Ofsted needs to be abolished - further details

[MrsMurphyIWish]

Have started a new thread as think it’s important this doesn’t just get lost on my previous thread

The Ofsted report for the school where the head teacher died has been published …

They are toxic and need reform immediately.

www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4765105-ofsted-needs-to-be-abolished-trigger-warning?page=1

My friend is a languages teacher- she was observed by an Ofsted inspector who clearly had no knowledge of languages and who questioned the use of punctuation such as ¿Qué hora es? in Spanish.

Surely with deep dives it doesn't work unless inspectors focus on subjects they actually have knowledge of? Otherwise how do they decide whether an answer is legitimate or not?

I know of an infant school who was recently inspected by one inspector-a secondary school assistant head. He knew very little about young children and even less about their curriculum.

I have two acquaintances who are HMIs. One has briefly been a head of department but never been a HT or senior leader. Doesn't seem right on me that he is making judgements which could cost a head their job.

Also my own school has not been inspected for 12 years. If safeguarding is so important, how is this ok?

Yes, the safeguarding argument doesn't really work for me when it's fine to leave schools for 5+ years without an inspection.

You could have a system of regular safeguarding audits, and a separate system for looking at teaching and learning/school improvement and factors around that.

@Postapocalypticcowgirl completely agree. There is a separate system of inspection for the faith aspects of faith schools, I’m sure safeguarding could and should be split out. And HTs helped to administer it. A lot of safeguarding is actually good administration. let trained administrations look after administration.

Successful, constructive auditing is a real skill.

I'm not sure I agree that Alan Derry the Lead Inspector has extensive experience according to his LinkedIn profile.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/alan-derry-a78299168

The other two inspectors named are not even listed on here, updated March 2023, are they trainees?
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/ofsted-pen-portraits-of-her-majestys-inspectors-hmis/ofsted-hmi-pen-portraits

That list only has HMIs on who are employed Ofsted and work for them full time.

The other two inspectors in this case are OIs. This means they are often serving SLT/heads elsewhere who do some work for Ofsted. Lots of HTs do it to get an insight into what is required to help their own schools.

Someone on Twitter made the point that if all of these OIs stopped doing it the system would collapse.

Thanks for the clarification. OIs sound like a good "realistic" perspective but stil requires adequate training.

Yes and many have questioned the fairness of serving heads/slt being complicit and having insider knowledge of what is required.

I'm trying to understand the outcry, but I just don't get it.

You can argue the rest of it being unnecessary (deep dives etc) but Safeguarding is basic.

The school failed on Safeguarding. I can read a report and go well ofsted are making a political point if they are prattling on about whatever, but Safeguarding? A failure on Safeguarding.

Nobody should be arguing that that is ok.

Whilst it is tragic the head took her life, I'm not sure we should be surprised that that is included on the report. It factually happened.

I know a school that has failed on Safeguarding. In fact I should imagine we as a family might have been one of the reasons for the failure. Yes in our case actually we weren't put at risk by the Safeguarding failure but that wasn't any thanks to the Safeguarding paperwork of the school and frankly if the Safeguarding was dependent on the school we would have been stuffed. It could well have been recorded the same as the ofsted report here. Thankfully the head has been removed thanks to a ofsted inspection. Damn good thing too as she had completely ruined the school.

Yes ofsted needs reform. What has happened is tragic and awful for the family of the woman. But the one thing ofsted should be doing is monitoring Safeguarding and no school should fail on that.

No one is arguing that schools shouldn’t be inspected for safeguarding and if you agree that Ofsted should be reformed then you agree with what everyone is saying about it.

I completely agree and I find it scary that this Headteacher who refused an inspection could start a trend of schools having no accountability.

Don’t be daft.

No one is arguing that schools should have no accountability. That people keep bringing up this straw man is just bizarre.

Not about this report I don't.

I think this report sounds fairly balanced.

It sounds like a beautiful school until something goes wrong. Then it sounds like an absolute nightmare.

It's absolutely right that the ofsted report should be reporting on this.

I totally agree.

There is no way on earth I'd want my child attending a school that wouldn't let ofsted in at all.

🤦‍♀️

Do you think it appropriate that inspections are conducted in such a manner that they are actively detrimental to the mental health of the workforce and distort educational practices in entirely unhelpful ways?

That’s what this is about. Not about whether schools should be inspected or whether safeguarding is important.

But ANY audit is stressful. I'm in a different regulated profession and have been audited by our regular and it's always very stressful. I don't see how impromptu audits can be stress-free

Then this report really shouldn't be a rallying cry. Nor should this woman's death.

This report is everything an ofsted report should be. This report still needs to be published. The failures in this school still need to be bought to light.

To put it bluntly Ofsted should not be afraid to publish reports detailing failures in safeguarding in case heads kill themselves.

There is the political point regarding the rest of what ofsted does.

But safeguarding should never be comprised to make political point.

This report is everything an ofsted report should be.

No, it’s not. There is no reason for it to have a single grade on it, It’s light on detail and very muddled. It doesn’t describe steps needed to be taken. Safeguarding is lumped in with other stuff.

And this report was issued after 13 years of no inspections. If you care about safeguarding, that’s pretty concerning.

If you think this report is everything an Ofsted report should be, you have pretty low expectations. It’s a pile of shit.

No-one is suggesting that a school inspection can or should be stress free.

Most of my friend are in professions that require audits or outside independent competency tests. But they are appalled by my accounts of what an OFSTED is like, and don't consider their own inspections/audits to be at all comparable. Stressful, yes, but they're predictable and the goalposts don't change every five minutes. Nor are their results and personal failings announced to the world and specifically to all their clients and colleagues.

Why should a school that can't safeguard its pupils not be graded anything other than inadequate?

It is inadequate.

Why should we not label a school inadequate if it is inadequate.

But yes a do agree ofsted should be visiting far more frequently. I actually think every school should be ofstedded 12-18 months after a change of head.

I think the report has done a good job at highlighting the schools strengths and personally I haven't found it at all muddled. Sometimes I don't think a report has to be highly detailed to do what it needs to do. In fact if I walked into the school today I'd have a pretty good idea of what I'd find. A delightful school were the kids are happy and generally well educated.

They might however have accidentally employed an Ian Huntly or forgotten to put in that safeguarding query or have a couple of SEN kids that they have no clue what to do with....

@Postapocalypticcowgirl Yes, I can see that would be crazy. Cuts then more cuts, especially in smaller schools.

I agree with you @Icedlatteplease . It’s all fine until it isn’t fine, and we can’t say it isn’t fine as it’s too stressful for those concerned - really not a good argument.

But yes things like this are the stuff that does need reform.

But to be fair if I saw anything like this in a report I wouldn’t think much of it anyway