Ofsted has announced a delay to teacher training inspections until January 2026, following a request from education secretary Bridget Phillipson.
The watchdog had been due to make updates to its existing initial teacher education (ITE) framework for inspections for the 2024/2025 academic year.
However, the government has asked for this to be postponed as more major changes are planned - including the introduction of report cards replacing overall grades from September 2025 when a new framework is being introduced.
A consultation on these changes to inspections will take place in January next year.
‘All providers’ next inspection under new framework’
Ofsted said today that the postponement will ensure that “all ITE providers in the next cycle are inspected under the same Ofsted framework”.
It also added that as the majority of ITE inspections take place in the spring and summer terms, most inspection activity is expected to restart from January 2026.
However, re-inspections of providers whose ITE programmes are rated as less than “good” will continue. Early Career Framework (ECF) and national professional qualification (NPQ) inspections will also go ahead as normal.
Ofsted’s chief inspector, Sir Martyn Oliver, said: “I’m very grateful to everyone working in initial teacher education for their response to our ‘Big Listen’. Postponing the inspection cycle means ITE providers will have their next inspection under the new framework.”
Pause ‘to allow new framework to be tested’
Emma Hollis, the chief executive of the National Association of School-Based Teacher Trainers has welcomed the announcement, which has coincided with the organisation’s conference this week.
She said: “On behalf of our members, we have been advocating for a pause in Ofsted inspections until January 2026, to allow the new framework to be thoroughly tested within the sector as it develops.
“For most providers, this means there will be no ITE inspections until then and so having shared their, and our, concerns with Ofsted, we are delighted this feedback has been listened to and responded to accordingly.”
In Ofsted’s Big Listen consultation response, published in September, it said that overall effectiveness grades for ITE and ECF inspections would be replaced with report cards - and that these would focus on a broader range of assessment criteria “setting out more clearly what providers’ strengths are and where they can improve.”
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