First, what is the SW100?

We’ve got a big problem in the South West: we have the worst educational outcomes for disadvantaged young people in the country.

The 'disadvantage gap' in the South West is worse than the national average at all stages. This means that a child experiencing disadvantage will start at primary school around five months behind their peers. When they leave secondary school twelve years later, this gap will have widened, with the most vulnerable children in our communities finishing school almost two years behind their friends [🔗].

While shocking, these aren’t extreme examples; these are average figures, typical experiences and expected outcomes. But it does not have to be this way. When school and trust leaders elevate this challenge—that is, eradicating endemic educational inequality—gaps are closed and lives are transformed.

And that’s what the ‘South West 100’ is all about.

In essence, the SW100 is an internationally-informed, regionally-led, and community-focused school leadership development programme; supporting high-impact school leaders into their first headships in Devon and Cornwall.

What’s unique about it?

It’s part school leadership programme; part collective impact project.

Endemic educational inequality isn’t complicated—it’s complex. Framing and accepting the issue as such gives shape to how we approach it. As with all complex problems, we know there’s no magic bullet that’ll solve it and no one person or organisation has all the answers. It’s a shared challenge impervious to lone interventions.

That means the programme isn’t about sharing tips, tricks and toolkits with a bunch of individuals but, rather, establishing a powerful network of leaders, organisations and institutions to integrate actions and achieve systems-level change. Nobody is as smart as everybody.

For this to work, we know what matters:

Getting the right individuals involved matters—both on the programme and in the movement. We’re looking for people who share our commitment and are determined to initiate change with the humility to listen, learn and adapt as they do so.

Building strong, trusting relationships between those people matters. This is fundamental. The Relationships Project reckons that when relationships are “nurtured, valued and prioritised, people are happier and healthier, communities are stronger and more resilient, and businesses are more successful and efficient”. We agree and are committed to relationship-centred practice.

Belonging matters. And to foster it, we need to develop a literacy of scales because we recognise that different-sized groups are good at different things. Small and mighty teams can do things that larger groups can’t—and vice versa. The community-building practice, Microsolidarity, talks about ‘crews’ and ‘congregations’. A crew being a small but mighty team—“active, dynamic, practical and engaged”. Crews are highly-efficient, highly-impactful units. A congregation is larger: small enough for members to know a bit about one another but big enough to support crews to coalesce. This is a good way to think about the five, distinct, 20(ish)-person-strong cohorts that make up the core SW100 programme, and the movement we’re building around it.

So that’s what this page is all about

We’ll be using this page to share some key reflections, provocations, insights and challenges we’re uncovering with you—to build momentum towards our shared vision of all children in Devon and Cornwall enjoying lives of choice and opportunity.

There’ll be more questions than answers!

If you share our commitment and want to join us on the journey, subscribe to our monthly blast below.