer, schools might seem to follow a traditional hierarchical leadership model, with the headteacher at the top, the reality is that teacher actions are routinely underpinned by the teacher’s own choices, independent thought and priorities: ‘the leader-centric approach is no longer valid or appropriate’ (Nicholas and West-Burnham, 2018, p. 141). As a result, if a school wants to truly embody an evidence-engaged culture, leaders might want to work towards a culture ‘based on interdependent working towards equity grounded in the essential dignity and value of every individual’ (Nicholas and West-Burnham, 2018, p. 142).

Distributed leadership can be understood as having several key components:

• requires multiple levels of involvement in decision-making
• focused primarily on improving classroom practice or instruction
• encompasses both formal and informal leaders
• extends to students and encourages student voice
• is flexible and versatile (non-permanent groupings)
• is ultimately concerned with improving leadership practice in order to influence teaching and learning (Harris, 2008).

The approach to distributed leadership 

Bishop Challoner Catholic College is a voluntary aided secondary school in Birmingham, with approximately 1,200 students on roll, with 32 per cent having free school meals in 2024. 

Teams and structures in Bishop Challoner Catholic College have been designed to engage many voices in a research-driven culture, seeking out pockets of expertise wherever they may be found. 

A strong collaborative team of lead teachers has been created over the last 10 years, alongside a curriculum and assessment team, with the mission of leading the implementation of research-driven practice in multiple facets of teaching and learning, including curriculum and assessment. The team is slowly and constantly evolving. The lead teacher role is to demonstrate excellence and provide support in three areas: quality of teaching and learning; curriculum development; and staff development. Each of these three areas is explicitly research-based. Teaching staff are identified through flexible criteria, including talent-spotting those who demonstrate good practice, strong engagement with improving pedagogy and a desire to contribute beyond their current role. These staff are invited to join the lead teacher or curriculum and assessment teams, initially on a shadowing basis. The team currently includes staff from eight departments across the school: maths, English, science, PE, history, art, computing and RE. This ensures plurality of perspectives in decision-making about teaching and learning.

How do staff ensure that their work is research-based? Lead teachers and the curriculum and assessment team consult a range of data to identify priorities for improvement, utilising the implementation guidance support (EEF, 2024) to ensure that a range of appropriate data sources are explored. Once a priority for improvement is identified, the teams use research resources for teachers, such as the range of guidance reports by the Education Endowment Foundation or the Great Teaching Toolkit (Coe et al., 2020), to identify strategies appropriate for the context of the pupils and school. Any decision on teaching and learning, curriculum or assessment advice is ongoing, justified and supported by reference back to the research source.

The school has a weekly programme of mini-briefings for staff sharing pedagogical strategies, and a weekly programme of mini-briefings sharing technological and innovation strategies. These are coordinated by lead teachers and prioritise seeking voices from across the school; ECTs to senior leaders lead these briefings, in a deliberate effort to create a culture where all voices are valued and expertise is shared. Each briefing explicitly refers to the research basis for the strategies shared, building whole-staff awareness of the research and reinforcing a culture wherein classroom decisions are based on research awareness. As a brief example, if advice on chunking tasks is shared, the work of Sweller (2016) on cognitive load might be briefly explored to help staff to understand why this is likely to be an effective teaching approach.

Delegation to lead teachers does not just mean assigning menial tasks: ‘distributed leadership means more than delegated leadership’ (Hargreaves and Fink, 2006, p. 116). Lead teachers support teaching and learning development by collaborating on half-termly programmes of lesson visits; by planning and delivering INSET; and by taking responsibility for planning and delivering sustained CPD (continuing professional development) optional pathways on research themes led by their area of expertise. Feedback from all these elements are discussed half-termly by all lead teachers, who then mutually agree next steps and additional actions to improve practice further. This fosters a ‘shared sense of ownership of the whole team’s goals’ (Buck, 2016, p. 122).

The headteacher makes a conscious effort in these meetings not to impose on decision-making where practical, but rather to allow the team to develop their own solutions and retain ownership over teaching and learning. If the headteacher’s role is to create the structure and conditions for desired culture, distributed leadership is a choice that is ‘profoundly dependent on trust’ (Nicholas and West-Burnham, 2018, p. 145); by attending meetings but allowing other voices to be heard and lead decision-making, the headteacher makes this trust clear.

