Single school inspections should be scrapped and replaced with trust-level inspections, former Ofsted chief inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw has told Tes.
Sir Michael, speaking ahead of Ofsted announcing findings from its Big Listen consultation on the future of school inspection, believes the current inspection system is no longer fit for purpose and is in need of radical reform - including, as he told Tes last year, the scrapping of single-word judgements.
“The overall effectiveness judgement, which tries to capture the different strengths and weaknesses of a school in a single word or phrase, is causing endless controversy and a loss of confidence in the inspection system,” he said.
Inconsistent Ofsted judgements
He said: “The headteacher associations, and certainly individual heads I speak to, believe that insecurity and inconsistency of judgement by inspectors is causing too much upset and confusion in our schools.
“There is also widespread concern that those charged with making the one-word judgement may not have the necessary experience of inspection or school leadership required to make these crucial, and sometimes career-ending, calls.”
Sir Michael said he has sympathy for the inspectors, though, as he believes they have to make a subjective final judgement without recourse to the wealth of data that exists on historical school and pupil performance, and on a fairly narrow curriculum-based inspection framework.
“No wonder there is a tendency on the part of some inspectors, faced with conflicting pieces of evidence, to go into default mode and err on the side of generosity in awarding their overall effectiveness grades,” he added.
Ofsted ratings of ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’
He believes the statistic oft-quoted by the last government that nearly 90 per cent of schools are judged to be “good” or better is inaccurate.
Sir Michael said this cannot be true when regional inequalities are so great, when the attainment gap is wider than ever and poor children are falling further behind their peers; when attendance and behaviour are such big issues and when so many pupils are being taught by supply teachers because of the teacher recruitment crisis.
“Not that I’m arguing for more schools to be put in an underperforming or failing category - that would only lead to greater despondency and further problems around the recruitment and retention of staff,” he added.
When Sir Michael was chief inspector, Ofsted replaced the satisfactory judgement with “requires improvement”. But he warns the current system is not helping school improvement.
“If 90 per cent of schools are judged ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’, as a head of one of those schools, I can sit back and relax for five years and not address the key weaknesses obscured by that single-word judgement. I can see many parents saying when they read the one-word judgement: ”Oh! the school is Ofsted ‘good’, so I don’t have to worry; I don’t need to challenge the school on any particular issue.’”
Inspection report cards
Unsurprisingly, he would back Labour’s plan to replace single-word inspection grades with a report card but with one stipulation.
“The plans for the report card seem sensible, but should be designed in such a way that not only provides comprehensive information to parents but also clearly highlights those schools where intervention is required.”
He said it’s not just single-phrase judgements causing problems, though. He believes the current framework with its emphasis on the curriculum needs better balance, with much more said on the quality of teaching and the progress and outcomes of pupils.
“Any curriculum is only as good as the quality of its delivery in the classroom and the workshop,” he added.
Trust-level inspection
Whatever framework is in place, however, Sir Michael does not see inspection of every school in the system individually as viable in future.
He said that we will never be able to get the quality of inspection we need to inspect every school as the cost would be more than the government would be willing to spend, and it’s doubtful whether the system can provide enough quality inspectors at that scale.
Instead, he feels that when the system is fully organised into trusts, we should inspect the trusts alone and do so in a very particular way.
He said: “If I was [education secretary] Bridget Phillipson, I’d abandon this idea of every school in the country being inspected and go to inspecting trusts on a regular basis.
“It should be the responsibility of the trust to publish a report annually to parents on the academic, pastoral and safeguarding performance of their constituent schools.
“Ofsted should then check the veracity and validity of these reports using a template agreed between the Department for Education, the inspectorate and trust representatives.”
Trust accountability
He said he argued for trust-level inspection when he was leading Ofsted but could not get the plan over the line. As such, he feels trust-level inspection is well overdue.
The government’s King’s Speech earlier this year included plans to bring multi-academy trusts into Ofsted inspection. Until now, Ofsted has not had the power to directly inspect trusts.
“We now have all these trusts up and down the country with chief executives being paid a lot of money without commensurate accountability,” he said.
“There has been an explosion in the number of trusts but we don’t know nearly enough about what is happening inside each of them. We are at risk of undoing all the positive work of the recent reforms by not getting on top of trust accountability.”
Does Sir Michael have any other words of advice for current Ofsted chief Sir Martyn Oliver as he makes ready his plans on the back of the Big Listen?
“It is tempting to say nice things to get cosy with government. Remember that you are independent of government and are accountable to Parliament for national standards in the education and care system,” Sir Michael said.
“Your job is to help improve the lives and outcomes for young people through inspection. That’s it. It won’t necessarily make you popular, or win you friends with government or indeed the sector, but it is what the job requires.”
Ofsted has declined to respond to Sir Michael’s comments.
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