\n<\/p>\n
Proposals for overhauled school inspections have been criticised as cosmetic, vague and potentially out of date by school leaders and Department for Education (DfE) officials, just days before approval by Ofsted\u2019s management.<\/p>\n
Ofsted, the schools inspectorate, has made changes to its new school inspection toolkit \u2013 how it will carry out inspections \u2013 after earlier criticisms. It plans on renaming grades and shrinking the number of evaluations areas from nine to seven, in the latest draft seen by the Guardian, but appears unlikely to win over sceptical teachers in England.<\/p>\n
The new system is part of efforts to implement the government\u2019s manifesto pledge to replace inspection reports with a \u201creport card\u201d format and do away with single summary grades such as \u201cinadequate\u201d that have become controversial since the death of Ruth Perry in 2023.<\/p>\n
But Ofsted\u2019s struggle to reform its inspection framework is turning into a headache for Bridget Phillipson, the education secretary, who is also juggling a curriculum review and an overhaul of special needs education in England that are all scheduled to be published in autumn.<\/p>\n
The draft proposals, to be approved by Ofsted\u2019s executive on Wednesday, has ditched controversial plans for a \u201csecure\u201d grade and instead renamed it \u201cexpected standard\u201d, after complaints that the original term was confusing.<\/p>\n
The top grade, previously proposed as \u201cexemplary\u201d, has been replaced by \u201cexceptional\u201d, the \u201cstrong\u201d grade amended to \u201cstrong standard\u201d, while the lowest \u201ccausing concern\u201d grade is changed to \u201curgent improvement\u201d.<\/p>\n
There are also plans to cut the number of evaluation areas from nine to seven, by combining the teaching and curriculum areas into one, and merging the attendance and behaviour areas. It also revises the report card\u2019s \u201ctraffic light\u201d colour codes for grades, with the top exceptional grade to be blue instead of dark green.<\/p>\n
But the changes have been criticised as \u201ccosmetic\u201d by school leaders and are unlikely to settle the fears of teaching unions and multi-academy trusts, with one describing the proposals as \u201ca pick-and-mix of statutory rules taken from random documents and turned into an inspection framework\u201d.<\/p>\n
Those who have seen the revisions say it is studded with ill-defined language asking inspectors to evaluate categories such as leadership or assessment as \u201cbroadly,\u201d \u201ctypically\u201d or \u201con the whole\u201d in line with national performance.<\/p>\n
\u201cSome of the things that have made it in, you\u2019re thinking, how do you inspect that? There\u2019s a whole lot of vague language. I don\u2019t think they are going to implement it,\u201d one school leader said.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of schools are going to end up in the middle bracket [of grades] because Ofsted won\u2019t be able to argue against it. It\u2019s a mess, it lacks precision, and there\u2019s too much overlap between different categories.\u201d<\/p>\n
DfE officials have raised concerns that the proposals fail to take account of the government\u2019s plans to have mainstream schools open more units for children with special educational needs and disabilities (Send), as part of the overhaul of special needs provision in England to be announced in autumn, around the same time as the new inspection framework is being introduced.<\/p>\n
Feedback by DfE officials seen by the Guardian describes \u201cfuture-proofing and sequencing concerns\u201d about the toolkit, including that the expectations around pupils with Send \u201cmay become out of date\u201d.<\/p>\n
The DfE feedback also suggests schools may be put off enrolling pupils with special needs because of Ofsted\u2019s requirement that schools must achieve \u201cabove average outcomes\u201d in Sats or GCSEs to be awarded high inspection grades.<\/p>\n
A spokesperson for Ofsted declined to respond directly to the criticisms but noted: \u201cOur proposals, including the toolkits, will be formally finalised when we publish our response to the consultation in early September and not before.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t recognise the \u2018DfE criticism\u2019 assertion \u2013 we are not out of step with government proposals. We have already made clear in recent press releases that we\u2019re revising the toolkits to tighten language, in response to feedback \u2013 we are confident this will be recognised in September.\u201d<\/p>\n
A DfE spokesperson said: \u201cOur Send reforms will make sure there is more early intervention in mainstream schools, and we are working closely with Ofsted to ensure their education inspection framework enables this.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are laying the groundwork to ensure all children have access to the help they need, from more early support in mainstream schools across ADHD, autism and speech and language needs, through to \u00a3740m investment to encourage councils to create more specialist places in mainstream schools.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ofsted\u2019s full proposals are due to be implemented from November. However, the Association of School and College Leaders and the National Association of Head Teachers have said that timetable is \u201centirely unacceptable\u201d, adding: \u201cIt will significantly add to workload pressures, negatively affect leaders\u2019 and teachers\u2019 wellbeing and mental health, and further undermine trust in the proposed framework.\u201d<\/p>\n
Relations between Ofsted and the teaching profession have been deeply strained since a coroner\u2019s finding that Perry\u2019s death was \u201ccontributed to by an Ofsted inspection\u201d. Perry\u2019s sister, Julia Waters, has described Ofsted\u2019s proposed changes to inspections as \u201ca rehash of a deeply flawed system\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Proposals for overhauled school inspections have been criticised as cosmetic, vague and potentially out of date by school leaders and Department for Education (DfE) officials, just days before approval by Ofsted\u2019s management. Ofsted, the schools inspectorate, has made changes to its new school inspection toolkit \u2013 how it will carry out inspections \u2013 after earlier<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13911,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[285,320,4422,2660,7573,7574,7575],"class_list":{"0":"post-13910","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-politics","8":"tag-date","9":"tag-experts","10":"tag-inspection","11":"tag-ofsted","12":"tag-ofsteds","13":"tag-proposals","14":"tag-vague"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13910","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13910"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13910\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13911"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13910"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13910"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13910"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}