Lead teachers also have their own projects linked to their own areas of research expertise and enthusiasm: in 2024, individual lead teachers have created and are leading whole-school development on:

• precision coaching
• cross-curricular reading strategies
• Microsoft Showcase School
• arts hub development
• SEND support
• spiritual life and Catholic ethos.

A structured programme of research-engaged events prioritises seeking voices from across the school community to lead research-led CPD. Across the year, as many as 30 staff members are actively involved in planning and delivering CPD. All CPD is expected to disseminate relevant research, while structuring time for staff to discuss how this research might be applied in the specific context of the department or class.

Gunter advocates for teachers as professionals fostering an ‘inclusive approach… [building] relationships between educationalists in all sectors of education… focussing on pedagogy as lived relationships that may not have temporal boundaries’ (2001, p. 15). The school is outward-facing, seeking opportunities for staff to be published, complete research and speak at conferences, and to grow staff expertise and confidence in a research-led profession. This form of leadership encourages staff to inspire each other, influencing colleagues to ‘take up opportunities, move in new directions, or to attend to external pressures’ without the direct instructionA method of instruction in which concepts or skills are taught using explicit teaching techniques, such as demonstrations or lectures, and are practised until fully understood by each student of the headteacher (Hargreaves and Fink, 2006, p. 122). In one example of outward-facing leadership from staff, participation in national grassroots initiative Women Leading in Education has been driven by engaged middle leaders and senior leaders over many years, and is now a part of the school development plan, shaping the culture and nature of the school from within the formal structures holding staff to account.

Finally, the school recognises the research expertise of those trained under the new Core Content Framework (DfEDepartment for Education - a ministerial department responsible for children’s services and education in England, 2019a) and Early Career Framework (DfE, 2019b), seeking to celebrate this knowledge and identifying opportunities for these staff to share their knowledge with the wider school community. We recognise that those trained under the new Core Content Framework and Early Career Framework have a wealth of up-to-date knowledge of current research literature, and we seek to celebrate and share this knowledge through collaborative CPD opportunities. Department training in which staff work together to action-plan teaching and learning priorities has had positive evaluation and feedback from all staff, who recognise the benefits of collaborative learning and accountability.

When creating a research-informed culture, we recognise that ‘how evidence is used matters at least as much as what the evidence says’ (Moss and France, 2023, p. 12, emphasis author’s own). The EEF implementation guidance (2024) reminds teachers that planning to sustain change is crucial to success. The school empowers staff to make interventions that are aimed at long-term change by distributing areas of responsibility, explicitly discussing the EEF implementation guidance, involving many staff in writing school development plan reviews, and involving many voices in reviews and consultations.

The approach: In action

A recent school priority has been the development of student reading skills. The identification of need came through the analysis of internal and external data, through testing of reading ages and through the analysis of assessment data from Years 7–11. Having identified this as a priority, the lead teacher and curriculum and assessment teams turned to an exploration of the research to identify and prioritise which strategies to implement. Consulting guidance reports from the EEF and the Great Teaching Toolkit, the teams drew together a set of research-based reading strategies appropriate to the context of the school. All members of the teams then played a role in disseminating these strategies, by leading CPD, briefings, lesson visits, mentoring and coaching. Through this process, more voices were sought as examples of good practice. In one example, geography and science teachers were identified as demonstrating the strategies effectively; they were asked to share their work more widely, further encouraging others, growing best practice and embedding the desired strategies in all departments. The lead teachers worked together to set ongoing targets to ensure that strategies were embedded and sustained year on year, with a clear goal for future practice. Over the last 18 months, these research-engaged reading strategies have been implemented across the school. Engagement with these strategies has been maintained into a new academic year and students across the school are benefiting from the improved teaching of reading.

The impact: A research-engaged and informed staff

The impact of this approach is the concrete engagement of all staff with educational research on a regular basis, as a routine part of the experience of teachers in the school. It is clear that the distribution of responsibility for the implementation of new strategies – for example, in the reading example outlined above – has led to sustained changes in classroom practice for teachers across the school.

This approach to leadership of research engagement, when done well, should build the school towards becoming what Hargreaves and Fink call the best professional learning communities, those that bring ‘the energy and ability of the whole community forward to serve the best interests of all students’ (2006, p. 128).