Advancing Collaboration in Education (ACE) explores the topic of collaboration and cross-sector working at all system levels. This is a key factor for implementing inclusive policy and practice. The activity focuses on the implementation process of cross-sector working at national level.
ACE aims to offer a better understanding of system-wide collaboration and the governance of system-wide work for inclusive education. This includes defining cross-sector collaboration, to be meaningful for all stakeholders involved.
This activity is one of six within the Agency’s Thematic Country Cluster Activities (TCCA). Each activity involves collaboration between a small group, or cluster, of Agency member countries. ACE is Cluster 4. TCCA focuses on member countries’ priorities and addresses country requests for more tailored activities to support policy development needs and build upon learning points from other Agency activities. The clusters aim to support countries in their efforts to promote continuous improvement for all stakeholders across the whole inclusive education system. For more information, visit the TCCA web area.
Activity framework
The activity builds on the TCCA Literature Review, which highlights the crucial role of cross-sector collaboration in inclusive education.
ACE recognises the need to explore processes that enable collaboration and effective communication between ministries, regional- and local-level decision-makers, and between services, including non-governmental organisations and schools. It draws on the literature review’s working model for a multi-level, multi-stakeholder quality assurance, monitoring and accountability framework and on theoretical frameworks that offer insight into the implementation of cross-sector collaboration. In this way, ACE will gather policy and stakeholder information to develop cross-sector knowledge and understanding.
ACE will undertake a series of activities that involve stakeholders from different levels and support policy-/decision-makers to improve cross-sector working. The activity will run until December 2025.
Participants and target group
The ACE cluster countries are Finland, Iceland, Luxembourg, Norway, Poland and United Kingdom (Wales). These countries have been grouped on the basis of their highly integrated governance plans.
The ACE cluster countries will guide and co-develop the work during this activity, based on their national priorities and their alignment with Agency objectives.
Aims
This cluster activity will explore the topic of collaboration and cross-sector working at all system levels as a key factor in implementing inclusive policy. It will consider:
- Overall governance mechanisms: developing multi-sectoral structures
- Cross-sector co-operation between ministries (that is, education, health, social care, housing and labour) at national level
- Collaboration and co-ordination at local level (decentralisation, multi-level governance, school-to-school networks)
- Collaboration with local communities (linking education with other services, such as employment and housing; collaboration with non-governmental organisations, universities, private sector, etc.)
- Cross-sector working in schools (that is, between teachers and specialists or professionals from different sectors, such as health and social care).
- Capacity building for collaboration (linked to the need for teacher professional learning)
- Leadership for collaboration (linked to the above)
- Collaboration with parents and consultative bodies (linked to collaboration with local communities and within schools, which could be a transversal collaboration)
- Accountability and quality assurance mechanisms for cross-sector working.
ACE aims to support countries to advance cross-sector work. It will do so by providing country-level decision-makers with a framework, tools and connections at national/regional level to advance collaboration for inclusive education among all stakeholders.
Activities and outputs
An initial output is an internal background paper on cross-sector collaboration for inclusion, created with the Collaborative Action for Inclusive Education cluster. Complementing the TCCA Literature Review, the paper highlights relevant trends and needs in cross-sector work for inclusive education. It presents models and tools as exemplary methods and practices for implementing cross-sector work that should be considered, discussed and adjusted to countries’ needs.
The ACE activity includes three in-person meetings to share examples, facilitate peer exchange, and plan the activity going forward. The first meeting, in October 2024, was an international seminar on ‘Intersectoral Cooperation in Meeting the Diverse Needs of Students’.
Stakeholder involvement is central to the ACE activity. Stakeholders will be invited to share their experiences of collaboration. The cluster countries will be asked to identify key stakeholders that represent the activity’s target group.
The activity’s final output will be a guide to help national-level decision-makers assess solutions to gaps in cross-sector collaboration for inclusive education. This guide will set out concrete examples of practice that explore the process of implementing cross-sector working.