What is the National Professional Qualification for Senior Leadership (NPQSL)?

For school leaders who are, or are aspiring to be, a senior leader with cross-school responsibilities.

This programme will,

Develop evidence-led expertise equipping you to respond effectively to the school-wide challenges you will encounter; empowering you to lead your specific whole school responsibilities, enabling the flourishing of children and adults through an ambitious vision for your school.

Deepen your knowledge application to enable you to help your school keep improving across a number of specific areas of school life – including curriculum, behaviour, teaching and organisational management.

Provide you with a dedicated expert coach who will champion, challenge and encourage your leadership journey, developing your specialist knowledge and supporting your wellbeing and resilience as a leader.

Create networked communities of practice of fellow professionals to support your development for the long-term, enabling the collective expertise of the whole education system to grow and develop

This course is based on the 10 units of the NPQSL framework and will be delivered across 5 cycles of the learning model, as follows;

Cycle 1
School Culture & Teaching

Cycle 2
Curriculum and Assessment & Behaviour

Cycle 3
Additional and Special Educational Needs and Disabilities & Professional Development

Cycle 4
Organisational Management & Implementation

Cycle 5

Working in Partnership & Governance and Accountability

Cycles 1-4 will follow our usual learning model.

Cycle 5 will be held as two national ACTIVATE webinars followed by a whole day APPLY session, which will be delivered online by the national team. There will be no coaching during Cycle 5. Instead there will be additional opportunities to prepare for your final assessment. 

How much is the programme?

The cost of the programme is £1,135.

Full funding is available for all teachers who work in state-funded schools and state-funded 16-19 institutions in England.