Change Starts With One Person: Celebrating Our Education Heroes

Neil @ Future Action
16 minutes ago
3 min read

Celebrating the people who chose to take action and create a better world for young people

I've spent a lot of this summer pulling together our Future Action 2025/26 Impact Report, reading case studies, revisiting the data and reflecting on another year of partnering with incredible schools and organisations.

There are lots of numbers we're proud of: improvements in wellbeing and attendance, reductions in behaviour incidents, greater engagement and more young people feeling safe, connected and like they belong.

But as I worked through all that evidence, something struck me.

Behind every number is a person.

Almost every story of meaningful change we've documented started with one person looking at what was happening for their young people and thinking:

'We can do better than this.'

And then doing something about it.

Change starts with action

Sometimes it's a teacher noticing that a child needs something different, a PE leader finding a new way to engage someone sitting on the sidelines, or a school leader questioning whether correcting behaviour before creating connection is really working.

It might be someone introducing movement because children are arriving anxious, a Virtual School investing in a different approach for care-experienced young people, or a partner saying, "How can we help more schools access this?"

These decisions rarely feel transformational at the time. But a child responds, a colleague notices, someone else tries it and the idea grows.

We've watched this ripple effect happen repeatedly.

An educator tries something. Their school develops it. We capture the story in a case study.

Another school sees what's possible. A partner gets behind it.

Sometimes funding follows and suddenly an idea that started with one person's decision is reaching young people they may never even meet.

Action creates evidence. Evidence creates belief. Belief gives other people permission to act.

That's how change spreads.

"What you did mattered"

People working in education spend an enormous amount of their professional lives being evaluated through targets, performance management, inspections, data and improvement priorities.

We're very good at identifying what needs to improve. I'm not sure we're always as good at stopping and telling someone:

"What you did mattered."

That's why this summer we created the Future Action Special Commendations 2025/26.

They're not competitive awards and there's no ranking. They're simply our opportunity to recognise some exceptional people we've had the privilege of partnering with this year who saw an opportunity to make things better for young people and took action.

🏆 Future Action Board of Honour 2025/26

Different roles, different organisations and different parts of the country, but every person on that Board has something in common.

They cared enough to act.

Some have transformed practice within their own settings. Others have shared their work so generously that it has inspired change elsewhere. Some have opened doors, championed our work or secured funding that has enabled us to reach more schools and young people.

A huge thank you

To everyone on our Board of Honour, thank you for trusting us, challenging us and taking our ideas and making them better.

Thank you for adapting the work around your children and communities, sharing what worked and what didn't, opening your doors to others and championing Future Action when we're not in the room.

Future Action can provide frameworks, training, resources and support, but you create the impact. You're the people building the relationships, noticing when something isn't right and creating environments where young people can feel safe, move, regulate, connect and belong.

Most importantly, you turn ideas into action.

Maybe you're the person who starts it

If you're reading this and there's something you'd love to change for the young people in your school or organisation, you don't have to transform everything tomorrow.

Start with one thing.

After six years of Future Action and partnering with hundreds of schools, I've become increasingly convinced that change starts with one person making a decision to try and create a better world for young people.

If you're ready to take that first step, we partner with schools and organisations to understand their context, identify where change could have the greatest impact and turn that ambition into practical action.

And who knows? Maybe this time next year, your name will be on our Board of Honour.

READY TO TAKE YOUR FIRST STEP?

👉 JOIN THE RISE UP WAITING LIST HERE