In what follows, we describe briefly the key services offered by the LAHC to its members. We hope that after reading this you will have a much better idea of the enormous opportunities that membership opens up and the tremendous value for money that membership represents if full use is made of the services on offer.

The conference not only gives members the chance to address important educational issues with leading international experts. It also allows senior members of staff to meet counterparts from other schools and get a peek into the world of the head, it provides members the opportunity to share experiences which others can take back to implement in their schools, and perhaps most importantly it is a rare opportunity for heads to spend time with colleagues in a

The school review model is a unique instrument, tailor made to the needs of LAHC schools and with the flexibility to cope with the range and variety of circumstances within the membership. It is a tried and tested model which has proven over and again to have a significant and far reaching impact on schools, and which most importantly has empowered schools to improve their capacity for continuous self-improvement.

"Three years on ... there are clear, measurable indicators of improvement that are directly traceable back to the recommendations that were made. We have also taken fundamental decisions which, if not entirely the result of Review recommendations, were certainly helped along by them. To put it simply, the school is offering a better education thanks to the review".

perspective on what the school thinks of itself.

Many heads of schools that have been reviewed have commented that one of the most valuable elements of the review is the preparation that the school does prior to the arrival of the team. This process of preparation provokes a deep self-reflection that sharpens a school's self-awareness and enables it to identify clearly its priorities before a single reviewer has set foot on the premises. By the end of the review there is a clear focus for creating a strategic action plan to address the priorities and the review follow-up between one and two years after the review helps to maintain the focus and recognise the advances that have been made.

Every head knows how lonely the job can be and how useful it is to have someone else who understands the job give objective and constructive advice for improvement. To this end the Head's Appraisal instrument was designed, and it has been applied on eight occasions, not only to heads but also to other senior managers. Those who have been on the receiving end have no doubt as to its usefulness but we recognise that the formality and public nature of the process could be intimidating for some heads, particularly those with less experience in the job.

For this reason we have moved towards a more flexible proposal of a Critical Friend, whose role and scope is defined completely by the head requesting the service. Using the Head's Appraisal model as a starting point they decide which aspects of the job they wish to focus on and which members of the school community are to provide evidence, and in what form. Thus a colleague from another school puts themselves at the service of the head requesting the service for a period of two or three days and provides confidential, objective and constructive feedback at the end of the process.

The service can be provided for a head, a senior manager, or even a management team. There are already a number of members who have been on one side or the other of the process (or both) and who would be willing to offer their services to other heads. This is, of course, an incredibly valuable experience for both parties as the critical friend learns a tremendous amount from spending a few days in another school. In the spirit of all of LAHC services, there is no fee charged - the only costs are those of travel and accommodation - making this tremendous value for money.

"For me, the appraisal process was a welcome and useful exercise. I believe very strongly that someone with overall responsibility for so many lives and livelihoods should be much more accountable than the average international school head is, and that the appraisal process could not only provide schools with important feedback but also strengthen Heads' positions against the sort of arbitrary, unfounded and precipitated decisions taken all too often by over-zealous, uninformed, highly politicised school boards. I cannot recommend the process too strongly".

School visits can take a variety of forms, but the guiding principal is that of using the enormous expertise within the universe of LAHC schools to transfer knowledge and experience from one school to another in a focussed, mutually beneficial and cost effective way. These are examples of high leverage actions through which a significant impact is achieved for a relatively small effort (and cost).

One example of a school visit is when a school with a department that is struggling or in need of help invites a successful and experienced teacher from another school to come and work with the department (typically for a week) and provide advice, support and possibly training. As with other LAHC services there is no fee charged, the only costs being travel and accommodation. The visiting teacher gets the opportunity to see another school and learn from what they see there, and also of course to visit the country and do some sightseeing. Compared to the cost of sending the whole department on a training course, which may not completely address their specific needs, this is extremely cost effective and completely relevant, which makes it extraordinary value for money.

"My week ... was incredibly rewarding. Not only did I have the opportunity to be a fly on the wall in another school, I gained a valuable insight in to how other music departments approach and resolve the same problems, I brought back many ideas to share with my department and colleagues and have made a commitment to continue sharing ideas and resources"

Another alternative is to send a teacher on a fact finding mission in which they visit a number of schools over a period of several days to pick up ideas and find out how other schools are addressing the issues which they are concerned about. Often this can be combined with attending a conference or training workshop to maximise the cost-benefit.

There are obviously many variations on the theme, such as bringing a teacher to work with a group of schools, or bringing more than one teacher and organising a conference at the beginning or end of the visit with costs being offset by inviting local schools. All of these ideas have been put into practice in the past in different contexts and there is no doubt about the benefits that have been gained. It is really just up to individual members to identify the opportunities and use the network to full advantage.

In one case a senior manager from one school "shadowed" the head of another. The host head commented afterwards "he claims that it was a very worthwhile experience for him - I KNOW it was a very interesting week to me".

In terms of the service provided by LAHC, the proposal is that every member school will receive a visit every year from either the Executive Officer or the Regional Representative in which needs and opportunities will be discussed and analysed with a view to establishing the sorts of links described above. Obviously links can, and have been set up without going through the LAHC machinery and this is the goal to which we should be working but in order to get the ball rolling the service of facilitation will be vital.

The training of reviewers, and more recently of review leaders, has been a major activity of LAHC since its foundation. Although the primary objective of such training is to prepare people to take part in reviews, it has been recognised on many occasions that the training itself is enormously valuable professional development for a ridiculously low cost.

Members of staff who have been through the training will look at their own and their colleagues' work in a different light and will be well placed to contribute effectively to internal evaluation and appraisal procedures. So even if they do not take part in a review straight away, the training will have an immediate impact on their own school. Of course if they do take part on a review then the impact will be even greater because the learning experience of spending a week in another school looking critically at every detail of its operation is the best professional development available - and it's free!

As mentioned in the section on School Visits, the intention is to make sure that every school in the LAHC receives a visit once a year from either the Executive Officer or the Regional Representative during which time is set aside to discuss the school's and the head's needs and the services that LAHC can offer to support those needs. Obviously it is up to each head to decide which services to make use of but it is hoped that these visits will help members to appreciate the full range of services on offer and encourage them to take full advantage of these opportunities.