Pupil Voice Surveys That Actually Change a School — Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield, Fairfield Prep

Mark Taylor 00:00:00

Hello. Welcome back to Education on Fire. Today I'm delighted to be chatting to Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield and he's the Deputy Head Academic at Fairfield Prep School, part of the Loughborough Schools Foundation. He focuses on enhancing pupil experience and academic engagement. Recently leading initiatives such as adapting IAPs pupil voice surveys for younger years. We discussed how the real power of pupil voice lies not in celebrating what we do well, but continually asking how it can be even better for our children. We also cover implementing STEAM based enterprise education in the school and how this encourages participation from the wider school community and beyond. Hello, my name is Mark Taylor and welcome to the Education on Far podcast, The place for creative and inspiring learning from around the world. Listen to teachers, parents and mentors show how they are supporting children to live their best, authentic life and are proving to be a guiding light to us all. Hi, Jamie. Thank you so much for being here on the Education On Fire podcast. I had a great conversation with Andrew Groom about the singing project he was involved in with the Love for Schools Foundation. So it's great to be able to speak to someone who's part of that and sort of get this sort of prep idea of what it's like to be in the foundation. But I know you've really had some insights into getting some student voice and some, some, some impact and some understanding from a survey that you've done. So we're gonna really enjoy that kind of understanding of how, I think when you hear what a student's voice really sounds like across an entire school, how that's then implemented, I think people will find that really fascinating. Yeah. So thanks so much for being here.

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:01:38

No, thank you, Mark. Thank you for having me on your show. Brilliant.

Mark Taylor 00:01:42

So why don't we start first of all with that survey? Where did it come from? And sort of. What was sort of the impetus of sort of getting that? Because I know it's across other schools as well.

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:01:51

Yeah. So we're part of IAPS, which is the Association of Prep Schools across the country. And what they were looking to do was carry out a pupil voice survey that was prime, primarily aimed at children in Key Stage 2, and they were looking to. For schools to involve themselves in that process. And it was a good opportunity. I thought it was perfect. It had been developed by heads across the prep schools across the country and it was an opportunity really, that I thought it would make perfect sense. You know, it was great to get involved with that. So the idea was, is that the survey would be implemented and get a good cross section of viewpoints and the analysis would be undertaken by an external firm and then those results would be shared with us. And that was it really. The idea was to see where it would go. The, obviously from our point of view, it would be a perfect insight into children's views and would help us with our monitoring and we would be recognized for our involvement in that process. So again, we saw that as a perfect opportunity and we went in and I think the process was very straightforward, very, very easily implemented. But I think it was the results that came out of it that really surprised us and has taken us down a whole new route from that. So what started as a fantastic opportun opportunity has turned into something quite, quite big for, for us as a school.

Mark Taylor 00:03:24

And I think for me it was the, the engagement was the first thing which I think struck me. They're sort of in the high 90s of response and, and then you suddenly feel like you've got a real picture of what people are thinking rather than just sort of a token gesture, so to speak.

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:03:40

Yeah. And I think that's, I mean our school has always been. The staff have been amazing involving themselves in, in those sorts of ideas. So when an opportunity throw themselves in. And we were, as like you quite rightly said, we, we knew that we were going to get a high response rate, so our response rate was fantastic. And then picking it apart a little bit more and going into the bit more detail when the results were announced and we actually understood the context and you know, how big was that sample size? So over 31 schools across the country took part in that and I think it was, you have to excuse me, looking for the, for the figures, but over four and a half thousand children took part in that survey. So our representation in that, it was good to understand that, yeah, we got a good understanding of our results, but in that wider context of prep schools across the country as well.

Mark Taylor 00:04:34

And tell us, what were the questions? What was the, what were you, what was the sort of, the idea behind it in terms of what you were trying to get that information about?

