Cyprus

• Children in Greek Cypriot national dress in the 26th Limassol Primary

Cyprus

The European School Heads Association (ESHA) Conference is in Cyprus, and I'm accompanied by Chris Harrison Vice President, Jack Hatch National Treasurer, and Roy Tedscoe National Council Member and ESHA rep. It is the first week of November and the temperature is around 30* with constant sunshine and brilliant views of the Mediterranean. In England it's cold, windy and wet. Is this a jolly? Well let me go through reality. To get here meant leaving home at 1am with Veronicah and James to sit in a cold bus station and catch a National Express bus to Gatwick North. Then a four hour flight with a 22 month old. Negotiating a transfer to the hotel took half an hour. The taxi driver spent a considerable time driving with his mobile telephone in deep conversation. We only had two near misses. From experience I only sit in the back seat of taxis, and I admired my Vice President's courage or innocence in taking the front seat. On at least one occasion he could have
shaken hands with a lorry driver. Taxis aside the hospitality is excellent.

Although a European event it provided an excellent opportunity to discuss wider international school leader issues with Mike Benson and Vicki Shannon of the Ontario Principals' Council, and Gail Connelly of the National Association of Elementary School Principals in the USA.


Next morning we had the latest from Andy Hargreaves and the Boston School: 'Performing beyond expectations'. The outcome of research on why some schools, local areas of schools, businesses, and sports teams stand out beyond the norm often in difficult situations.

Neil Hawkes presented on the Values Agenda. Although I've heard Neil before and subscribe to the message, the single factor I picked out was to make this work explicit in the school community. This is linked to our UNICEF Rights Respecting Schools Award work. As we are now an Academy Trust one of the early pieces of work is for the school community to revisit it's aims and values and ensure that these are agreed, communicated, and lived up to by all.

One of the best sessions in international work is the twin opportunity to network with colleagues and school leader organizations across the world, and to visit local schools. At the 26th Limassol Primary we were presented with Cypriot dance and song. In a quiet moment afterwards I congratulated the music teacher who then rushed off and copied for me with great pride a CD of the songs from an original school recording. It will remain the highlight of the trip, and I will showcase the children's work on several occasions. This resonated with a visit several years ago to a school in Chiang Mai in northern Thailand where traditional playing by Primary School children of the soot and the elegance and expression of their dance impacted immensely on those watching.

So do SATs tell all the story or increasingly indeed any of the story.....and the Finnish Heads - always lauded by successive Governments as the top of the PISA league table reacted with horror at the prospect of testing at 11 years. They believed that as this would distort the curriculum it would reduce the effectiveness of their schools!