Goodbye one word OfSted judgements .....

[Mischance]

Hooray!
They were always a nonsense and I am glad the new government has taken swift action.

All we need now is proper support for struggling schools ... I will keep hoping ...

Hasn't

Damaging how? Surely that's good for a school?

What needs to happen is for schools to have zero notice of an ofsted inspection. That is where the pressure builds - ofsted are not seeing a proper snapshot, they're seeing a staged production whereby school staff have run theirselves ragged.

There’s hardly any notice now-they phone at lunchtime one day, there is a 90 minute conversation with the head and then they’re onsite by 8am the next day. On our last inspection, the staff were given a timetable after school of what the team wanted to see the following day and the head had to rush about finding cover to release all the teachers the inspector wanted to talk to-deputy, literacy lead, phonics lead, deep dive subjects and senco-all would have been teaching and the inspector didn’t want to see them teach, they wanted to question them. Getting cover for those lessons (whoever does this would still have to teach good lessons as the other inspectors would be doing lesson observations) takes a bit of time and planning. We certainly don’t have spare teachers knocking around, we’d have to find supply teachers who were happy to come in at the last minute into an Ofsted (often that’s the reason that they left teaching in the first place!).

If they just arrived at 8am, they might find the head out on a course and there is no time to arrange cover for all the class teachers the inspectors want to speak to. They wouldn’t find any parking left anywhere my school at that time if they just turned up!

You go and visit. Every school is so different and will suit different children. They mean very little anyway and that’s the point. People go off a word.

That's kinda my point. That pressure in that afternoon/evening is a real cooking pot. Ofsted should be looking at teaching standards and safeguarding processes.

It wouldn’t bother me if they just turned up, but they can’t expect staff to pop along for an interrogation every half an hour as they’ll be teaching.

The amount of time spent in class looking at teaching and learning was minuscule at our last Ofsted. It was all Deep dives and grilling subject leads who generally have no qualifications in the subject and receive no additional pay or time for leading the subject!

The pressure for staff isn’t in the night before though-that’s just a tidy up, it’s the continued pressure in the 18 months before where you are being constantly told to do xyz (that benefit nobody) just in case Ofsted might ask to see it.

This isn't really true. There's barely any time to do anything before they're in. If the school isn't ready then it isn't going to be ready. Teachers can't even mark neglected books because if the kids have the books, there's no chance to get them back.

When DDs school was inspected last year, the Head had to return from a residential trip!

I know of several schools this has happened to-it’s very disruptive even the day before! It would be a nightmare to staff if Ofsted just turned up in the morning! Someone in school would have to swap with the head, someone would then have to be found to cover for them etc. Finding supply teachers prepared to work an Ofsted isn’t easy!

The exemption for outstanding schools was lifted in 2020 - https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/school-inspections-statistical-commentaries-2021-to-2022/a-return-to-inspection-the-story-so-far-of-previously-exempt-outstanding-schools

Yes, I said that earlier.

I don't want to be insensitve, but if someone has underlying mental health issues, a myriad of things could push them over the edge. You leaving a bad restaurant review could cause someone to end their lives, beeping someone who drifts into your lane could cause someone to end their lives, but society would cease to function if no one criticised anyone in any capacity becuase of the remote possibility that it might be their final straw. It is not normal for below average work performance to lead to suicide, so if that was the result in this case it was 100% due to pre-existing conditions. It was this woman's responsibility, her family's responsibility, and the responsibility of any mental health professionals she was engaging with, to manage her symptoms, including suicidal ideation.

Oh FGS read the coroner's report before spouting this crap. She had no relevant past mental health history.

Incidentally, before go blaming her bloody family for not 'managing her symptoms', she wasn't allowed to discuss the outcome of the inspection with them. Or with mental health professionals. Because those were the rules. Rules which have had to be changed as a result.

I mean 'I don't want to be insensitive but I am going to blame Ruth Perry and her family for her death instead of Ofsted, despite the coroner's report blaming Ofsted' is pretty shitty.

It's not plausible for someone with no mental health issues to commit suicide over a bad review at work. Even if they were not documented, it doesn't mean they didn't exist, and, again, it's not plausible for suicide to be caused by one isolated and really quite minor event, especially in a woman as they are less likely to impulsively end their lives over things they probably wouldn't if they slept on it.

Oh I see, you know better than the coroner who actually looked at all the evidence. 👍

@noblegiraffe I think it’s fairly clear the Coroner took some evidence and ran away with it, No evidence from Ofsted inspectors. Did any HMI contribute? The Coroner said all sorts of things about the inspection team but they didn’t present evidence to the coroner, as far as I’m aware. It was all one sided.

Plus all schools have known for years that failing safeguarding meant a big fat fail! How quickly we forget Soham snd DC being murdered. Now we just think it’s a quick fix. Either we sort out recruitment and do what is legally required , or we don’t and take the consequences. If we no longer care about safeguarding, change the law. Labour could do this but any death resulting from any lessening of the law will be mega news. When this inspection was conducted, safeguarding law did matter. All Heads knew it mattered! Hopefully it will continue to matter.

But that's exactly it. Ofsted isn't "a bad review at work" fgs. It was her whole life, her community, her work. It's perhaps best not to say these things. It's a prime example of how one ofsted inspection (as we see some schools are left so long that no original teachers are there - it's meaningless. We know it's meaningless. From this thread parents blatantly still think it's a valid indicator of schools...) but a negative outcome ruins a career.

She was facing career ruin, and where do you go. And a damming of all her work...

The coronor hasn't written it on a whim for goodness sake. I love how mn traders think they know better without listening to actual people in the field/actual documented evidence or a willingness to learn. It's crazy. It's like the posh mums version of people down the pub spouting rubbish.

"She was facing career ruin, and where do you go. And a damming of all her work..."

And not only that. She was well aware that an inadequate Ofsted judgement can not only bring down a school, but a whole area - people move away to avoid inadequate schools, and don't move into the catchment of inadequate schools. This was the area where she had grown up and now lived, with her family, so she felt the burden more intensely.

If she'd been able to talk to anyone about the judgement or how she was feeling, they may have been able to help put it into perspective - not least, remind her that a negative safeguarding judgement can be overturned within a month or so - but it had to be kept confidential.

Yes exactly that. Much better written than I have and the confidentiality and the a whole area being affected are huge. A school is part of the community and a headteacher a focal part of the community. Living knowing your world is about to fall apart but can't tell anyone. To dismiss it as a bad day at work is ridiculous.

From this thread we already see some parents just want to go to the schools declared outstanding by an ofsted inspector on one day in 10 years say. What happens to a school and the whole local area when deemed inadequate. It's like people can't see how these 2 things are intrinsically linked.

I think it’s fairly clear the Coroner took some evidence and ran away with it, No evidence from Ofsted inspectors. Did any HMI contribute?

And your credentials which trump those of the actual coroner are?

If there is even the slightest bit of doubt about the lack of humanity with which Ofsted treated Ruth Perry, they published the Ofsted report for her school 2 months after her suicide, and this is how they referenced her death in it. Bear in mind that her suicide caused huge shock and upset both in her own community and in the wider education community, so this was an extremely sensitive document that some thought shouldn't be published at all.

A brief mention about the 'change in leadership' before details about breakfast club.

They had to delete the report.

Absolute lack of any sort of concern about the impact of their actions on teachers.

It's mind blowingly awful isn't it. 😔.

Everything about the system needs so much change.

It's not plausible for someone with no mental health issues to commit suicide over a bad review at work.

An Inadequate Ofsted as Ruth Perry was facing is not just a ‘bad review at work’.