The government’s schools White Paper marks a significant and welcome shift in ambition, with a clear commitment to halving the disadvantage gap within a generation.

Complementing this, the government’s announcement of Mission North East signals a recognition that the system is not working for too many children in the region and that a specific, focused set of policies is required to fix this. It is potentially a once-in-a-generation opportunity.

However, policy alone will not deliver this change. The real test will be whether Mission North East can translate ambition into practice through partnerships that are purposeful, focused and built to last.

After all, the challenges facing children and families are complex and interconnected, spanning economic change, health inequalities and access to opportunity. Schools cannot be expected to address these alone.

Mission North East partnerships

In areas of disadvantage, especially, the strongest evidence points to the impact of coordinated, multi-disciplinary approaches that bring together education, communities, services and employers.

For Mission North East to succeed, therefore, partnerships must be anchored with a clear and practical aim: removing the barriers that prevent children from accessing education and opportunity in the first place.

This means focusing on providing the conditions so that children and young people are healthy and ready to learn, as well as focusing on academic progress and attainment. These are not mutually exclusive.

We can already see what this looks like.

In Middlesbrough, a collaboration between Tees Valley Education multi-academy trust, other schools, the voluntary sector and wider partners, through a National Lottery-supported programme, has tackled sleep poverty, an often hidden but significant barrier to learning.

Furthermore, through work with the Zarach charity, children have been supported with beds and practical help, enabling them to attend school ready to learn.

It is a simple intervention, but it demonstrates how targeted, partnership-led action can break down barriers and open up access to education for some of the most vulnerable children and young people.

Long-term thinking

Alongside this, there is a need to think differently about how opportunity is built over time. Primary schools have a critical and often under-recognised role here.

Research highlighted by the Careers and Enterprise Company shows that engagement with the world beyond school has the greatest impact when it begins early, particularly for disadvantaged children from around age 7.

This is not about pushing children towards careers too soon. It is about helping them to understand their place in the world, and connecting learning to their local environment and future possibilities.

When this is rooted in place and supported through partnerships with employers, civic organisations and the voluntary sector, it strengthens both engagement and aspiration.

Coming into education from industry, I have seen the difference that this kind of connection can make. But if we are serious about transforming a generation’s offer, we need to go further.

Lifetime networks

This is not simply about employability. It is about a broader education for life, where children and young people develop the knowledge, confidence and networks that enable them to navigate an evolving world.

That requires deeper, more intentional partnerships that extend beyond isolated experiences and become part of the fabric of education itself.

This also needs to be understood in the context of wider economic ambition.

The Treasury’s focus on regeneration in every region, alongside the work of the North East Chamber of Commerce, highlights both the scale of opportunity and the urgency of ensuring that it is inclusive.

Without that link, though, there is a risk that growth does not translate into greater equity.

Three key areas of focus

Mission North East, therefore, has a unique role to play as a convener of this work - but three changes will be critical.

The first is moving from pockets of strong practice to a genuinely shared regional approach, where partnerships are aligned around clear outcomes and designed into the system rather than reliant on individual relationships.

The second is ensuring that communities - families, children, educators and partners - are not on the receiving end of reform but are meaningfully involved in shaping it, so solutions reflect lived experience as well as policy ambition.

The third is building for sustainability and scalability from the outset. Partnership approaches must be designed in ways that can endure beyond initial funding and be replicated across different contexts without losing their impact.

Underpinning all of this is the need to ensure that it is achieved without adding unsustainable pressure on to an already stretched workforce, and without destabilising the support that children and families rely on.

Change will need to be carefully sequenced, properly resourced and grounded in the realities of schools and communities.

There is a lot to do, but if Mission North East can harness that collective effort, partnerships can move from isolated activity to a shared regional mission, and more children in more communities will gain fairer access to the opportunities that allow them not just to learn but to thrive.

Katrina Morley OBE is the founding chief executive of Tees Valley Education multi-academy trust