As we all know, the UK and many countries across the world are facing teacher shortages and it is important to find and reflect on approaches that could help us to address this crucial issue. This is precisely the aim of the Teaching Commission.
Its most recent meeting focused on the links between school culture, continuing professional development (CPD) and teacher retention. In this blog post, I would like to reflect on some of the evidence presented by Professor Qing Gu and how this relates to activities at the Chartered College of Teaching.
Why the ‘human capital approach’ to teacher CPD is flawed
Recent efforts to curb the teacher retention crisis in the UK and elsewhere have focused on increasing the availability and uptake of ‘high-quality’ CPD for individual teachers – a laudable goal, you might think, and quite rightly so. Of course, high-quality CPD opportunities for teachers are important, essential even, but the issue with a ‘human capital’ approach to teacher CPD is that it puts the onus on the individual teacher and disregards the important role that schools as organisations and their leaders play in providing the necessary resources and work environments for teachers to implement their learning in practice.
Schools as learning organisations
Evidence presented by Professor Gu on the ECF and the NPQ (Gu et al., 2023) as well as international research evidence all point to the importance of schools enabling teachers and leaders to transform their learning into real changes in their practice. This appears to be a prerequisite for any CPD to positively impact teachers’ decisions to stay in the profession. In other words, if individual teachers engage in CPD but they feel as though they cannot implement the learning in their own classrooms, even the best quality CPD may not impact teacher retention in any meaningful or sustainable way. In the same way, CPD for school leaders can only positively impact retention when schools provide them with the necessary conditions to implement their learning.
Let us take evidence-informed practice as an example. As Professor Gu outlined in her presentation, citing her and colleagues’ research into the topic:
‘A ‘good’ research-informed innovation can rarely travel into the day-to-day realities of classrooms on its own merits without school leaders that can help teachers engage with it and apply and adapt it to their own classroom contexts’
(Gu et al., 2021)
This is not to say that teachers cannot or should not engage in individual CPD, nor is it in any way a call for whole-school CPD only. On the contrary, we know from our own research into mid-career teachers with colleagues from Sheffield Hallam University and the Education Policy Institute (Booth et al., 2021; Muller et al., 2021), how important it is for teachers to be able to take ownership of their professional development and to be able to develop as expert classroom practitioners. However, they need to be able to do so in a conducive school environment that allows them to subsequently apply this learning in their classrooms and share it with colleagues, so that whole-school changes can potentially be envisioned. What Professor Gu’s research highlights is the need for a shared vision and direction that allows teachers to explore and experiment with their practice and critically reflect on evidence as a team.
In turn, leaders need the necessary professional freedom and agency to enable them to implement changes in their schools. These conditions need to be enabled rather than curbed by the accountability system.
Ofsted’s proposals for a new inspection framework include a focus on ‘developing teaching’ (Ofsted, 2025). Clearly, this is an important area to take into consideration but based on the evidence discussed here, Ofsted could only achieve positive change if its inspection considers how leaders are enabled to implement a whole-school culture of staff development that goes beyond individualised approaches to CPD. In turn, leaders will need the necessary professional freedom to implement changes in their contexts, which is extremely difficult under a high-stakes inspection system.
So, how can leaders achieve a culture of learning in their schools? The following Impact articles provide further research on the topic as well as practical steps in developing a culture of learning and research use:
⚬ Developing staff professionalism through leading a culture of learning
⚬ Schools as learning organisations – A framework to improve research engagement
⚬ How teacher-led research can meaningfully contribute to appraisals
⚬ A distributed leader approach to evidence-informed practice
A recent webinar with colleagues from Evidence Based Education and our own Helen Barker also explored alternative approaches to formal appraisal. It discusses the rationale behind our short course ‘Planning your professional learning journey’ and how it can be utilised in schools as an alternative to formal appraisal processes. You can access a recording on our Video Hub.
Finally, the group membership model at the Chartered College of Teaching aims to empower leaders to develop a culture of learning in their schools. It allows schools and trusts to take learning from the individual to the school or trust level, enabling a sustainable approach to staff development. Combined with one of the Chartered Teacher accreditation pathways, school leaders can ultimately achieve the distributed leadership of professional development that is a key driver in establishing a strong culture of staff development in their schools. For leaders who have already been engaging in this important work, the Chartered Leadership pathway is a way to recognise their expertise in utilising research to shape practice in their schools.
I hope that these resources provide you with a good starting point to explore the important of school culture for teacher retention and encourage you to explore more content on MyCollege, our member platform.
Chartered College group membership serves as a powerful driver of teacher retention and an evidence-informed school culture for hundreds of schools, trusts and organisations – you can request a quick quote here to learn more.
“Chartered College group membership has inspired and motivated teachers to develop their practice and share this with colleagues both inside and outside of their schools.”
Laura Yandell FCCT, Principal Deputy Head (Curricular), Harrow International School Hong Kong
The next meeting of the Teaching Commission takes place on Friday, 11th of April, with a member roundtable taking place on Thursday, 10th of April with the aim to inform discussions. We will share a write-up of the discussion in the coming weeks.
References
Booth, J., Coldwell, M., Müller, L. M., Perry, E., & Zuccollo, J. (2021). Mid-career teachers: A mixed methods scoping study of professional development, career progression and retention. Education Sciences, 11(6), 299.
Gu, Q., & Ahn, M. Y. (2020). The Research Schools Network: Supporting Schools to Develop Evidence-Informed Practice, Evaluation report. Report available from: https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/networks/research-schools.
Gu, Q., Eleftheriadou, S., & Baines, L. (2023). The Impact of the Early Career Framework (ECF) Programme on the Work Engagement, Wellbeing and Retention of Teachers: A Longitudinal Study, 2021–2026. Interim Research Report# 2: Early Career Teachers’ and Mentors’ Reported Experiences with the ECF Programme.
Muller, L. M., Booth, J., Coldwell, M., Perry, E., & Zuccollo, J. (2021). Continuous professional development and career progression in mid-career teachers. Impact, 11. Available from: https://my.chartered.college/impact_article/continuous-professional-development-and-career-progression-in-mid-career-teachers/
Ofsted, (2025) Improving the way Ofsted inspects education: consultation document. Available from: https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/improving-the-way-ofsted-inspects-education/improving-the-way-ofsted-inspects-education-consultation-document