Lord Theodore Agnew, founder of the Inspiration Trust, on the gap between what schools teach and what the next decade demands
“Education needs absolute fundamental and revolutionary change. The whole basis of knowledge is changing so fast that we’re going to need very different skills in the next 10 years to those taught in the last 50. And we haven’t begun that debate at all.”
ord Theodore Agnew is one of the most influential and outspoken voices in English education reform. One of seven children raised in Norfolk by a single father who governed through what he called "benign neglect," he failed his 11-plus - a moment he can still recall down to the smell of the floor polish in the corridor - and left for Australia at 18 with no qualifications.He spent a decade there before returning to build a successful insurance business, which he later sold. From there he moved into public life, joining the DfE board in 2010, helping drive the academies programme under Michael Gove, and eventually serving as a minister in both the DfE and the Treasury. In 2012 he founded the Inspiration Trust, which today runs schools serving more than 10,000 pupils across East Anglia. In this conversation, Lord Agnew reflects on the failure that shaped his mission, the financial discipline he brought from business into schools, and why he believes the entire model of mass education is now fracturing.
🎙️ Episode highlights
Lord Agnew reflects on failing his 11-plus and why the memory bit so deep, arguing that we still don't account for the fact that children's brains develop at different paces.
He describes being asked by a senior DfE official what on earth he could possibly bring to education, and how that scepticism only spurred him on to found the Inspiration Trust.
He explains the financial discipline he carried from business into schools, and how the waste he stripped out went straight back to the front line rather than to shareholders.
He reveals how curriculum-led financial planning has funded three extra hours of teaching a week, essentially giving every secondary pupil an additional year of education.
He shares the trust's investment in 25 "reading mentors", delivering one-to-one support that has helped some children recover two or three years of reading age in just six months.
Looking ahead, Lord Agnew argues that homework is "a total joke" in the age of AI, and points to gamified models like the American Alpha Schools as a glimpse of a very different future.