Ofsted - I'm mystified

[dougal3]

My child switched schools a while back. The old school was pretty amazing; high academic standards, lots of well-funded activities, caring and committed staff, lots of parent participation, well-organised, an ethic of striving on the school's part, transmitted to the kids ... blah, blah.
The new school is O.K.. It's safe. It teaches a minimal curriculum at a minimal level. Academic standards are poor. Curricular delivery the basic minimum. Curricular enrichment negligible. It's very unambitious in what it wishes to achieve. The Head is complacent. Staff likewise.
The Head and staff deal with parents making suggestions for enrichment by bitching about those parents WITH OTHER PARENTS. This makes me very unwilling to make any suggestions of my own.
The ambitions and delivery of the two schools could not be more different. I would rate no. 1 as outstanding and no. 2 as O. K.
What baffles me is that the previous school is rated "good" and this one"outstanding". What on earth did Ofsted see that I, as a parent, and someone working in both schools, miss?
Has anyone else experienced this?

Ofsted reports are a pile of poo TBH. How old are the reports?

the second school has all the right paper work

It's all down to paperwork.
school have to submit a SEF (self Evaluation Form)
If they do everything they say on the SEF, tick in the box.

I know what you mean.

DS's school has just had a Ofsted report and it received a satisfactory 'score' overall, though a lot of the commentary had comments that were scored as Good.

It seemed strage to me cos I am very happy with the school. DS is achieving well, he is happy, there are lots of extra curricular stuff, good SENCO, striving HT etc.

Dunno how the Ofsted inspector came to that conclusion. I was initially worried, but now realise that he has seen the svhool for one day, we experience it every day and I am happy with my decision to send him there.

ofsted is a very in-exact tool

The reports are pretty recent, both of them. Can you believe it, I'm actually worried about naming the year (they were both in the same year,) for fear of identification!
What really gets me is that the Ofsted "outstanding" is actually used by parents when they are analysing how they feel about the school. It's weird, they'll say "Oh, such and such a thing is disappointing ... I wish they did such and such like X school ... but I don't know, they are an excellent school. Look at the Ofsted report." I want to scream. It really kills the parental will to improve the school. Bizzarely, it interrupts the actual conceptual process of parents. They literally cannot believe the evidence of their senses!!
It drives me mad and it makes me really cross about Ofsted and their power.

Sorry, just replying to Mingming - this experience really makes me feel, strongly, you should go with your own perceptions of the school.

why did your child move from the first to the second? And if its really not so good are you looking to move again?

Interesting questions UMM. We moved because of work and economics. It's interesting about the looking around. Basically, I have the old school, and friends still there, as a comparison. Even so, my husband and I can't quite believe it's as bad as it seems. I'm not joking about the power of the Ofsted report; the other parents argue very strongly that all is well. However, my husband points out that very few people get to try out a variety of schools in depth and so there is very little in objective comparison lying behind people's opinions!!! (We return to the power of the Ofsted report).
A friend at the new school moved and her child started another school. She 'phoned me and said that she finally understood what I was going on about (I'd been wibbling to her in a confused way for a while), and she urged me to try and move my child.
So, we've finally decided to start looking around but it is very worrying. The schools that are appealing are (surprise, surprise!!) popular, with huge waiting lists, which are still active.
I really think we're just going to have to lump this school. Hence my frustration at the unwillingness to inject vision or ambition. Again, I blame the dead hand of the Ofsted for this. A "good, with room for improvement" might have incentivised staff and given some grounds for parental pushing.
As it is, the staff are hostile to any suggestions. Really hostile.