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:04:43

Well, again, it was as it was developed by heads of prep schools. They had already sort of designed that survey, so we were working within those parameters, but there were essentially five sections that they were looking at. So one was asking children how they feel about school, which was one. The second one was their experience in schools, the children's experience on a day to day basis, how they're taught. One section was dealt specifically with experience of reading and then the other one was what children do outside of lessons. So there were 25 statements in all. And the way that the survey was designed was that there were five statements per section. And then the children would go through and basically on a scale, say whether they agreed or disagreed with a certain statement. And then through that you'd gain an understanding of how they felt about each of those areas. And again, the insight was amazing. You know, what was initially from Nev. Charles point of view, not a lot of time, you know, from given their curriculum demands, but what you got back was an incredible insight into how they feel about these different areas.

Mark Taylor 00:05:54

And was there any sort of surprising things that you didn't expect to sort of get back?

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:06:00

Well, I think one of the things that struck me was when the results came back, it was amazing how positive the responses were. Now bearing in mind, you know, with, with surveys there are always, sometimes it is the consistency of results that you're always hoping for, but you, you know that there are going to be sections where it doesn't quite fit the picture. But one thing that surprised me was, was how consistent the the results were across those different year groups where a three form entry four year groups were surveyed. And what struck me was how consistent those results were. And that that was the first thing. The second one was how positive the results were. And in fact, I remember the day that the results were made available and I was looking at them, I was, I was just absolutely blown away by how positive they were. And I knew that it was one of those sort of amazing moments where you just wanted to shout out about it, you wanted to share them more widely with everybody because again, they were so good. And one of the areas, and it's interesting because whenever you do the survey, it's those areas you look at your strengths but for development. And one that struck me was how low reading was in the survey. Now even though the results for us were still high, they went as high, you know, with all the others in comparison. But when we delved down into a bit deeper with IAPs, reading was one that was really quite, quite poor on the survey across those schools that were surveyed. And I think for me that was, I was a bit surprised. You know, I know, I know that reading has been under a lot of screen. Obviously it's the National Year of Reading. We know through various research pieces that reading and attitudes to reading have become sort of increasingly affected by the digital age that we're living in. But it surprised me how low some of those results more widely across the survey really were. So even though they were lower for us, it was Surprising that in the context of prep schools across the country how, how low reading came out in that survey.

Mark Taylor 00:08:06

And do you think this is a cycle? Because like I say, we're in a digital age and you kind of feel like we're never going to go back to a pre digital age. But it always just reminds me of sort of around the 80s when I was in secondary school and the drum machine suddenly hit existence and it was kind of we're never going to have a live band with real drummers again. And then of course, 10 years later it's all about the. Of actually having live people doing what they're doing. So reading's not quite the same. But do you think there'll be that sense of. We know that the digital and. And the focus isn't there anymore, but actually people will start to realize that actually having a book and reading and going into that world and in a more immersive way over a long time of actually getting through a whole book or a whole book series will sort of come back in. What are your sort of insights on that?

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:08:57

I think we're in a really interesting phase at the moment. I think with AI and the conversations that people are having. There's a real period of discussion here and scrutiny of digital. And I've certainly felt that over the past year or so, particularly in the world of education, the discussion around AI and screen time has really come to the fore and it's almost polarizing. I think that it's almost sort of dividing people into two camps. There's a camp that is embracing it and sees the benefit of it. And then there's the more sort of very cautious anti camp. And from what I'm seeing, it's really interesting, some schools have moved completely away from their involvement with digital and therefore more traditional forms have become more important and they've been really pushed, whereas others, it's sort of they're throwing themselves into the other camp. And I think we're in a really interesting period at the minute because I think, whereas I think we have to navigate that very carefully, I think we have a duty to prepare children for the future workplace in which they're going to be working in the world, in fact that they're going. They're going to be living in. Whereas I think for those of us who have lived in those periods of change, you know, I remember when I was at primary school when the BBC computer came in and there was one worked up per for the whole school and you know, your time on that was satro sank you know, and again, thinking of where that, where we were then and where we are now, you know, we're in a very, very different time, but I do think we're in a period of flux. And I think the conversations that are being held at the moment are very valid. But I think for us at the moment it is being careful not to jump in too, too quickly and make those rash decisions. And again, you have to be careful when to take action and when not to take action. And I think from our perspective, we've been very mindful of that. We have had discussions around AI use and digital and. But also on the flip side, we really recommend, you know, we recognize the value of tradition and handwriting and reading and I would say, you know, nobody's got it right. But I think at the moment we are very mindful of that sort of discussion that's going on at the minute.

