Independent ISI vs Ofsted

[papaandmama]

So three private schools in my area have had recent ISI inspections and all of of them have had Excellent in every area. Is this standard? Is it a case of ‘grade inflation’ where they know it’s not in their interest to bring down independent schools or does ISI get tough and criticise schools when necessary?
(It got me thinking because one of the schools that is supposedly ‘excellent’ doesn’t seem that great…)

It’s very very different.
IME of teaching both state and independent, ISI are happy with people talking the talk whereas Ofsted scrutinise cold hard numbers and want evidence in abundance.
If Ofsted visited the ‘Excellent’ independent school that I currently work at, they’d fail.

It is not the same as pp said. They are not comparable.

Having said that, yes they do fail schools. I can think of a couple of secondaries locally to me where that has happened. But they won’t be advertising it! No link to the report on the website, not mentioned in advertising.

You will hear about it from both the outstanding (in state) and excellent (in private) schools because it is a marketing tactic.

ISI are allowed to comment on things which Ofsted don't as well though I think - when I was at school they wrote that the school needed to rebuild the library!

They actual do some of the things which people complain about Ofsted not doing - so come back soon after problems and allow schools to fix them, rather than just slapping on a number. So if you look at Westminster School https://www.isi.net/school/westminster-school-7236

You can see they had a short visit in 2021 where ISI found a number of problems, so they came back in 2022 and the school had made improvements to meet the standards.

If ISI just gave excellent to all schools they would be pulled up on it. They are monitored by Ofsted. Otherwise all Indy schools would opt to be inspected by ISI and not Ofsted wouldn't they?

There’s a school near us which ISI inspected recently. Among other things they went through all their paperwork with a fine tooth comb and found lots of things that hadn’t been done A1 properly. Just the sort of stuff Ofsted pulls schools up on. And with ISI, if records aren’t kept properly it’s an automatic fail on leadership and management.

Interesting! Maybe these three schools really are ‘excellent’ then! Just seemed a coincidence they all did so well.

@papaandmama
The reports can differ. The outcomes are often less severe with isi. They also consider what a school intends to do. Not just what it is doing right now.

Ofsted get loads of info in advance. Sats data, progress data, value added, subject progress data and outcomes, absenteeism, PP and fsm data. finance data, staff data - loads of it! ISI gets next to nothing. You cannot go on a government website and interrogate exam results and fsm data (eg) like you can for a state school. Therefore isi tolerate “work in progress” on such things as curriculum development and progress data accuracy, ofsted are less likely to.

Any schools that is RI or Inadequate gets a follow up visit from ofsted. Poor safeguarding is an automatic fail from ofsted.

ISI are far more descriptive but less enquiring. Yes, there is oversight by ofsted and some alignment but most people think it’s light touch! Few private schools opt for ofsted: for very good reason. The boarding element has to be ofsted - if applicable.

Not all schools receive excellent. One of the local preps were criticised for not stretching the most able and a different local prep was failed for not following proper background checks before formally hiring teachers which is a safe guarding issue.

I'm not sure 'excellent' is the equivalent of outstanding for Ofsted but ISI is not just a rubber stamp.

@MomFromSE Failing safeguarding is an automatic Inadequate from Ofsted. As the recent widely publicized case near Reading demonstrated. So at least that seems identical!!

I do think isi tolerate a lot more “the school is working on it” or “plans are being made to”. Ofsted are far less generous. Either it’s something that is done to the required standard, or it’s not. They can judge if the school has capacity to improve but isi take that as a given. If they have plans, it’s ok.

Failing to stretch the most able means the school’s assessment policy and review of DC progress is crap. Also therefore their ability to plan lessons and teach based on sound knowledge of attainment and progress. For a prep not to stretch the most able must have concerned parents who were, presumably, expecting that aspect of teaching to be foolproof at a prep! Not sure if isi publish stats on Inadequate ratings.

@TizerorFizz yes I agree.

