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Create a supportive staff community

Measuring Impact and Success

Your school needs to ask how the impact of this benchmark can be assessed and what successful development from your starting position looks like. These are qualitative judgements and so qualitative methods are appropriate to make them.

Ways to assess impact might include:

  • Circulate a survey that contains open-ended questions like: ‘What impact do you think developing a supportive staff community has had on how you have been helped by other members of staff?’ or ‘To what extent do you think the work we have been doing on developing a supportive staff community has been successful?’
  • Ask staff to be as comprehensive as possible in their responses.
  • Organise a focus group of a cross-section of staff to discuss these questions.
  • Facilitate key stage and/or departmental discussion of these points, concentrating on the impact and success of the development of your school community in a specific area of your school.

It is important to recognise that this benchmark measures the extent to which progress has been made, as your school will continually develop a supportive community as an ongoing process.

Remember in each case to describe the impact of your actions (that is, what difference they made) and not just what you did.

Overview

This benchmark focuses on developing your school community so that staff feel able to discuss wellbeing and mental health challenges without stigma. It is also about creating a culture where any member of your school community can ask for help from another, without the limitations of hierarchy. The headteacher, for example, might ask an ECT teacher for support. As part of this benchmark, staff should be encouraged to be open and authentic about how they are coping mentally. Talking about mental health should be seen as a strength, rather than a weakness.

Intentions

Intentions are actions you intend to take in order to improve your provision in this benchmark. Choose three intentions to focus on.

A wellbeing policy can sometimes focus only on pupils or if it does include staff, they are only considered briefly. This is an opportunity to rewrite your wellbeing policy (if it is mostly concerned with pupils) or to create a bespoke staff wellbeing policy. A staff wellbeing policy should make it clear what your school aims to achieve in how it takes care of its staff. It should reaffirm the school’s intention to create a supportive staff community.

Ensure that all the staff in your school are involved in devising the policy. If the statement is drawn up by the SLT or the Mental Health Lead, circulate it to staff for their comments and edit accordingly.

  • Set achievable goals in your staff wellbeing policy, taking into account your school’s starting point.
  • Refer frequently to the policy and include it in documents related to staff wellbeing and mental health.
  • Remind staff of where your school is heading in developing a supportive community and where it would like to be at a specific point in time.
  • Ensure that staff wellbeing is not just a paper exercise but that the policy leads to action.

Top tip

  • Review the staff wellbeing policy regularly (at least once a year) by asking your staff to comment and suggest changes. You can download and use this staff wellbeing policy template as a starting point.

Further resources

 

 

Creating a supportive school community involves developing a culture where it is the norm to talk about staff wellbeing and mental health. This will be evidenced in both informal conversations and formal communication, such as departmental or phase meetings, SLT meetings or staff briefings/meetings.

To encourage staff in this respect, it might be worthwhile organising a whole-staff training session, preferably a morning or afternoon or even a whole day. The purpose of the session will be to bring talking about mental health and mental ill-health into the open and to enable staff to raise issues related to the context of your school.

An introduction to the training might focus on the language we use when referring to mental health. Why is it unacceptable to refer to someone who is physically disabled as a ‘gimp’ but it is acceptable to say that someone is ‘mental’ or ‘loopy’ or ‘crazy’? What stereotypes are at work when referring to someone with mental ill-health or who has been diagnosed with a mental illness? How are these stereotypes reinforced in films or in TV series? To what extent is mental ill-health linked to violence in films, for example, serial killers?

Consider the following:

  • Would it help to bring in a mental health expert who understands/supports schools to launch the training and to organise discussions?
  • What are the main causes of mental ill-health among your school staff?
  • What are the causes and signs of stress?
  • How does stress affect your work in school?
  • What is burnout and how do we avoid it?

Top tips

  • Look at the headline data from the latest Teacher Wellbeing Index from the teachers’ mental health charity, Education Support.
  • Request posters from Education Support to display in staff areas so that they have the helpline number in case of mental distress.

Further resources

 

This intention is about moving from an individual perspective – ‘I am coping alone’ – to ensuring that the school performs its duty of care in taking responsibility for its staff. Staff see that their wellbeing is a balance between looking after themselves and the school taking care of them.

Find out from your staff whether they feel that the school is taking care of their wellbeing and mental health.

Audit staff workload or ask the question: ‘To what extent does this policy/task/meeting impact adversely on staff wellbeing and mental health?’ Adjust your approach accordingly.

Put self-care tips in your staff newsletter. Ask staff to contribute their favourite tips. Combine general self-care (plan time for yourself at home) and self-care strategies specific to their role. (Limit the time you spend planning a lesson. If the time is open-ended or too long, it is likely that planning will seem never-ending.)

Include group activities. Walking around the building at lunchtime with other members of staff is likely to be more sustainable than walking alone. In addition, it provides an opportunity for staff to share how things are going and to ask for support.

Top tips

  • Despite always being with people, teaching can be an isolating and lonely occupation. The more staff work on their own, the less contact they have with adults. ‘Letting off steam’ is important – burying it leads to stress and anxiety. Coping alone can also lead to feeling that you are the only one to be experiencing doubts and difficulties and increasing your perception of the level of challenge you are facing. This is particularly true of early career teachers who can believe that more experienced teachers have got it all worked out.
  • Have a school strategy that, when staff do release tension by letting off steam, they either propose a solution after doing so or ask someone else for a suggestion on how they might address the problem. This reduces the likelihood of staff becoming defeated and only talking about the problems. If the person themself or the staff with whom they are sharing a difficulty is unable to suggest a solution, it should be flagged to SLT. This prevents problems being viewed as intractable and therefore remaining unaddressed.