Mark Taylor 00:11:20

Yeah. And I think that sense of transition, and I love that analogy. I remember being, you know, the, the BBC computer and going to the computer room a little bit later on and, you know, this, the Internet and, you know, and, you know, we can't imagine life without the Internet anymore. So therefore you kind of feel like, say, AI is here, so it's going to be part of, of our life moving forward in a way that we don't know. But at the same time, we also understand that people are thinking, I need more time away from screens. I need the. I, I need the emotional time to spend with a book or in. With the imagination that you, that you would have with your kids or even within, within yourself to find those things. And I think you're absolutely right. It's going to be where that percentage is, and it'll probably be very different for different people and it'll also be different like, say, today than in five years or even 10 years. So I think, like I say, the conversation is the most important thing and I think people finding their balance with it both from an educational setting, but also sort of from a family point of view, personal sense.

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:12:22

Yeah. And that it's, it's funny how, you know, every day we're learning more. You know, those conversations are cropping up. We've had those discussions about screen time, rules and regulations, again, helping everybody understand that, you know, we've got the educationalist perspective, but also we've got the parental perspective and how we help parents understand that. And even from what we've been seeing, you know, their parents have changed as well from, from over time and their understanding and how we can help them Understand the impact of screen and what they are facilitating in their. In their way as well. Again, that's. That's another element of it that we have to navigate to.

Mark Taylor 00:13:00

Yeah. So in terms of reading itself, we sort of mentioned it's sort of the National Year of Reading and this kind of real focus on it this year. What is it that you sort of done within school as a. As a way of promoting it, as a way of kind of understanding children's insights into what that is for them, which maybe wasn't our perception a year or two ago, like you say, with the sort of changing times.

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:13:25

Yeah, well, I mean, we're very fortunate. We. We have a. A school library. And, you know, when I joined the. The school several years ago, one. One of the things that first amazed me was how expansive our collection of reading material is. And. And I would say that our offer of reading and our pusher reading and for reading for pleasure is. Is. Is. It's a fantastic asset that we have. And we have a school librarian, again, which we are very fortunate to have. And her passion is. Is fantastic the way that she really celebrates reading. And you can see across the school that reading is. Is very important to our children. And again, that comes from the. The staff. When you have staff like, like. Like Heather, who's absolutely amazing. She is helping children develop their love of reading. And again, that just. That just disperses itself across the school. And I think one of the things that came back from the survey when learning that not only was reading one of our sort of lower areas in our pupil voice survey, but recognizing that in the wider picture of prep schools that reading was. Was actually really quite significantly low. Having that discussion with our staff about understanding attitudes to reading, that was where we wanted to go. So one of the first things that came out of the survey was, okay, well, we recognize that reading is lower. Well, why is that? What do we want to know about reading and attitudes to reading from our children? And we sat down as a staff and began to flesh out a survey that would help us. It was almost like the pupil voiced the set the next chapter, almost to understand what our children were thinking. So we sat down together and we said, okay, what do we want to know? What do we want to find out from our children? We wanted to find out about attitudes of reading at home, at school. We also wanted to know a little bit more about their attitudes to reals reading, about the systems that we employ at school. We have within our prepet, we have book bands, which a lot of schools do, but Then with our older children we use an accelerated reader program which again they move on to. And we wanted to delve a little bit deeper into that. What are the children's attitudes towards those systems? You know, are they happy with, with that? You know, do they like being sort of moving up through those levels? Is that a motivator or is, is that a barrier? We also wanted to find out more widely about what was happening at home. So we were asking questions about their reading attitudes at home, what they prefer doing, what they like to do, what them read more. And once we've got that sort of fleshed out in those questions, and again we could have gone into a massive amount of detail but we had to be mindful of the age of our children. You know, we've got our younger children in year one and that was one of the things that we did with the original survey is that even though it was originally intended with our older children, we actually created a secondary version that we ran internally that sort of married it up. So we were able to have sort of common statements across the entire school, but we were able to sort of delve a bit deeper with the older ages. So we replicated a reading survey based on that model. So we were able to gain a school wide perspective with statements. But then we were able to tailor it specifically to the age and phase of the children. So putting that into place and it was, well, I think it was great to see the staff so motivated by it. I think the fact that they were able to sort of input their, into the survey as well. And again, with every survey design we remain mindful of what we wanted to get out of it as well. And we'd learned a lot of lessons from the original survey because even though we hadn't designed it, the analysis and what we want to do, we have, we're very fortunate to have a data analysis team who are able to analyze data in ways that, you know, go well my, my understanding. But what's been great is that from an educationist perspective, it be, it's been great to have these conversations with them and say it would be great if we could find out this or it would be great if we could delve down deeper and find out what the attitudes of this group are. And with that in mind, we've been able to sort of take the, the questions and curiosity of the staff. We've been able to put it with the sort of, the statisticians, you and say, okay, when we're designing a survey, how are we going to get the Most out of this information. And we've been able to marry and design a survey which has been able to give us some really, really deep insights. And what came out of that reading survey, again was. Was fantastic. The amount of information we've got, again, incredibly positive. I mean, one of the first things that came about was that reading is really, really enjoyed by children, by our children. And actually when we delved in a bit further about what they prefer to do and is digital and screen time an issue, they actually, you found that it was the more traditional, fine, they do enjoy reading, they do enjoy playing outside. And again, some of those were. It was great to see that actually our children, it's not a top priority to be on a screen and play on computer games. They actually do fur reading and being outside and playing with their friends. And again, that was, that was amazing to see and be able to share that with the staff.

