New collaborations to support children’s learning and wellbeing

The Open University’s Centre for the Study of Global Development and the Education Commission’s Education Workforce Initiative (EWI) have been collaborating on a series of initiatives focusing on education workforce research and reform. 
We have been exploring what we call ‘learning teams’: how different actors work with teachers in new ways to support children’s learning, with an emphasis on collaboration and partnerships. 

‘Learning teams’ embraces a diversity of partnerships, alliances, relationships and networks appropriate to different contexts that are created to address specific needs and challenges: they might focus on actors within schools, collaborations between schools and communities, or with different sectors and external agencies. 

We are specifically interested in initiatives (coordinated systematically and/or at scale) where collaboration has required (or inspired) people to extend or adapt the scope of their roles, potentially leading to new forms of practice. 

This study included an analysis of 17 countries’ Education Sector Plans; an extensive literature search; engagement with organisations around the world working with team-based approaches; and a case study of a new collaborative programme in Ghana. 

The main findings highlight the diversified and necessary, context-specific nature of successful learning teams, the importance of highly motivated individuals to advocate for and mediate collaborative practices, the need for supported shifts in identity (including training and resources), as well as limited opportunities for scaling and sustainability.