Opinion: Closing the gap between policy and practice

There's nothing new about online surveys, of course. But Headspace is different for two reasons: it will be a rolling survey, asking for headteachers' views once a term, and will contain some regular questions, allowing changes to head teachers' views to be tracked over time.

For any policy maker this kind of data is like gold dust. The gap between policy making and practice can often feel gargantuan, so the temptation to listen in on an ongoing dialogue with those who are working on the education front line will be considerable.

There are pitfalls with such a survey. The participants, although likely to work in all types of schools from around the UK, will be self-selecting and therefore potentially unrepresentative. Many headteachers will be reluctant to take part because of the time involved (although each survey will purportedly only take half an hour). Others may feel insufficiently IT-literate. Some won't even be aware that they are being invited to take part in a survey, unless they read The Guardian from cover to cover on a regular basis.