UCL will shortly be sharing marketing material for the Early Headship Coaching Offer.

In the meantime, please see below an update regarding the programme specification and the proposed delivery model.

1. The Early Headship Coaching Offer replaces the Additional Support Offer.
2. Participants are eligible for this package of structured support and networking opportunities if they are in their first 5 years of headship; are employed in a state-funded school, or are employed in a state-funded 16 to 19 organisation in England on starting the training; have either completed an NPQH before taking up their first headship post or are currently taking one; have not withdrawn from the additional support programme previous.
3. We are aware that many areas may well provide local support packages for new headteachers already, as such the UCL ECHO programme is designed to sit alongside existing local offers rather than replace them.
4. Programme features include:

• It will be online.
• It will be managed and delivered centrally by UCL, but with facilitators/coaches drawn from the Delivery Partner network as well as UCL central recruitment. (Detailed person specifications for the role of facilitator/coach will follow shortly but see point 5 for further information.)
• It will consist of six facilitated/coached peer to peer support sessions each of 90 minutes across 12 months.
• Each group will consist of around 4 - 6 early career headteachers.
• The participants in each group will all work in the same phase. (The rationale for this is that the focus of each session will be the heads sharing issues and challenges and working out possible solutions as a group.)
• The groups will be organised on a national rather than a local basis. (The rationale for this is threefold – firstly, to allow the participants to speak more openly. Secondly, to allow the participants to get perspectives from parts of the country other than that in which they work. Thirdly, so as not to compete with local offers.)
• As well as the six 90-minute sessions participants will have access to a bespoke ECHO resources via a new UCL eXtend platform.
• The new programme will begin with an early roll out in October with a cap of 60 participants. This will be followed by open cohorts from Spring 2023.