Further memorandum submitted by the National
Union of Teachers (NUT)
1. This submission from the National Union
of Teachers (NUT) focuses on the future direction of Ofsted school
inspections, the evaluation of major national education initiatives
and the inspection of early years provision.
THE FUTURE
DIRECTION OF
OFSTED SCHOOL
INSPECTIONS
2. The DCSF Children's Plan announced that
the Ofsted school inspection framework would be revised for 2009.
It suggested a number of areas in which changes to the current
framework were needed, including recognition of schools' performance
in children's personal development; the introduction of indicators
for all the Every Child Matters outcomes at school level; and
an increased emphasis on inspection according to risk.
3. The NUT has previously drawn the Committee's
attention to the fact that, despite the inclusion of references
to the five Every Child Matters (ECM) outcomes as part of school
evaluation requirements, most inspection criteria refer to "enjoying
and achieving", with arguably more emphasis on the latter
half of that outcome.
4. The inclusion of the ECM indicators highlights
a long standing tension between what Ofsted uses to base its reports
on and what parents and others want to know about schools. Ofsted
through its reliance on performance data to inform judgements
concentrates on what is easily measurable. Fundamental questions,
such as the happiness, well-being and engagement of individual
and groups of pupils within a school are not so easily answered
by "snap shot" or data-led approaches and are more likely
to be accurately determined by on-going monitoring and evaluation,
in particular, that done through schools' self evaluation work.
5. This exemplifies the difficulties of
attempting to marry the inspection schedule with the ECM indicators,
as the two have very different starting points, over-arching philosophies
and purposes. Whilst acknowledging the desire to reflect the ECM
agenda within the Ofsted inspection framework in order to "mainstream"
it, this can only ever be on a superficial level, as the much
broader and less easily measurable concerns of the former cannot
be adequately captured by the "snap shot" and data-driven
approach of the latter.
6. In addition, the inclusion of the ECM
indicators in the inspection evaluation criteria is predicted
on schools' ability to address wider societal issues, such as
the prevailing culture of the neighbourhood and the socio-economic
profile of the community from which the school intake is drawn.
As the 2006 Audit Commission report More than the Sum: Mobilising
the Whole Council and its Partners to Support School Success
notes:
"improving the prospects of the most disadvantaged
pupils in schools is not a matter for schools alone ... The council
as a whole, along with its wider partners, has a key role in helping
to create the infrastructure and conditions which maximise schools'
chances of success. School improvement and renewal are inseparable
issues from neighbourhood improvement and renewal, particularly
in the most disadvantaged areas".
7. Although individual school inspection
reports feed into the evaluation of a local authority's children's
services provision, the contribution made by the local authority
is not a factor when assessing individual schools. The recent
inclusion of community cohesion in the current inspection framework
and the proposed introduction of the ECM indicators would suggest
that this situation needs to be reviewed:
— Does HMCI believe that it is possible
for Ofsted to gather data within individual schools on the five
Every Child Matters outcomes indicators, when those outcomes are
equally dependent on what happens outside school, in pupils' homes
and local communities?
— Does HMCI agree that the contribution
of the local authority's children's services should be taken into
account in the evaluation of schools' performance in terms of
community cohesion and the Every Child Matters indicators?
— Would HMCI confirm whether failure
to achieve the ECM indicators of being healthy, staying safe and
economic well-being could lead to schools being liable to be placed
in a category of concern?
8. Whilst the inclusion of the ECM indicators
is welcome, it does not get to the heart of the problem with the
Ofsted inspection system. The priority areas for inspection reform
noted in the Children's Plan are, with the exception of increased
proportionality, concerned with the content of the inspection
framework rather than with the process of inspection. It is now
widely accepted, however, that the greatest flaw in the current
statutory inspection arrangements is structural in nature. It
is a system based entirely on securing accountability accompanied
by punitive measures for those schools which have been found to
fail. Teachers are uninvolved in and alienated from the process
of quality assurance and evaluation. The arrangements have failed
to channel teachers' expertise, experience and their commitment
to the evaluative process.
