For the past couple of months, Ofsted has been teasing out its proposals for a new inspection framework to be introduced next autumn.

First came the emphasis on the curriculum, and a focus on what’s planned, taught, learned and assessed. For many of us, this is welcome but way overdue. The introduction of the national curriculum, coupled with testing and inspection, has for a long time stifled, rather than encouraged, curriculum thinking. The wealth of curriculum theorising and development prior to 1988 was tossed aside.

That extended bout of curriculum amnesia has resulted in certain debates (progressive vs formal education, knowledge vs skills, content vs process) coming to the fore once again.

The chief inspector can take credit for instigating this latest phase in curriculum thinking - it’s far better that these debates are happening than not - but in order to protect this phenomenon, she needs to be very careful in her use of gradings.

The teasing continued with the chief inspector’s latest speech in the North East. Amanda Spielman announced the loss of outcomes as a standalone judgement - potentially a very significant move signalling the weakening of a “hard exit” approach to accountability. If accompanied by a change in mindset by inspectors, this could lift a considerable amount of pressure and stress from schools suffering from both socioeconomic and test-induced disadvantage.

A second major change has been proposed: splitting the current judgement of personal development and welfare into two: one judgement for “behaviour and attitudes” and another for “personal development”. This is a welcome (and politically sensitive) recognition of the importance of non-academic aspects of a school’s provision.

Ofsted is trying to get things right

The most intriguing  - and, to me, problematic - aspect of the recently announced changes is broadening the existing “quality of teaching, learning and assessment” judgement into “a quality of education” judgement which includes the curriculum alongside teaching, learning, assessment and outcomes. The judgement should recognise both the interdependence and connection between all five of these components, but also ensure that no single component outweighs the others in a summative judgement.

That would require a painful adjustment of the priorities many inspectors and schools hold - some appear to be entrapped in an outcomes-obsessed mindset.

While I welcome the re-emergence, after a quarter of a century, of “quality of education” as a theme in school inspection, I do regard it as problematic. Why? Well, naive as it may seem, I see schools as serving one overall purpose, not easy to define but of great significance: to provide good quality education for their learners. The mark of an effective school is to do just that. Its overall effectiveness is to be equated with its ability to provide quality education.

Under the proposed changes, “quality of education” is confined to academic matters such as teaching, curriculum and assessment and separated from wider issues of personal development and behaviour. This could lead to some strange, paradoxical judgments. If the current grading system is retained, a school providing a “good” or even “outstanding” quality of education might be judged as “requiring improvement” overall; similarly, a school with a quality of education that “needs improvement” might be judged “good” overall.

The “quality of education” needs to be rescued from its subordinate status and replace the effectiveness grade as the overarching one. That grade could then be replaced by a less exclusive one, perhaps “the quality of the school’s formal provision” or “academic quality”.

I believe that Ofsted’s consultation on the proposed new framework is a genuine attempt to get things right, or as right as they can be in an imperfect world. Those of us who believe that judging the quality of education is the overriding purpose of school inspection need to take the opportunity to convince Ofsted to enshrine this in a new contextually-sensitive, enabling framework.  

Colin Richards is a former staff inspector for the school curriculum in HM Inspectorate of Schools