Mark Taylor 00:18:50

And I think you have to also understand that children instinctively want to thrive, don't they? And I think like, say kids want to play, they want to be, you know, like, we all sort of understand if you do too much of one thing, you definitely feel the, the negative side of that. And, you know, I think we want to be social, we want to be interacting, we want to be outside and, and the screen is one particular thing that we know is a current issue. But I think understanding that and like saying getting all those numbers back and getting that feedback makes you think, yes, they. Not that we want them to go outside and play more or be more sociable, that if they instinctively want to because it's what they enjoy, then it's then just a question of creating the environments to do that. And, and it just reminds me when you were saying about the reading habits and that sort of thing, you know, children can only sort of, sort of respond and understand to what they know exists. And I think it'd be interesting to know, you know, how often do you see your parents reading? You know, do they. Do they read for pleasure? Is it just a holiday thing? Is there time for us to read? And I think that obviously changes with age as well. You know, sort of bedtime reading or sort of that sort of early evening is different when you've got children into that prep school age as opposed to secondary school. And I think them seeing what parents do habitually for themselves and that they're doing it for pleasure is a really sort of fascinating thing too. It's certainly something I saw my mum do an awful lot and I think that did sort of as I got older, I started to realize there's this whole world I can explore, explore and experiment with in a way that wasn't structured within school. And understanding that it was also my journey as well as something I had to do because it was all within that school setting. I think that was a real sort of game changer in understanding for me.

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:20:35

Yeah. And as you said, one of the questions we did ask was, you know, how do you see your parents read at home or do you see an adult read at home? And again, it was quite sad that actually that was quite one of the lower percentages that a lot of our children don't see that at home. And again, is that symptomatic of the business of the world in which we live in and that actually parents are struggling to do that with all the demands that they have, or is it that they actually don't value it, or is it something for them that they feel is more private and actually they want to do it in their own time or their prioritize their children and everything else they have to do rather than seeing the value of actually sitting down and reading with the children or just exposing them to say, okay, well you're on the sofa, you know, playing with your toes. I'm reading a book. But what was interesting was we, we looked into that correlation to see, you know, was do, do children. Do children's attitudes to enjoyment of reading is, does that have any bearing with their exposure to adults reading or seeing adults read at home? And what was quite fortunate and reassuring was even though the number of children who said that they do see adults reading or reading with them at home is lower, that hasn't prevented them from enjoying reading. So whereas before you might think that there has been some correlation, we actually found through our survey that that isn't the case, that actually children do enjoy reading and they do value it and see it as an important life skill, even though they don't naturally see it coming from their parents or an adult around them within their work, within their home space.

