Looking Back to Move Forward: Reflections on a Year of Change and the Challenges Ahead for Schools

As we head towards the end of yet another academic year (my 24th in education), many school leaders will be reflecting on what's been achieved, what remains unfinished and what September is likely to bring.

Every academic year presents its own challenges, but 2025/26 has felt particularly significant. Schools have responded to a renewed inspection framework, continued to navigate financial pressures, strengthened support for increasingly complex pupil needs and remained steadfast in their commitment to delivering high-quality education.

Looking back over the past year, one thing stands out above all else: the expectations placed upon schools continue to grow, yet the capacity to meet those expectations hasn't grown at the same pace.

From my own work across schools, multi-academy trusts and higher education, I've been struck by the resilience, professionalism and commitment shown by leaders and staff. Despite increasing complexity, schools continue to innovate, collaborate and improve. Yet it's equally clear that many are operating at, or beyond, sustainable capacity. Perhaps the defining feature of this year has been the widening gap between expectation and resource.

Schools are being asked to improve outcomes, strengthen inclusion, respond to increasing levels of need, prepare for inspection, support staff wellbeing, embrace new technologies and engage meaningfully with parents and communities. Few would question the importance of these priorities individually. Collectively, however, they present an enormous leadership challenge. Increasingly, the question is no longer, Can we do this? Instead, it's become, What do we stop doing in order to do this well?

Inclusion remains one of the defining challenges

If there's been one theme that's dominated conversations throughout the year, it's been inclusion. Across the country, schools continue to respond to increasing numbers of pupils with additional needs, while wider support services remain under significant pressure.

The publication of the government's White Paper has reinforced that inclusion will remain at the forefront of educational reform. While many of the proposals will take time to develop and their long-term impact remains to be seen, they signal a continued expectation that mainstream schools will play an increasingly central role in meeting a wider range of pupil needs.

Alongside this, many schools are continuing to develop specialist resource provisions, inclusion bases and alternative approaches to early intervention as they seek to provide the right support at the right time. However, goodwill alone cannot solve a capacity issue.

Unless policy reform is matched by sustainable investment, many schools will continue to face the challenge of delivering increasingly inclusive practice while operating within significant financial and workforce constraints.

The challenge for the year ahead is not whether inclusion should remain a priority - it absolutely should - but how schools can continue to strengthen inclusive practice while maintaining the capacity to do so sustainably.

Accountability isn't going away

This year's also required schools to get to grips with a renewed inspection toolkit and a different approach to inspection.

Whether leaders welcomed the changes or not, schools have invested considerable time in understanding the revised framework, reflecting on their own provision and considering what the changes mean for school improvement and inspection readiness.

One thing's clear: accountability remains firmly embedded within the education system. Inspection continues to play a central role in providing assurance about the quality of education that children receive. For school leaders, this reinforces the importance of robust self-evaluation, honest reflection and a relentless focus on continuous improvement. The schools that are best placed for inspection are rarely those preparing intensively once the call comes. They're those where leaders know their schools well, understand their strengths and weaknesses and can demonstrate the impact of their improvement work through the experiences of pupils and staff.

As schools look ahead to the next academic year, accountability is unlikely to diminish. Instead, leaders will need to continue embedding improvement into everyday practice, ensuring that inspection readiness remains a by-product of effective leadership rather than a separate activity.

Financial pressures are unlikely to ease

If inclusion is the educational challenge facing schools, financial sustainability may become the defining leadership challenge of 2026/27. Schools and trusts are increasingly being asked to deliver more with the same funding and, in many cases, less in real terms. The recent teacher pay award illustrates this perfectly. While additional funding has been announced, schools are expected to absorb part of the cost themselves because the settlement is not fully funded. For many schools, this will require difficult decisions.

These pressures are compounded in areas experiencing falling pupil rolls. Lower pupil numbers inevitably reduce income at precisely the time that costs continue to rise. For some schools, maintaining current staffing structures may simply become unaffordable. No school leader enters the profession wanting to make decisions about restructuring or reducing staffing. Yet for some governing bodies, trust boards and leadership teams, these conversations may become unavoidable over the coming year.

The challenge will be protecting educational quality while ensuring long-term financial sustainability. Strategic leadership increasingly means making difficult decisions today to protect provision tomorrow.

Political change may bring further uncertainty

The coming year may also bring significant political change. With the prospect of a new Prime Minister and potentially a new Secretary of State for Education, schools may once again find themselves responding to evolving national priorities. New ministers often bring different perspectives on curriculum, accountability, inclusion, teacher development and school reform.

While political leadership may change, the responsibility of school leaders doesn't. The challenge will be maintaining strategic consistency while remaining sufficiently agile to respond to new policy direction. Successful schools will distinguish between long-term educational priorities and shorter-term political announcements, ensuring that decisions remain rooted in the needs of their pupils and communities.

Looking beyond September

The horizon extends well beyond the next academic year. The publication of the final revised National Curriculum in Spring 2027 will represent another significant milestone. For the first time, religious education is expected to be included within the National Curriculum, alongside wider curriculum reforms that are likely to shape teaching and learning for years to come.

Artificial intelligence is also moving rapidly from curiosity to practical reality. Increasing numbers of schools are exploring how AI can reduce workload, support planning, enhance assessment and improve operational efficiency. The challenge for leaders is ensuring that technological innovation strengthens professional practice without replacing the expertise, judgement and relationships that lie at the heart of education.

Alongside these developments sits an increasingly important conversation about system capacity. For some smaller trusts and standalone schools, sustaining the breadth of expertise now expected across areas such as SEND, safeguarding, curriculum, estates, finance, governance and compliance is becoming increasingly challenging. This is likely to accelerate conversations around collaboration, shared services, federation and trust growth, not simply as structural reforms, but as practical responses to growing operational demands.

What does this mean for school leaders?

The coming year is unlikely to be easier than the one we are about to leave behind. Schools will continue to navigate financial uncertainty, increasing complexity, political change and rising expectations. The greatest challenge for leaders may not be responding to change itself, but resisting the temptation to respond to everything.

The strongest schools are rarely those pursuing the greatest number of initiatives. They're those with the confidence to prioritise, the discipline to implement well and the courage to stop doing things that no longer add value.

Leadership in 2026/27 will require clarity of purpose, careful stewardship of resources and an unwavering commitment to developing people. Sustainable improvement will depend less on working harder and more on working more strategically.

Looking forward with cautious optimism

Despite the challenges ahead, there remains every reason to be optimistic. Schools have repeatedly demonstrated an extraordinary ability to adapt, innovate and improve, often in circumstances that would challenge any organisation. That resilience remains one of the profession's greatest strengths.

The question isn't whether more change is coming. It almost certainly is. The more important question is whether our organisations are resilient enough to respond without losing sight of what matters most.

As one academic year closes and another begins, perhaps the challenge for all of us is not simply to ask what lies ahead, but to consider how we will lead through it. Because ultimately, successful schools will not be defined by how well they react to change. They will be defined by how consistently they improve the lives, opportunities and outcomes of the children and young people they serve, regardless of the challenges that surround them.