Ofsted needs to be abolished (Trigger warning)

[MrsMurphyIWish]

Watched this heartbreaking story today:

www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001k4r9

A headteacher took her own life as her school was rated inadequate. The pressures Ofsted creates are immense. Last week Ofsted were on strike Wednesday so decided to break protocol and rang schools Friday to conduct inspections on Monday - some schools were off for snow but that wasn’t a good enough reasons and even if the messages were picked up, that meant school staff would have worries over the weekend - some even going into school. Then there were schools who complained as these schools were given “extra notice”. Ofsted has created such a toxic work environment.

How has it come to this? A teacher who dedicated their life to education feels that a one word judgement meant life wasn’t worth living?

I'm usually quite resilient but I cried for days following our Ofsted inspection last year even though the headteacher hinted to us all it went well and not to worry. They just make you feel like pure shit. I can only imagine how awful the poor headteacher felt.

Ofsted is not fit for purpose

super sad, 2 of the schools my kids go to /went to had exactly the same happen going from outstanding to inadequate and likewise safeguarding issues raised at both.... so it does destroy a schools reputation and potentially end a heads career. For me, its why on earth did anyone decide pausing inspections of outstanding schools was a good thing, doing well at 1 point isn't a guarantee of future good work. There are a lot of knock-on consequences for the local community and all the current staff/people applying for future vacancies at a school as nobody wants to be called inadequate when you previously had pride in working at an outstanding school.

Agreed. There should be a paperwork inspection to ensure all Ts crossed and Is are dotted but then instead of a label from a face to face inspection just a list of points to improve and points to do well.

I totally agree. Ofsted does more harm than good.

I know of a head who killed themselves in similar circumstances.
OFSTED is a toxic organisation, which seriously distorts educational priorities and drives good teachers away.
Scrap it and start again. I dread to think what it costs; but lots of tax payers money is spent on pointless bullying of people who are working hard and trying their best.

A friend who's support staff had her school rung last Friday for a Monday/ Tuesday inspection. She said the teachers were in school for 10 hours on Saturday to get things ready!! Plus more time on the Sunday making books and planning lessons.

Support staff were told they could go in if they wanted but there was no money for overtime. My friend didn't go in. But she felt a bit guilty. Imagine feeling guilty because you don't want to go to work for free!

The whole thing just sounds ridiculous. I have no knowledge of how public sector are observed and judged. Does a GP have inspectors observing them in a patient appointment? Do police officers have someone following them around for an hour in order to make a judgement about the police station? I know teachers have this, but do other people?

My school was wrecked with an inspection, with a new head who ran it like a business with a lot of fuss about uniforms. The inspirational teachers left and the average grades went up overall, but at a cost for the brighter students who were essentially used as classroom assistants and pulled down.

...and then they wonder why nobody wants to go into teaching! A relative currently finishing a primary ed degree told me that 2/3 or her cohort do not want yo go into teaching at least straightaway.

This is an utterly heartbreaking story, and it is not an isolated incident. Many more headteachers have suffered nervous breakdowns as a result of Ofsted inspections, but they don’t make the news.

Having such a high stakes, unsupportive inspection system with potentially catastrophic outcomes has been the subject of criticism for years, and the government has missed many chances to act.

This has to be the catalyst for change.

In this case looking at the paperwork wouldn’t have changed the outcome. Most of the concerns centred on safeguarding procedures and paperwork which weren’t in place.

In which case the outcome should have been some time and support to improve safeguarding paperwork with a reinspection to follow-up. Not for the school to be badged INADEQUATE and the head publicly humiliated.

Evidence for OFSTED is a significant driver behind increases in workload that don't really make much practical difference to improving what goes in in the classroom.

Schools have turned into a dog eat dog world of political survival trickling from management down. The academies take-over policy rarely solves issues deep down and tends to shunt issues from one school to another in a cycle. The "zero tolerance" mentality that many academies adopt when taking on a new school is harmful to students and staff. Both benefit most from stability, but the politics imposed through the OFSTED system is the antithesis of that.

Schools need to be safe. They need to educate young people and there does need to be an accountability and feedback process, but OFSTED is not it and the stakes are too punitive.