Mark Taylor 00:22:06

Yeah. And, and I, I really sort of love that insight that you're able to, to gather. I love the fact that like say, having been involved in the original survey, to then take that on board to gain more information, change the age group and sort of get that is a, is a real sort of sort of testament to, to understanding the children within your, within your school. And I should just mention actually at this point, book G, Will Peters, who we had on the podcast, actually only on the YouTube site, because he was actually sort of showing us behind the thing in that platform. Reading Bass was all around sort of reading for pleasure. And the whole point of it was the fact that sort of peer to peer they could sort of share their insights of stories they could do reactions to what they've read sort of. And, and what I really loved about that was the sense of, of it was taking their understanding of maybe the way social media works and digital and wanting to sort of input but in a non traditional format and more in a way that they might be used to seeing around them anyway. But the essence of it is what they got from a story, what books they liked, why they liked it and the ability to sort of, if they were reading a book based in London they could find on the map and it would give some information about it. And I just thought that the creative ways that people are coming up with, with new ways of supporting children in the modern world, but still using this particular example was reading is that it's the essence of the book and what people got out of it and their insights from it in a, in a sort of a non traditional way of being able to communicate it with. I loved it. So yeah, if you haven't done, haven't seen that, do go and check that out on, on YouTube. That will be, that should be out by the time this, this podcast goes live. So yeah, just wanted to give Will a shout out at the same time there. So take us into the, the school more broadly having as I mentioned at the beginning, spoken to Andrew about music and that's obviously a really important part in terms of the arts, but I know the idea of sort of STEAM Enterprise and, and that kind of thing is something we can chat about today as well. How does that sort of fit in with the ethos of the school in. And, and how you sort of sort of bring that into the curriculum or into the sort of the school environment in a, in a more sort of traditional sense.

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:24:16

Yeah. So several years ago we looked at developing STEAM more, more widely across the school. And I was, that was my original sort of task was to see how we can do that. And through my sort of investigation and my work it was, it was seeing how you do that effectively and I think, you know, it's easy to sort of tag, tag it on in a certain way. You know, through a lot of work I'd looked at, they schools had done that in a week and others had taken a sort of more specialist. And I guess it was looking at the parameters of our school day and our curriculum and thinking well how can we sort of raise the profile of steam? And it has evolved. I mean, again, you know, going back to my comment a few moments ago about it being a sort of an enrichment, we. That's exactly where we started. You know, we did start with a STEAM week, but through that I think it really has grown and we were looking at other opportunities with which to develop it. We knew that our provision of DT in terms of in comparison to other subjects was quite poor, needed developing. So we looked at DT and then we saw an opportunity there to revamp that and call that DTE with design, technology and engineering. So it became a sort of subject in its own right. So its importance really was raised. The profile of it was raised throughout the school. So it was great that as an arm of our team strategy, we were able to sort of really raise the profile of engineering. And then through that, there was an opportunity from one of the Science league came to forward and said that there was a competition regarding engineering that we could develop more widely. And even though that's sort of one of those competitions that exists, you know, you probably signpost children towards it, we thought, well, actually, here's an opportunity. We could have an engineering day where we actually involve our parents and see. Well, we knew that several parents work within the field of engineering, so is there an opportunity there to involve them? And that's what we've been able to do. And we're now in the sort of third year of that event. So we run an engineering event every year now which coincides with the national competition whereby we invite parents who are engineers to come in and share their expertise, but also work with the children throughout the day and help develop their idea. So it's sort of evolved. So we have the curriculum, there have been opportunities within that we've been able to take advantage of our computing provision. I mean, the way that we operate, we have subject specialist teachers for certain areas and computing and science being two of them. So through that we've been able to look for opportunities through our science and computing provision to see those links. And when we get to events like STEAM Week, which has really grown now, you know, initially it was a week where everyone sort of came off timetable and pursued a line of inquiry within their year group that has really grown now where the staff are working with the different year groups and those specialisms as an interest can really be shared across the entire school now. So it's gone beyond the realms of the subjects that STEAM relates to, to being a more widely embraced strategy. We've had staff as well, who have come forward and we have a STEAM committee now who meet and look at, again, other opportunities whereby we can really foster the links. And going back even further, one of the things we did with our curriculum was look at developing curriculum principles. And before we actually jumped on that sort of road with steam, we developed curriculum principles and as a staff, we came up with six key curriculum principles involving, sorry, including curiosity, communication, collaboration, principles that we as a school, regardless of age, phase and stage, that were applicable to all. And through steam, we were able to take that as a vehicle and say, okay, through steam, you will be collaborating, you will be communicating, you will be curious, and it's an opportunity again to embed it. And I think one of the highlights for me personally was following our STEAM week, again, going back to People Voice and how important that is and can be, is asking them, okay, you've had a scene meet, you've. You've had an opportunity to really immerse yourself in the world of STEAMING and look at the ways in which you apply the knowledge, skills and understanding. Thinking about those curriculum principles, which ones do you think you have used, you know, the most over the week? And what's been absolutely brilliant is the fact that children say, we've used all of them. And I think that's what's been great about STEAM is that it's the idea of breaking down subject discipline barriers and saying, actually, no, it's cross applicable here. We're using lots of different skills across these disciplines and STEAM is an example of that. It's being able to break those down and say, actually, no, you're using skills here in different ways in order to solve problems. I think that our STEAM strategy has really grown and it's by no means over yet, but again, it's been great to see that evolution. And again, with the enterprise, through STEAM Week, we have had an Enterprise week, which our Year five children undertake every year. And again, we've tried to see how we can sort of take the STEAM principles and use those with it. So we have a STEAM theme and the children within Year five have to work through the enterprise education element of it within that theme. And again, that's added more challenge for them because they've got to approach their business with that theme in mind. So, again, being able to integrate that into that process has been absolutely fantastic.