9. There is a lack of balance between internal
and external school evaluation in its use. This failure to achieve
balance has led teachers to view evaluation as a regular event
external to the life of the school. Teachers view section 5 inspections
as a process to be planned for and lived through but essentially
destabilising to the normal rhythms of life and certainly not
to be embraced as integral to the continuing and effective existence
of the school as a community.
10. There does not yet exist in England
a system which brings internal and external school evaluation
together in a coherent and systematic way, drawing on the strengths
of both and integrating evaluation into systems for supporting
teaching and learning. Yet developments in other countries, including
Australia, Canada, Finland, Hong Kong, New Zealand and Scotland,
have shown that it is possible to move towards such a coherent
system.
11. Teachers' judgements need to be at the
centre of evaluation. The evidence from those countries which
have adopted "bottom up" self evaluation is that such
approaches have contributed to high levels of achievement for
the vast majority of young people. Where teachers "own"
evaluation, standards go up, not down.
— Does HMCI intend to study the school
evaluation arrangements of other countries which are recognised
as effective in order to inform the 2009 review in England?
— Would HMCI comment on the involvement
of teachers in the inspection process and identify the ways in
which they are able to engage with inspection currently? Would
HMCI agree that such engagement is a vital aspect of school improvement,
both for individual institutions and for the education service
nationally?
THE EVALUATION
OF MAJOR
NATIONAL EDUCATION
INITIATIVES
12. The NUT has drawn the Committee's attention
previously to the fact that Ofsted will not be undertaking an
evaluation of some of the Government's most significant initiatives
in recent years, School Improvement Partners (SIPs), Building
Schools for the Future (BSF), the Making Good Progress pilot and
the Academies programme. The Government has instead commissioned
evaluations from two private sector companies, York Consulting
and PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PwC), to undertake this work and has
stated that this will be sufficient for its monitoring purposes.
It is notable that PwC has responsibility for the evaluation of
all of these initiatives with the exception of SIPs.
13. As the Committee knows, the Academies
programme has become highly controversial and politicised. Claims
have been made consistently that Academy status of itself raises
standards. This claim needs examining. The Government has already
announced, in the Children's Plan, that the progression or single
level tests which form the centrepiece of the Making Good Progress
pilot programme will be rolled out nationally as soon as possible.
This represents a fundamental change to National Curriculum assessment
which has concerned many teachers, who fear it could lead to more
frequent testing of pupils and more "teaching to the test".
SIPs have a pivotal role in the implementation of Part 4 of the
Education and Inspections Act 2006, relating to schools causing
concern and have a significant impact on the extent to which local
authority powers of intervention are able to be used. It would
be reasonable to expect that independent scrutiny by Ofsted, drawing
on its published inspection reports and other monitoring activities,
would provide invaluable information about the impact of all of
these initiatives.
— Could HMCI explain why Ofsted is
not conducting thematic reviews of three key Government initiatives;
the Academies programme, the Making Good Progress pilot and the
School Improvement Partners initiative?
— Does HMCI believe the PricewaterhouseCoopers
evaluation of the Academies programme and the Making Good Progress
pilot and York Consulting's evaluation of the SIPs initiative
will be as rigorous as evaluations conducted by Ofsted?
14. The NUT has learnt that Ofsted has agreed
a Protocol with the DCSF on academies, which includes the provision
of advice by Ofsted on the establishment of individual academies
and on academies policy more generally, via a programme of regular
meetings with the DCSF "Academies Group". The Protocol
also says that the first inspection of an academy should be "helpful
in promoting the academy's progress" and that the Academies
Group could suggest that an inspection or monitoring visit was
needed, or not needed, at any particular time. The Protocol was
only made available when a member of the public made enquiries
under the Freedom of Information Act.
