The Edword: Maximising value for pupils

We have become very good at measuring the cost of education. I’m not sure we have become equally good at measuring its value.

We know the cost of a teacher, a day of supply, a support intervention, or a new piece of technology. We measure attainment, attendance, budgets, and, increasingly, productivity. All those things matter. But none, in isolation, tells us whether we are creating the greatest possible value for a child.

A brilliant teacher who changes a young person’s perception of what they are capable of. A culture that means great people stay rather than leave. A child with SEND feeling that school was designed with them in mind, rather than somewhere they must learn to fit. The confidence to speak, the curiosity to question, the resilience to fail and try again. These things have enormous value, even if they are difficult to quantify. That distinction feels particularly important now. Scarcity understandably drives us towards efficiency. But if we allow value to become synonymous with cost, we risk becoming extremely efficient at protecting the wrong things. The better question is not simply “How can we spend less?” but “What are we trying to create, and how do we organise our finite resources around creating more of it?”

That is the question running through this edition of The Edword.