Chronic underperformance within UK schools cannot be tackled because of high levels of hostility from teachers.
The comments were made by a head teacher of a school in Leeds who says that this belligerent attitude is stopping poor schools being turned around.
The story was featured in The Daily Telegraph and highlighted the difficulty of removing teachers who were not up to the job.
John Townsley, who is executive principle of The Farnley Academy in Leeds, said that vested interests were holding back progress within the education system.
The Leeds head was speaking from experience, having turned around a local school from an “inadequate” Ofsted verdict to being rated as “outstanding” in what is considered a record time, just over three years.
Mr Townsley told The Daily Telegraph: “Heads find they have to back off when they try to tackle chronic underperformance in schools because of the level of hostility…We had an enormous battle.
"Many teachers were chronically under-performing. So we developed those teachers who wanted to improve and had the capacity to do so.
"Those who did not want to improve or who opposed what we needed to do left. Our leaders and teachers must improve performance where required or accept they cannot be a part of a school's future.”
Shen, of FunTech, a provider of summer camps for children and teens, believes that the standards of teaching is crucial for the UK education system: “The quality of teaching is a major concern for anyone involved in the education sector and we at FunTech spend a great deal of time and effort in attracting the best teachers for our summer camps. If the children aren’t engaged by quality teachers, then you have lost them.
“How the system trains, selects and rewards the top teaching talent is a constant worry for the authorities, and they do need to listen to the head teachers on the ground who are faced with the day-to-day realities of running a school.”
The debate over whether teachers are blocking progress is likely to run for some years yet.
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