Mark Taylor 00:30:15

I mean, that sense of really experiencing it, isn't it? Like I say, because you can talk about all of these things, but for children to sort of say, yeah, I literally walked the walk. I was in That I was part of a project, we saw this happen. And then like I say, to be able to reflect and say, yes, I did use this skill, I did use that skill and I can understand how that works in real life. And being able to join all those dots, I think is so valuable. And we often talk about sort of community and you sort of mentioned there about parents and people in, in that field being able to come in and help as well. What are some of the, the benefits and, and some of the conversations you've had from that? And how easy has it been to sort of develop that sort of community sense by parents being involved. Involved in, in something that you're able to really support with?

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:30:58

Yeah, I think that our parents have always been keen to support their, the progress of the, their child. And I think when we've opened up an opportunity to them and what's been great is that the, the sort of, the idea of them coming forward and saying, yeah, yeah, I'm definitely on board with that. 100. And I go back to that. Engineering being an example. The other one that we've done recently is we do a careers initiative for our year six children. And this year, one of the feedback from the previous cohorts who have undertaken that was the fact that they wanted more practical experience. And our initiative, the children felt, was more. Had an academic focus. There was a strong emphasis on the sort of universities and colleges and they wanted to sort of investigate and explore the world more practical based on jobs. So this year we opened that up and said to parents, we're looking at doing a careers fair. It'd be great if parents could come forward and talk to the children about their journey through their careers, understanding that, you know, now most people will undertake probably six or seven different careers in their lifetime, rather than just one that you were sort of set on. So through those initiatives, it's been great that the parents have been willing to get involved with that. The Careers Fair was well supported in that respect. And the Engineer Day, again, that's been well supported. And I think parents appreciate the opportunity to firstly see what's going on in school. I think they appreciate the chance to come in and see, well, okay, you know, some children are better than others. They're explaining what they do at school. So for parents, it's their curiosity. I think they want to get involved and they want to see what's going on. But also as well, it's the nature of the event. With the engineering day, the way that they operate. It wasn't just coming in and Helping the children, saying, okay, I'm an engineer, how can I help? It was an opportunity. Then say, well, how did your passion and love of engineering begin? Where did it start? Where did it take you? And there's an opportunity as part of the day over to the parents to say, okay, well, tell us about your journey. Where did it all start? So I think empowering the parents and saying, okay, tell us about you, rather than, you know, it being very prescriptive, it's been great. And I think they really enjoyed that. And I think the feedback we've had from them is that they've really valued that. They valued the opportunity to talk about their experiences and help inform the children. You know, again, it's not. Not pressuring them into anything. It's just helping them understand a little bit more about the options available to them in life. And I think that that's gone down really well with what we've been doing.

