British Secretary of State for Education Visits

British Secretary of State for Education Michael Gove recently visited the United States to learn more about successful and innovative districts around the world. During his trip, he stopped by Appian Way to meet with Dean James Ryan and Professor Tom Kane and learn about the work of the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Gove spent some time talking about the parallels in education between the United States and Britain, as well as his trip, which included visiting various schools throughout Boston.

Why are you visiting Harvard Graduate School of Education today? We’ve come to Massachusetts because it’s the highest performing state in educational terms in the whole of the union and it’s one of the best performing educational jurisdictions in the world. And, here at Harvard, there is a concentration in expertise, not just what makes Massachusetts a state strong educationally, but there is an Olympian view of what’s happening in American education. You have an education school which has access to academics who’ve been responsible for cutting edge research, which is shaping how all of us policymakers and practitioners think about school reform.

What do you see as similar challenges in education between the U.S. and the U.K.? The U.S. and U.K. are chillingly similar in that their biggest problem is the extent of educational inequality that both countries face. Both America and Britain have outstanding universities – Harvard, Cambridge, Stanford, Oxford – but behind those high-performing institutions (and there are some amazingly good schools for children five to 18) there is a long history of underachievement that has correlated with poverty. One of the things driving education reformers in America is the desire to make sure what works for some can work for all and we want to try to do the same thing.

What would you say are some of the biggest differences? One of the differences is when you have 50 states, each will have districts. Then you have geographical and labor market peculiarities in America.  But actually the similarities are more powerful than different. One might think there would be a gulf of difference between education in California and Massachusetts, and that neither have much to teach Liverpool or London, but you find the same issues come up: Why is it that black and minority children have historically underperformed? Why is poverty so heavily correlated with educational underperformance? How can you encourage more great people to enter teaching? How can you ensure that you successfully evaluate and reward great teaching? How can you make those things that are successful scalable? How can you distill lessons of successful institutions and ensure that intellectual property is more widely shared? The parallels are more powerful even to the actual politicians and trade unions. If I was to think of a difference, the one difference in the UK, we have more data about what happens nationally. We have had something in effect similar to common core and a national inspector of it. So, it’s easier to build and use international benchmarks to identify more quickly what is working and what is not in England.

What have you seen today that you would like to bring back with you? It was very refreshing and encouraging to meet the Governor [Deval Patrick] because the three things at the heart of Massachusetts economic strategy – education, innovation, and infrastructure – are the three things we need in England for economic growth. It was uncanny to hear him when he was talking about lengthening the school day or getting the best people into teaching or preK education, he was making the same arguments in almost the same language that we’d been making. It was curious to see that synchronicity and overlap. That was encouraging.

Among other things that were particularly encouraging was talking to people here [at HGSE who are] grappling with rigorous evidence and details of what works and what doesn’t in education. One of the refreshing things about coming here this afternoon has been hearing people passionate about improving teaching and schools who have no political axe to grind. Everyone has their own views, but the conversations have been around what’s been working and what hasn’t and how can we learn from innovations so far, which ones haven’t worked, and which ones should we leverage more to get more change. In particular, Professor Tom Kane spoke about how we can empower teachers to analyze their own craft, to improve their own practice, and give children a better chance.

What could the U.S. learn from the U.K.? I don’t think we can say, “Look here U.S.A., we are doing things better in England.” It’s dialogue. I think that Britain and, at different times, America, are innovating in different ways. England is not the 51st state, but it is the case that we are pioneering and trying different things, and learning from America and vice versa. In England, we have something called Teach First, which is a straight rip off of Teach For America, but I also think the fact that we will have an educational official energetically teaming high-performing schools with underperforming schools in order to create new equivalents of CMOs (Charter Management Organizations), in essence chains. If I were, for the sake of argument, influencing someone in charge of education in the United States, then I’d say identify top performers and get them, without relinquishing control of their own schools, to take over underperforming schools and create partnerships. That would be the one thing that I would evangelize for.

How do you see HGSE as helpful to you in your position?  There are huge variations in the quality of higher education and the quality of education schools. You just have to look at people of Harvard and the work being done to know that there is a deployment of rigorous evidence in the service of improving practice. I didn’t know about the Ed.L.D. Program, which seems to be a model of how you generate people who’ve learned, in a way, leadership lessons [in places such as] in business school to drive change in education. In crude terms, if you want to go to one of the best universities, you go to Harvard. So, one of the best education schools would be Harvard. And everything I’ve heard today reinforces that. But I’m going to Stanford, so we’ll find out if it beats that. But Harvard is in the lead.

One of the wonderful things about being in the United States is there is a restless desire to find out how to improve things. One of the wonderful things is there is a refreshing lack of cynicism with how people approach education.