My DD's school lost an innovative and hardworking head to a mental breakdown after Ofsted rated the school inadequate with safeguarding concerns. He had totally transformed the school and I felt - and feel - incredibly sorry for him and all the staff. I was so cross I wrote a complaint to Ofsted and CC'ed the school but just got a generic response back.

Since then, staff turnover has been ridiculous. I can understand why - imagine working your butt off for years to turn a school around, have positive interim inspections, only for someone to come in for 8 hours and tell the world that your school is crap and dangerous for children. Appalling.

Ofsted should be there to support schools and help them improve, not put them under so much pressure that morale collapses and teachers kill themselves.

I'm not against reforming OFSTED but I would not support the return to a lack of scrutiny about what happens in schools and no accountability over year after year of children being failed.

It’s always struck me as unhelpful for schools to have overall ratings. I think it would be better for the reports to just rate the individual areas and not give an overall score. Frankly, if parents can’t be bothered to read the full report to find out how their child’s school is performing, that’s on them.

Though the more I hear about Ofsted inspections, the more I think they just shouldn’t exist full stop. The amount of stress they cause to already overworked school staff is awful. I’m not sure what the answer is but the current system isn't fair on teachers.

I agrée with @Untitledsquatboulder reform may well be what is needed but abolishing an inspection programme will not raise standards.

Certainly the state of some fire authorities was pretty dire when inspection was brought back.

Also agree that maybe an overall rating isn't helpful. Police and fire have 'pillars' where they are assessed against different outcomes such as effectiveness, efficiency and people. Certainly from what I read on here and hear in RL some schools should certainly be marked down on how some SLT and Heads treat the staff.

A basic check of ‘is this school, in the context of its community, providing a decent standard of education and care?’ with a brief of ‘carry on if you are’ and ‘instant access to all necessary support and development if you aren’t’ should be sufficient.

Particularly if the checks were undertaken by experienced education experts who were then responsible for co-ordinating / providing follow up support, not delivering a snap judgement then waltzing away.

I was at school pre-Ofsted and pre-National Curriculum and there was some seriously poor stuff going on. A light touch and supportive oversight regime, where the vast majority ‘pass’ and the few who don’t are then heavily supported, would perhaps avoid the worst extremes of both systems.

Ofsted was the reason a London borough lost a very committed, talented and hardworking primary head when my friend opted to take early retirement.

She said it had got to the point where the LEA cared more about the Ofsted report than anything that actually went on in the school.

It's shit, imo.

I think that there should be some kind of regular inspection/quality check. I went to school in 70s and 80s and the standard of teaching was frankly shocking.
But I agree that it isn't great. I briefly went into teaching in an FE college, from a professional training background. I left within 18 months.

Our school was inspected in March 2020, the week before lockdown, when everyone was really stressed and lots of people were already staying at home. It was downgraded from good to requires improvement, and hasn’t been inspected again since, so has been stuck with that label and become the school that parents avoid locally based on it, even although other schools seem to have more problems.

I don’t think anyone is suggesting that schools shouldn’t have some sort of monitoring regime, particularly as one of the problems in the school in the OP was that it had been allowed to go 13 years without inspection.

It’s the extremely high stakes and unsupportive nature of inspections that is the issue. Because it’s only every 4 years or so that’s also a problem as it distorts everything around it. Yearly light-touch inspections would be less stressful and more useful.

@cantkeepawayforever "in the context of its community" was used for very many years for providing a substandard education for the masses. So no.

Our school was inspected in March 2020, the week before lockdown

Utterly ridiculous. What could they have possibly learned from that, schools were in chaos.

In NI we have been taking part in action short of strike for years, I can't remember how many exactly but it it is six or more years anyway. As part of this we have not been taking part in inspections by ETI (our version of OFSTED), we refuse the inspectors at the door.

We have to take part in safeguarding inspections and the inspectors can only look around the school, receive the safeguarding folder and speak to some P6 pupils.

Funnily enough, grades and attainment have never been better. I have worked under a couple of principals who are ETI inspections and I can honestly say they were the worst schools I taught in, every box was ticked but the schools and and the kids had no warmth or personality.