This paper builds on a paper presented at ECER 2021 which drew on the first phase of a small-scale longitudinal study examining how current and former students on the Into Headship (IH) programme in Scotland supported their school communities during the first lockdown in the UK, with a particular emphasis on children and young people (CYP) considered to be vulnerable through disability, poverty, being looked after or otherwise disadvantaged. Its starting point derives from Ainscow, Booth and Dyson’s (2006) typology of inclusion – ‘inclusion as a principled approach to education and society,’ concerned with the inclusion of all children.

It has been well documented that global inequalities, as identified by Wilkinson and Pickett (2018), have been magnified through the pandemic. An extensive range of commentators highlights the catastrophic global impact of the restrictions and disruption to schooling posed by the pandemic on the mental health and wellbeing of children and on their learning (Lee, 2020; Mowat, in press, 2023a, 2023b; Shum, Skripkauskaite, Pearcey, Waite, & Creswell, 2021; UNESCO et al., 2020; UNICEF, 2021; UNICEF Data, 2020; World Health Organisation, 2020). A substantial number of children in Europe were living in homes that lacked the resources to support home learning and were living in poorly heated homes (Mowat, in press, 2023a; Van Lancker & Parolin, 2020). 

Whilst much attention has been devoted to losses in learning brought about by the pandemic and to learning recovery, increasingly attention is turning towards the socio-emotional wellbeing of CYP (Lee, 2020; Mowat, in press; OECD, 2020; Wang, Zhang, Zhao, Zhang, & Jiang, 2020). UNICEF (2021) highlights the fragility of support systems for children and how the hardships experienced fall disproportionally on the most disadvantaged (p. 16). Even when restrictions were eased in the UK, children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) and those from low-income families continued to show elevated health symptoms (Shum et al., 2021; Mowat 2023a).  In England, the lack of face-to-face contact with children at risk of abuse and neglect led to a reduction in referrals to social services (a finding mirrored globally (UNICEF, 2020b)) and the anxiety brought about by disrupted relationships with staff and peers led to increasing incidences of self-harm in some children within the care system (OFSTED, 2021; Mowat 2023a). This highlights the key role that schools play as places of learning but also places of safety and belonging.

The quality of school leadership is an essential element in creating schools which are equitable, inclusive, and compassionate in their approach. This requires a focus on the whole school community and on responsive and adaptive leadership which has at its heart inclusive practice and social justice (Mowat, 2023a). School leaders have had to navigate an unprecedented landscape of complex and rapid change and therefore the quality of headship preparation programmes becomes crucial in ensuring that prospective headteachers can rise to the challenge. 

This small-scale empirical study is supported by a BELMAS grant and focusses on Into Headship, a masters-level programme delivered within a single academic year in partnership with Education Scotland. Through examination of the ways in which IH students supported their school communities during and in the aftermath of lockdown (with a specific, but not sole, focus on more vulnerable CYP), the study seeks to ascertain the degree to and ways in which engagement with the IH programme had prepared them to meet the challenges in order to inform the development of headship programmes globally.

This paper focusses on the second phase of a longitudinal, qualitative study, with phase one being an online survey based on an open-ended questionnaire administered to two cohorts of Into Headship students conducted in June 2020 towards the end of the first lockdown in the UK. 46 students responded to the survey. Phase 2, conducted in Dec 2022/Jan 2023, focusses on the period beyond the initial lockdown and, drawing from the findings of phase 1, has a specific focus on the wellbeing of the school community – pupils, staff and families. It has been conducted via. individual interviews with eight respondents to the initial survey, drawn from the secondary, primary and special education sectors. In addition to reflecting on how they had supported the wellbeing of their school communities beyond the initial lockdown, participants were provided with their response to the survey (phase 1) and asked to reflect on how close to reality their initial perceptions of the challenges to be faced as schools emerged from lockdown had been and whether there were challenges that had not been anticipated. Three focus group discussions have also been held with participants from each of these sectors. The focus group discussion had a broader focus, examining the response of the Scottish Government to Covid recovery; insights about leading in times of crisis; and insights to inform the development of the IH programme nationally. Whilst at an early stage of analysis, the initial interviews and focus group discussions seem to largely corroborate, but add greater depth, to the findings from phase 1. Participants within the 2nd phase of the study were drawn from respondents to the survey who had indicated a willingness to participate. An open invitation was sent, and criteria were drawn up to select the sample, such that it was representative of respondents to the survey as a whole: the SIMD (Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation) status of the school; urban/rural; sector (primary, secondary/special education); and gender of the participant. Participants attended a short briefing and informed consent was gained. Whilst the initial intention had been to conduct data-gathering face-to-face, this proved to be too complex to organise and interviews and focus group discussions were held via. Zoom and Microsoft Teams. Data is being analysed via. thematic analysis, drawing on a framework of King and Horrocks, generating, initially, descriptive and analytical codes and then over-arching themes.

The findings will reveal the challenges that prospective headteachers (some of whom will have, in the interim, taken up a headship post) have faced in meeting the demands of a rapidly shifting policy landscape in the midst of a pandemic and the means by which they have sought to support their school communities (staff, families and children) in the recovery period. In particular, the findings will identify barriers to the inclusion of CYP facing adverse circumstances, whether through disability, poverty, being care experienced or marginalised in any shape or form, and affordances. It will provide insight into the approaches that they have adopted and their perceived efficacy which should inform the work of senior leadership teams in Scotland and beyond. It will demonstrate how priorities may have changed over time as schools have moved into the recovery phase. It will enable insights to emerge regarding the national response to recovery and will also identify those aspects of the Into Headship programme which have provided IH students with the knowledge, understanding, skills-set, confidence and resilience to address the needs of their school community and areas in which the programme could be strengthened, insights which can inform the development of headship preparation programmes more widely. The findings will be disseminated through conference presentations, academic papers and a research brief for practitioners.

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