15. All inspections of academies to date
have been led by HMI and involved a small group of other HMI.
The Protocol says that this is because of "the new and different
nature of academies" and "the need to ensure that a
consistent approach is adopted". In addition, the lead HMI
who have conducted the most academy inspections have also attended
the DCSF Academies Group termly meetings, including discussion
of individual academies with the DCSF lead advisor on academies.
— Would HMCI explain how, given the
close involvement of Ofsted in the development of individual academies
and national policy on academies, it can claim to inspect "without
fear or favour?"
— Would HMCI agree that, by participating
fully in the DCSF Academies Group, Ofsted has overstepped its
remit? How does HMCI reconcile the active involvement of Ofsted
in shaping the Government's policy on academies with the statement
currently posted on the Ofsted website "We do not report
to government ministers but directly to Parliament. This independence
means you can rely on us for impartial information?"
— Can HMCI clarify the ways in which
the inspection of academies differs from the inspection of maintained
schools? Can she confirm, for example, that Ofsted plays a more
overtly supportive and developmental role for academies compared
to other schools subject to Section 5 inspection?
— Consistency between and within inspection
teams has been an on-going concern for schools and an issue which
the NUT has highlighted consistently in its submissions to the
Committee. Would HMCI explain why consistency is considered to
be so important for academies that a dedicated inspection team
has been established? What measures to address consistency for
other schools which are subject to Section 5 inspection have been
put in place?
THE INSPECTION
OF EARLY
YEARS PROVISION
16. Revised inspection arrangements for
early years provision are due to be implemented in September 2008,
to coincide with the introduction of the new Early Years Foundation
Stage. According to Ofsted, the new arrangements seek to bring
consistency to early years inspection across all types of provider.
Maintained nursery schools and classes will still, however, be
subject to the more rigorous requirements of the Section 5 inspection
framework.
17. The recent BBC "Whistleblower"
programme highlighted a number of concerns about Ofsted's inspection
of early years settings, in particular, breeches of staffing ratios,
including levels of qualification, and CRB check requirements.
It also claimed that one of the nurseries featured in the programme
should have been closed following a critical inspection but that
this decision was reversed, apparently due to Ofsted's concerns
about the implications for the MP Michael Fallon, who was the
managing director of the nursery at the time of the inspection.
18. The Ofsted inspector "whistleblower"
who had prompted the making of the programme said that inspection
standards were so low that she would only send her own children
to five settings which she believed were of genuinely high quality.
In the programme she said "I genuinely don't believe that
the Ofsted inspection reports are worth the paper that they're
printed on".
19. The programme revealed the inadequacies
of the early years inspection system. Ofsted can only base its
judgements on what it sees on the day of inspection. If inspectors
are limited in the amount of time they can spend at each setting
because of the pressures of work, there would be little opportunity
for them to look for problems which were not immediately obvious.
This would suggest that there is scope for involving local authority
early years advisors, who know settings well and are aware of
problems and concerns about issues such as staffing because of
their regular dealings with settings.
— Would HMCI agree that, despite revisions
to early years inspection arrangements, maintained nursery schools
and classes still experience more robust and demanding inspections
than those in other sectors? Does HMCI believe that Ofsted publicises
these different arrangements adequately to parents, who it encourages
to use its reports to make decisions about early education and
childcare providers?
— Does HMCI agree that inspectors do
not have sufficient time to investigate the quality of early years
provision fully? Would HMCI confirm that a priority for inspectors,
when the new Early Years Foundation Stage is introduced, should
be to assess how far its statutory welfare requirements, including
staffing arrangements, are met?
— How does HMCI respond to the concerns
raised in the "Whistleblower" programme? Why does HMCI
think that an Ofsted inspector felt unable to voice such concerns
to her own organisation?
— Would HMCI agree that the rapid expansion
of early years provision has led to a shortage of well qualified
and experienced staff and a business approach to childcare, in
which the focus is on profit rather than quality?
April 2008
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