Further resources

Opportunities should be provided for staff to raise concerns about their wellbeing and mental health in meetings with line managers. For example:

In formal meetings, such as appraisal and professional development, the line manager should ask if the member of staff has any concerns about their mental health. Line managers should follow an understood and school-wide support process if a member of staff discloses that they have concerns about their mental health. This process should be set out in a policy document related to line manager meetings. The support process must take into account the need for confidentiality and safeguarding of staff.

In less formal meetings with staff, line managers should be alert to the possibility that a staff member is suffering from mental ill-health and if necessary, ask a direct question about it.

The process of mental health support should include advice on seeking external help if the internal support is insufficient because of the severity of the member of staff’s mental ill-health. External help includes seeking advice from their GP. The teachers’ charity, Education Support offers a 24/7 helpline staffed by counsellors: 08000 562 561.

Top tips

  • The question about mental health should be written into guidance for how to conduct formal line manager meetings. Training should be provided on how line managers should ask the question and what action should follow if the staff member confirms that they are suffering from mental ill-health.
  • The process of mental health support triggered by the line manager’s question must be understood by staff. An explanation of the process should be provided in a document, circulated and explained to staff, for example, in a staff meeting.

Further resources

 

Teaching can be a lonely job and having an anonymous ‘wellbeing buddy’ can really provide a sense of connection and support. The fact that someone is thinking of you and has taken the trouble to brighten your day can be a real boost whatever the circumstances, but particularly so when the job is proving challenging and tiring.

Here’s how it works:

  • Assign each member of staff a ‘secret buddy’. It’s important they don’t know who it is!
  • Brief the buddies on their role – it’s their job to cheer their buddy up over the course of the year with little acts of kindness, notes and gifts. They should aim to monitor their buddy’s wellbeing and be alert to when they might appreciate some support.
  • Give staff a quick questionnaire to fill in so the buddies know something about each other (birthdays, what kinds of food or drink they like, any passions/interests, etc.). Then it is up to each individual buddy to decide how (and when) to inject some kindness and positivity into their buddy’s schedule.
  • Discuss and agree as a team how regular the support should be – should it be once a week, once a term or every day?
  • Encourage staff to be as imaginative as they can. Those who take part will gain just as much from the act of giving ‘wellbeing gifts’ as receiving them.  

Top tips

  • Don’t assume everyone will want to take part: check who wants to be involved before you start the scheme.
  • Acts don’t have to be elaborate or expensive. Little notes wishing someone a great day can provide a simple boost and a reminder that other people do care.

Further resources

  • Find out more about a real-life account of a staff wellbeing buddy scheme and its impact.

This intention focuses on how your school can further develop staff involvement to increase the sense of working together as a team for a shared purpose. The larger your school, the more challenging this is.

When identifying how staff could work together more and become more involved in the life of the school, consider both formal and informal opportunities. It is vital that working in teams improves wellbeing and mental health by reducing workload.

Formal:

  • Are there opportunities for staff to work more as a team or in teams, for example, in staff meetings to discuss items or to work together to create cover lessons?
  • Could staff work in pairs or threes to adopt the lesson study model of observation, instead of formal hierarchical observations? Staff invite one another to visit their lessons, either because they want to show something that is working well or they would like advice on something that could work better.
  • If staff are interested in developing an aspect of teaching and learning, for example, questioning, could they team up to deliver a presentation to the staff? Could this be a part of their professional development (PD) to replace another PD commitment?

Informal:

  • Staff pair up as ‘buddies’. They look out for one another, for example, when one of the pair is on duty, the other brings them a hot drink. Or one teacher has a lot of photocopying to do and they are asked to cover a lesson. The other teacher does the photocopying for them.
  • A teacher has a special interest or hobby. They create a group of teachers who are also interested or who want to find out more. The time the group meets is attributed to each teacher’s professional development time.

Top tips

  • It is important to balance the increase in staff involvement in shared activities with a potential increase in workload. This needs to be monitored carefully if this intention is to avoid being undermined by staff taking on additional work that affects their wellbeing.
  • Consider whether any opportunities might be led by a range of staff who are not currently leading in this area.

Further resources

Reflection

There are two broad perspectives to consider when evaluating to what extent developing wellbeing in your school community has been successful:

  • the impact on individual members of staff
  • the impact on your school as a whole.

It is important that staff are not made to feel that they must discuss their challenges. Each person will have their own level of comfort in asking for help and sharing their difficulties. This is an essential part of developing a more supportive listening and helping culture in your school community.

Some other issues to consider:

  • Are leaders able to be open about their own vulnerability and to ask for support? If not, are they modelling an expectation that staff will be strong and put on a ‘brave face’ when things get tough?
  • To what extent does stigma in your school community prevent open dialogue about wellbeing and mental health? How can stigma be challenged?
  • Is there an implicit (or explicit) belief that if you can’t cope you are just not cut out for the job? To what extent does your school provide staff with wellbeing support to enable them to cope better?

Further resources

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