Mark Taylor 00:33:43

Yeah. And I think for me, what it does is that there's nothing easier to talk about than something you're passionate about. And there's nothing easier to like, say, to get people on board with. Was like, we, there's a platform here, you know, it's in your wheelhouse. We'd love you to be involved if you can be sharing those stories, asking questions, questions and just making it part of an ongoing dialogue. But because you're in a position to put that structure there in such a positive way, I think that is very different than just saying, we've got this event which might be nothing to do with anything that, you know, but could you just come and help out? Because then there's real tangible reason to be involved. And I think an easier kind of buy in from that point of view because I know certainly from, from when my kids were going through school, it was that kind of, it's a professional musician and for you to come in and do a samba workshop, then I can do that all day, every day. That's brilliant. You asked me to come in and do something which is completely out of my, my sort of expertise and I'm a bit more kind of, I'm not quite sure how that will work. And that, that sort of idea of, yes, this is something I can really support with and it's a real benefit to the children, but also something I can do which hopefully will benefit the school. I really, I really love that because I say the passion just breeds the passion.

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:34:52

Yeah, it's worked incredibly well with, like I said, with the engineering day. I think as well, we have Some university based parents as well. And I think as well from there, not only from a personal benefit, but also as well from their organisations benefit, they see that. So again, it's that opportunity and I think going back to Steam, that's the way we sort of want to develop it. We want those links with outside organizations like Rolls Royce and the universities that are local to us because they're keen to bring that into schools, they're keen to sort of spread what they can offer and what they do and those experience, experiences, and we've seen that through the work that we've been doing, is that, you know, those connections have been incredibly valuable. When you start building that network again, it just breeds and fosters more opportunities, which again is hugely advantageous to the children and everyone.

Mark Taylor 00:35:47

And I think that's the other thing, isn't it? Is contact is really key. Like you say, if you're based in the Midlands and you've got Rolls Royce just there, it's like, well, I can see where that is, I can see where that is. But then once you get involved with a company like that, it's like, well, not everyone's doing the same job within that company. You know, there are people in completely different fields with their different passions and their expertise. And then you realize that it's about exploring all of those things within the, the context of where you live or a company or an organization that you're doing. And then you start to realize the world's a big place and the opportunities are a big place. And also how all those character traits and all those skills you were chatting about before then become a real asset. And like I said, you're not going to be in the same job for your entire career these days. So understanding that the strength comes from that ability to sort of move and have conversations and realize that you can just follow your path and it will take you to that next step because you're already dealing with different people in different situations. Whether, like say, whether it's down the academic route or in a, in a more practical route.

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:36:48

Yeah, and again, I think that's one of the key points we wanted to sort of convey through the careers work that we've been doing is, as you said, it's those skills. Yeah, knowledge is obviously really important, but it's these cross transferable skills that you can gather up and build throughout your time and they are hugely, hugely important as you move through your life.

Mark Taylor 00:37:12

So obviously the acronym FIRE is incredibly important to us here on the podcast. And by that we mean feedback, inspiration, resilience and empowerment. It sounds like this is something which is. Would fit on really nicely from some of those things you were saying already. But is there one of those that jumps out at you or a combination that you can, you can think that you sort of have experienced, certainly within school?

