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Thinking about strategy
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 West Midlands coalition
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Strategy helps us to see things in a longer-term time frame and provides a focus for discussing priorities. It stretches our use of project capacity but also reminds us of its limitations. |
Much consultation and debate led to shaping plans for the Coalition project. The project responds to the challenges of the 
DFID Enabling Effective Support Initiative.
From a strategic perspective there is an ongoing need to review what we learn about:
the core function of the project;
We also need to address the implications of change in education policy.
Like any long term strategy we all anticipated changes that would provide new opportunities, but in the event some of them do not happen. For example, the idea that 'the Region' with devolved responsibilities would become a significant context for debate about the future of education seems to have made little progress. This is true even in areas where there are established responsibilities such as sustainable development.
Inevitably other things have happened much more quickly than we anticipated. For example, there seemed to be little interest from DfES in engaging the global dimensions agenda at the time of setting up the project. The DfES publication Putting the world into world class education is one indicator of this changing.
The useful thing about strategy is that it helps us to make use of opportunities in an effective way as and when they arise … or indeed to clarify which are and which are not opportunities!
Can we represent the strategy in a diagram?
At the heart of the Coalition project is the long term change in schools: change that embraces 'quality, global dimensions and development perspectives' [see A in the diagram below].
We advocate an approach which is about offering teachers space to be creative about this agenda, and in doing so to become familiar with the issues themselves … and about the professional implications of quality work relating to global dimensions.
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The strategy diagram encourages us to review such debates in the context of B: Enabling. The project is directly responsible for activities such as workshops, innovatory curriculum work or support to networking. What is of equal [in fact, in the longer term, more] importance is the extent schools get support from other sources, especially those within the education system.
When we consider the scale of the West Midlands the practical dimension of such an approach is clear.
The success of the project in the long term has to be measured at A, but the project has no direct role or responsibility for what goes on in schools.
The main planning, implementation and evaluation focuses on the enabling activities [B] managed by the project and the strategy itself [C] negotiated through the management and liaison groups. Nevertheless work in B and C have to be measured in the context of its contribution to enabling change in schools [A].
Where is the West Midlands?
This is a question that even people locally ask. The identity of the region is still evolving.
If there were 100 pupils in the West Midlands ...
There are over 800,000 pupils in West Midlands schools [excluding nurseries]. If there were only 100 this diagram shows where they would go to school.
