DORSET schools are increasingly working together to help raise standards – which in time may lead to more formal partnerships being developed.

Head teachers have set up a School Improvement Board which has just met for the first time. It will identify area-wide priorities and develop ways of making improvements in clusters of schools.

The system is being tried in the Weymouth and Portland area where all of the senior schools performances have dipped.

All Saints at Wyke Regis and Budmouth School are also being supported by Dorset County Council and are continuing to have regular ‘challenge’ visits where action plans are reviewed and monitored and, if necesessary, changes made. Financial grants have also been won to support key courses and improve employer engagement with the local schools.

Dorset County Council’s people and overview scrutinty committee heard on Wednesday that work is also being done with junior and primary level schools in the Weymouth and Portland area to improve their outcomes for pupils.

Assistant director for schools and learning Andrew Reid said although support was being offered by the council the idea was that schools should set and guide their own improvement agenda: “The idea is that we stand back and let them do it. We really need to do that because our resources are being parred back.”

He said that schools, working in clusters, would offer help, support and advice to each other: “We haven’t got the resources to create a revolution, we are having to evolve and following a trend which is appropriate for Dorset,” he said.

He said that in other areas of the country once schools started to work together they became more likely to adopt formal arrangements which sometimes brought finance and governance together – but he said that was not the aim in Dorset, although it might eventually be an outcome for some clusters.

Weymouth councillor Kate Wheller welcomed the initiative but said she worried that the Board might result in more work for already over-stretched heads.

“I am sure there will be benefits in the long-term but I am looking for an assurance that this won’t just put an extra burden on them,” she said.

Mr Reid said that those who were trying the system were liking it and benefitting from it: “All I’m trying to do is make conditions for change…I can’t promise the sun-lit uplands and I don’t want to increase workloads but all I can say is we can’t just do nothing…we cannot sit still, we have to do more.”

He said he hoped to encourage more schools to work together in a spirit of trust and openess, and of being a ‘critical friend’ to each other.