The University of Glasgow’s Chair in Educational Policy and Practice, Professor Chris Chapman, is the only academic from a Scottish university to serve on the Scottish Government’s new International Council of Education Advisers.‌

Chris Chapman 450The Council is made up of 10 world-leading education and business experts, who have extensive experience advising educators and governments on education leadership, school improvement and reform in countries including the US, Canada, Finland, Norway, Sweden, Malaysia, Australia and the UK.

They will advise on the Scottish Government’s priorities for education and ensure the actions set out in its delivery plan are influenced by international best practice.

Professor Chapman, who is a director of the University’s Robert Owen Centre for Educational Change, said: “I believe the creation of the International Council of Education Advisors is testimony to the Scottish Government’s commitment to ensuring that the best evidence and ideas from both Scotland and around the world inform Scottish educational policy and practice.

'It is my ambition that the Council will play a key role in supporting the further development of an education service with strong, focused leadership that delivers the highest quality learning and teaching, and works effectively with families and communities to ensure that Scotland the best place to grow up in. Ultimately, the aim of the Council has to be to support the development of an education system that allows every child, irrespective of their background, where they live or go to school to achieve their full potential.'

The panel members are:

  • Dr Carol Campbell: Education Adviser to the Ontario Premier and Minister of Education and Associate Professor of Leadership and Educational Change at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education; 
  • Professor Chris Chapman: Chair of Educational Policy and Practice at the University of Glasgow and Senior Academic Adviser to the Scottish Attainment Challenge.
  • Professor Graham Donaldson: Consultant and international adviser for OECD, former head of Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Education;
  • Jayne-Anne Gadhia, Chief Executive of Virgin Money;
  • Dr Avis Glaze, former Ontario Education Commissioner and Senior Adviser to the Minister for Education; 
  • Professor Andy Hargreaves, Thomas More Brennan Chair in the Lynch School of Education at Boston College and a member of the OECD team that recently reviewed Scotland’s Curriculum for Excellence;
  • Professor Alma Harris, Director of Educational Leadership at the University of Malaya;
  • Dr Pak Tee Ng, Associate Dean, Leadership Learning, and Head of the Policy and Leadership Studies Academic Group at Singapore’s National Institute of Education. 
  • Dr Pasi Sahlberg, former Director General of the Centre for International Mobility and Cooperation at Finland’s Ministry for Education and Culture, and a visiting Professor of Practice at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education;
  • Dr Allison Skerrett, Associate Professor in Language and Literacy Studies at the University of Texas. 

The Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Education, John Swinney, is also in the process of appointing a panel of teachers whose experience will help shape the programme to reduce teacher workload and monitor its impact. Among the teacher panel’s first tasks will be to consider ideas the Scottish Government has invited from teaching unions to improve teacher workloads.

Mr Swinney said: "I have set out the actions we will take to substantially close the attainment gap and deliver a world-class education system in Scotland. This work will be informed and shaped by leaders in the profession and lessons learned elsewhere.

"The International Council of Education Advisers will bring a global perspective from highly qualified educators with expertise shaping and delivering education reforms around the world. The teacher panel will ensure our plans are informed by the views of practitioners who work in our schools every day. Both will challenge and scrutinise our plans for education and ensure we consider the best evidence and expertise from our classrooms and around the world. I look forward to meeting both panels next month."

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First published: 19 July 2016

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