I've noticed that ISI also review progress and attainment data and will note of pupils are making above expected progress (i.e. positive value add). They don't provide the fine details like you get for state schools though which is annoying.

I think if you have an ISI school related excellent, then the basics are definitely all being carried out adequately and then read the detail of the report to get a sense of the rest.

Thanks for your replies. I’m not looking at these schools for my kids, they’re at state secondary school now but the local paper has published each of the prep’s reports recently (maybe paid advertising/marketing actually) which is what made my ask.

“As of 28 April 2023, failings were found at these independent schools during recent inspections.
The Department for Education has asked these schools to submit an action plan to address the standards which they are failing. These are set out in the annex to each school’s warning notice.”

It’s here: you’d need to look up each school’s report to find out whether it was an Ofsted or ISI inspection but they can’t all be Ofsted or it would say so.

Total amateur here - but my reading of the ISI reports is that the grading goes like this: Excellent, Outstanding, Absolutely Amazing, Intergalactic Awesomeness. And you have to read the words that are written and between the lines a lot…..

@WimpoleHat isi mostly only fail them for safeguarding. I agree that their reports don’t fully flesh out the issues. Partly because some of their indie ties didn’t run great schools themselves. Years ago the isi report on our school quoted the school’s development plan verbatim! Little analysts of lack of sn assessment policy. Just a glib comment that they were working on it. Ofsted would have probably failed SLT on that.

In my opinion isi are strict with health and safety and safeguarding. Regular checks and very thorough. The teaching and learning part is much easier (I was observed twice in one day, didn't think I did that great but it was fine 🤷‍♀️). It's much easier to demonstrate excellence in a private school by showing off all the pupils work, trips, clubs etc. The isi inspectors also seemed more supportive, looking for the positives whereas Ofsted are more negative, looking for places to fail you.

DD was at an independent prep when it was inspected. I know a good number of parents who said in feedback they got no information about progress. ISI acknowledged in the report parents had raised this as a concern but had been presented with evidence by the school to the contrary. What that evidence was the school couldn’t tell me. I never did get the progress information and pulled DD from the school that had managed to get a top grade in its ISI inspection. It felt like a complete sham.

ISI will say "
oh this is wrong" or "
we haven't seen evidence of this "
during the inspection and allow the school to put it right / show evidence. Not sure this is the same for Ofsted.

I saw this post and I realise it’s older but I can’t help commenting.
recent ISI inspections of a school were woeful. They gave full praise to the leadership and safeguarding just prior to the heads suspension and independant safeguarding inspection. Unbelievable and they have zero accountability. They aren’t like ofsted. The ISI were informed of all areas of concern by parents during inspection

As others have said above, ISI's theme music is "everything is awesome".
They conduct soft, cosy, superficial inspections which start with the assumption that everything is excellent and try not to find anything that would contradict that.
I've known schools with inadequate, amoral leadership which were run as personal fiefdoms and piggybanks for the SLTs and where the school's own policies on everything from discipline to SEN and G&T provision were blithely ignored and anyone who rocked the boat was off-rolled, yet ISI concluded that everything was excellent across the board.
ISI will only say things are not excellent if the failings are so serious that they fear the blowback will reach the ISI itself.

Interestingly since I posted this thread which I’d completely forgotten about, another local independent (Leehurst Swan) has failed inspection on two different things. So they’re not all excellent after all!

@papaandmama You would have to be practically a third world school
to fail isi.

It’s a recruitment issue. Failure to get medical records and references for new staff - so a bit like Caversham. It says staff and governors undertake safeguarding training (tick) but it seems don’t apply it. So a slt fail.

@TizerorFizz what do you mean? This school isn’t a third world school but I’m not sure what you mean by that.

@papaandmama It’s irony! You would have to be SO poor to fail isi! Obviously I know it’s in the uk. It was meant to be a joke,

Well said

the ISI were provided with numerous examples of ‘standard failures’ in an October 2023 inspection and yet ‘endorsed’ information provided by the school. Funny that - inspectors siding with the very people complained about. Woeful