ABSTRACT
Those of us who spend much of our professional lives labouring in that part of the educational vineyard known as ‘school improvement’ have recently been celebrating. For decades now we have been the poor relations of the field, tolerated, talked to at parties, but not really regarded as being a main player. But as western societies have in recent years grappled with the challenges of economic growth and social dislocation, our particular contribution to educational change has increasingly been recognised as important and helpful. As societies continue to set educational goals that are, on current performance, beyond the capacity of the system to deliver, those whose work focusses on strategies for enhancing student learning through school and classroom intervention are taken more seriously.
