2nd guessing Ofsted...

[ohwhatashow]

Teaching folk pls can you help me attempt some Ofsted-related detective work? We're about to make Secondary Transfer applications and are weighing up between 2 schools. Our frontrunner was inspected last week but the report will not be available until after our application deadline.

The school is currently rated 'good' and so had the corresponding 'short inspection'. But the inspectors wanted to return for a 2nd day. My research suggests this means the inspectors no longer think it is 'good' and have revised up or own. The school says the report will not be published for at least a month. Does the long time lag suggest a downgrading?

Our report took ages and we stayed the same! I'm afraid there's just no way to know.

It can also mean going from good to outstanding. Good luck OP

Yes it could be school are going for outstanding, but this is unlikely tbh.

Ours took longer than that to be published last year and we went from good to outstanding.

Why would it be unlikely? It's the same for both!

What was their progress 8 score last year? If it was “well above average” then the most likely outcome is outstanding, if it was “average” or less then a downgrading is much more likely. There was some data published on this recently and Ofsted judgements are now strongly correlated to progress 8 score.

It's unlikely because the amount of extra 'looking' and analysis that is involved in moving to outstanding, combined with the potential for them to move you down if they then find something they don't like, means most heads are happy to accept good with outstanding features, rather than put their staff through the extra requirements to get outstanding.

I agree with dumbledore that looking at their progress 8 will give a good indication.

If the school has “well above average” progress 8 then they have a 50% chance of being graded outstanding. Our Head would never have dreamed of saying no to a second day.

Having said that, I did hear of a headteacher who said no to a second day to go for outstanding. I thought they were mad. Getting the Outstanding grading means not having to worry about Ofsted again as long as results stay good. We can now just focus on doing our jobs the way we think works best for our students.

In our local area almost every short inspection has gone on to the second day and the grade has stayed the same. Reasons given by colleagues suggest that there is just too much evidence for inspectors to get through in one day.

Thank you so much for these replies. Progress 8 was an above average 2.8 last year but dropped to 1.8 this year...

1.8 is an amazing progress 8 score but I think you need to check your figures. The highest P8 score in the country last year was less than 1.4 and this year it was 1.8. 1.8 would make an Outstanding judgement highly likely.

Doh! Sorry, decimal in wrong place! That should read .18

Unless they have a huge Y11 cohort 0.18 will put them in the “average band”. Not a single school in the “average” progress 8 band last year received an outstanding Ofsted judgement. On that basis I think that The second day is because the first day didn’t provide enough evidence that they were still “good”. It doesn’t necessarily mean they will be downgraded but that the inspectors didn’t see enough evidence on the first day to make the judgement. A downgrade is more likely than an upgrade though. 1/4 of schools with average P8 got an RI or inadequate last year.