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Each September seems to bring some new vocabulary or other that inserts itself into Inset days, staffrooms and performance management meetings almost overnight. This year, that word is “fidelity” – a slightly less clumsy formulation of “faithfulness”.

Suddenly, a word that was mostly reserved for marriage gossip or geeking about stereo systems is now earnestly deployed to evaluate the implementation of phonics programmes and, increasingly, pretty much everything else that goes on in schools. Following the curriculum plan, the pedagogical script, the questioning approach, the behaviour policy – fidelity to all these and more is increasingly seen as the ethical approach to teaching if we are to ensure that every child can thrive, no matter their background.

Not everyone is happy about it. And it is worth looking at why. Because while we may think fidelity is the post-pandemic fix that education needs, we need to be more rigorous in asking, at what cost?

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