Leadership and mental health
Promoting the well-being of school leaders

Practical resources to support your knowledge and skills development.

About the campaign

The education system is currently facing one of the most serious challenges in recent years - a potential shortage in headteachers across England. Statistics show that between 2009 and 2011 a large number of current heads are due to retire. If trends continue, there is a real danger that there will not be enough aspiring heads to replace them.

In December 2005 the Secretary of State asked the NCSL to work with partners to develop a national strategy on succession planning.

• Read a summary of NCSL´s advice to the Secretary of State on succession planning   (PDF 110kb, 13 pages)

Responding to the challenge

In order to respond we must develop more leaders more quickly than we have done previously. It currently takes an average of 20 years for a school teacher to becomes a head; with the average age of new headteachers being 42 and 45 in primary and secondary schools respectively. We must improve both of these factors if we are going to succeed in obtaining the quantity and quality of school leaders that we need.

We also need to consider more flexible approaches to school leadership, for example by considering new models of headship.

Everyone, whether you are a current head, aspiring head, governor, or in a school network, diocese or local authority has a key role to play in making this change happen.

Campaign

1. The Tomorrow's leaders today campaign is about finding, developing and keeping great headteachers;
2. The mission of the campaign is to improve the perception of headship and increase applications for headship;
3. The campaign title is Tomorrow's leaders today, and the campaign aims to;
   • Increase applications for headship by January 2009, when shortages of headteachers are predicted to be at their peak
   • Balance perceptions of headship and address barriers to recruitment
   • Encourage the workforce to reappraise the nature of headship:
     - Headship is changing;
     - It's not a separation from everything they know and love about teaching;
     - It's not a 'one size fits all' role.
   • Encourage the workforce to be more positive about career progression
   • Develop the skills and capacity of governors to address succession planning
4. This web portal seeks to provide attractive resources, diagnostic tools, case studies and inspiration to meet the needs of four key audience groups in the campaign: aspiring headteachers; headteachers; governors: partners, including local authorities, diocesan boards, school groups and networks.