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:37:35

Yeah, I think that there are three, really, that point out to everything that we've done, whether it be the steam or whether it's been the investigation, exploration of the. But I think the combination of feedback, inspiration and empowerment. And I think obviously the empowerment comes from giving, as we've talked about today, children and parents the opportunity and empowering them. And I think that's been hugely beneficial in what we've been talking about today. And you can see the benefit of that. But throughout everything that we've discussed, feedback has been crucial to that. And I think being brave and strong enough to. And actually if we're talking about resilience, being resilient enough to actually take that step forward and say, okay, I'm going to ask for feedback, I know that actually I might hear something or get something back that might not necessarily be positive, but it's being brave enough to actually say, okay, I'm willing to take the step forward and accept that feedback in order to take it further forward. And I think that's exactly what we've doing been on that journey is that by being brave enough and stepping forward and saying, okay, let's hear that feedback, regardless of whether it's positive, negative. Well, you know, it's, it's acting upon it. And I think in, in the things that we've been discussing today, a lot of those initiatives have come from that feedback and being brave enough to say, okay, yep, the children didn't enjoy that, so let's make it better, let's change it, let's evolve it. And again, I see that that's how we've been working over several years on different aspects is how we respond to that feedback. And I think that's, for me, it's been really empowering. I don't think that's something I'm going to change. I think that's something I continue to explore and want to explore as a leader and as a school, I think we should be doing that more. And I think that fosters inspiration because I think going back to our reading survey, it's inspired our staff to get involved. It's inspired our staff to investigate and explore further, and it's inspired them to take action on what been finding. So I, I think, yeah, it's a real combination there, and you can certainly see how they, they complement one another. But from what we've been talking about today, I would definitely say that the feedback, inspiration, empowerment have been key to what we've, A lot of the aspects we've been talking about.

Mark Taylor 00:39:58

And I think for me, sort of from what we've spoken about, that essence of it being okay to ask questions, that sense of not knowing and exploring and, and I think it sort of came full circle there when you were saying about the feedback. Because I often have this when I'm in, in music lessons. I sort of like, what did you think? And everyone often goes with, oh, this wasn't quite good, or this wasn't quite as I expected. Which, you know, it's good to be analytical about what it is that you've done. But so often I say, but so much of that was brilliant. You know, you did this, you did that. The stuff we were working on all came in together. So this, I think changing the, the, the, the thought process that feedback has to be something which is negative or is always about improving. It can just be my honest feedback was this percentage of it was great or this thing I was working on was really good. Yes, we might be working on this next, or maybe this didn't go quite as well. But you, I think it's taking the emotion out of it and actually just saying, oh, yeah, right. So now we can take all of that information, we've asked our questions, we've analyzed it, and then we can move on. And I think the more you can do that and sort of normalize it, rather than the kind of I'm going to get into trouble or this is going to be a negative experience for me and like I say, neutral from an emotional point of view. I think that becomes a really positive thing because I think you're only going to get more and more feedback as you, as you get older and you go through school more and you get in, into your sort of profession. And I think it's such a hard thing, maybe it's an English thing as well, whether it's the same in other countries too. But I think that as an, as a, as a concept and a word as you sort of brilliantly described there, I think is such a positive thing.

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:41:32

Yeah, I think I was, I was reflecting on this. I think it's just being curious. I, I think, you know, I look at my, myself and I've been curious, you know, I've been curious throughout my life about learning and about thing and I continue to be curious and I. I want to find out more, I want to learn more and I think that that's probably where it all stems from, is that by being curious and, and having that puts yourselves on different paths to explore. And again, that's the way I just. I see is the benefit, really, of moving things forward and evolving. So, yeah, curiosity is a key part of that too. Yeah.

Mark Taylor 00:42:10

Amazing. Jamie, thank you so much for all your insights. I've loved the fact that you've been able to sort of share those specific areas that we've been able to do, but I think more importantly, the education more generally and widely and certainly how it's obviously actually impacted your school and how you're sort of taking that forward. So for people who want to find out more about the school or the sort of work that you're doing, where's a good place to signpost them in terms of a website or. Or place that they can find out more information?

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:42:37

Yeah, by. By searching. We're Fairfield Prep School, we're in the Midlands, so by. By finding more about our information on the website, definitely. But we're part of a foundation of schools, the Bluffborough Schools foundation at lsm. So, again, more broadly, you can find out more information about what we do and how we fit into that bigger part of the school's network there. So, yeah, if anyone wants to reach out, then please do find out more through those channels.

Mark Taylor 00:43:05

Amazing. Jamie, thank you so much. Indeed. I really enjoyed the conversation today.

Jamie Moseley-Sarsfield 00:43:09

No, thank you, Mark. It's been really good, really great.