Ofsted’s paper, Retaining the current grading system in education: some arguments and evidence, acknowledges but is largely dismissive about the level of professional dissatisfaction with grading, and prefers instead to stress levels of parental satisfaction with Ofsted inspection as a whole.
It acknowledges that grading has been “the subject of a lot of debate” but does not add the adjectives “passionate” or “fierce” to characterise it. It states, but does not argue, that the “consequences of being awarded each grade (particularly 1 or 4) can be significant” rather than saying that they “are very significant”. It distances itself from, and fails to take seriously enough, the threats that four-point grading is posing to both professional morale and to Ofsted’s own credibility and long-term survival.
It purports to be hearing the arguments for and against grading - maintaining that “on balance, the arguments for change do not yet counterbalance the arguments for keeping the current system”. It may be hearing, but is it listening?
I will not rehearse the arguments here; Tes has done much to publicise these.
Ofsted argues for the importance of parents having “clear information” about schools but is a one-word descriptor of overall quality “clear”? In what meaningful sense? It wants parents to have a “useful headline indicator of provider quality” but is that descriptor “useful” in any meaningful sense?
What use is a single Ofsted grade?
The paper makes the astonishing admission that “while we have never directly asked about the four-point grading system in our research” (why not, for goodness’ sake?), “we have a range of evidence on the high degree of public trust in Ofsted’s work”. But that evidence is at best tangential to the grading issue and at worst irrelevant to it.
After referring to “a clear relationship between Progress 8 scores and inspection grades”, it has the effrontery to suggest that “this gives our grading some face validity” - as if inspectors don’t use those scores as a - or even the - major basis for making those very grading judgements.
It argues, without any evidence, that the four point-grading represents “the best practice model” without offering any evidence other than that it is also used by two other government regulators.
There is, however, at least one other way of reporting quality without resorting to one-word, slogan-like descriptors, but Ofsted does not even consider it. This is to use brief, pithy, bespoke descriptors to capture the quality of a school.
Take this as an example from an HMI report of the past:
“Through effective leadership, a common philosophy and approach inform the work of children in each age group. Particular emphasis is attached to children’s social and personal development, which is of the highest quality. Due regard is paid to academic standards. The sense of shared endeavour and zest for learning nurtured by the school make it a learning community of unusual quality.”
Isn’t that clearer, more useful and more meaningful than the word “outstanding”? Couldn’t such appraisals be used at the beginning of every inspection report and used in any summaries to the press? If Ofsted ever gets round to allowing research and consultation with parents about a possible grading system, the latter might well prefer it to the current one. I also think that most schools are likely to be supportive of an approach that does not summarise their efforts as a single number or grade.
Who knows? Such research, independently conducted, might change what Ofsted currently considers the “balance” of the argument. Might.
Colin Richards is a former senior HMI
