Shadow Education Secretary will today set out Labour’s
plans to abolish Ofsted and replace the current high-stakes
school inspection system with a new inspectorate for education as
part of Labour’s National Education Service.
Labour’s will replace Ofsted with a two-phase inspection system –
all schools and education providers will be subject to regular
‘health checks’ led by local government, and a more in-depth
inspection led by Her Majesty’s Inspectors (HMIs), full-time,
trained inspectors, who will have experience and expertise in the
areas they inspect. This will ensure that parents receive the
“in-depth and reliable information that they need about our
schools”.
Under the new system, HMIs will carry out inspections in
response to concerns arising from these the regular ‘health
checks’, or those raised by parents, teachers and governors. This
means that in-depth inspections will arise from a genuine need,
instead of taking place at random.
The current inspection system is a major driver of high levels of
teacher workload and stress, which contributes to the ongoing
crisis in teacher recruitment and retention. Labour’s plans to
radically reform the system will ensure that teachers are
supported in the classroom, and do not see inspections as a
punitive process that will drive excessive levels of stress.
A Labour government will also launch a “school improvement
revolution” in office through a nationwide school-led peer review
improvement programme based on the London Challenge model, aimed
at supporting schools in deprived areas with challenging intakes.
This process will be led by regional National Education Service
(NES) offices across England, which will co-ordinate peer
review across their regions.
With tens of thousands of students at schools that have not been
inspected for a decade, Labour’s new inspectorate will ensure
that no schools are able to operate outside of the inspection
system.
Labour will also crack down on an estimated 500 illegal schools
that fall outside of the current inspection system. By
introducing a new, statutory definition of a school, Labour will
overhaul current Department for Education guidance that is open
to abuse due to significant loopholes in how schools are
defined.
Commenting on Labour’s plans to overhaul school
inspections said:
“In too many cases, Ofsted’s judgements and grades reflect the
affluence of a school’s intake and the social class of its pupils
– not the performance of the school.”
“School performance is far too important and complex to be boiled
down to an over-simplified single grade, reducing all schools to
one of four categories.
“The current system is unfit for purpose, so the next Labour
government will abolish Ofsted and replace it with a system that
will give parents the reliable and in-depth information that they
need about our schools.”
Announcing plans for a “school improvement revolution”
under the next Labour government, said:
“The current Ofsted regime labels and ranks schools but it
doesn’t help them improve. Labour will improve standards in our
schools and we will do it through collaboration, not
competition.
“The next Labour government will launch a school improvement
revolution, introducing a new system of peer-to-peer school-led
improvement – based on the success of Labour’s hugely successful
London Challenge – right across the country.
“Labour’s National Education Service will replicate the success
of the London Challenge in every city, town and village and all
corners of our country.
Labour will:
- Abolish Ofsted and replace it with a new, independent
inspectorate for schools, early years, further education and
children’s services, led by Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector;
- At the core of the new inspectorate will be Her Majesty’s
Inspectors (“HMI”), based in regional teams with expertise
across different phases, subjects and areas of education
provision;
- HMIs will, unlike much of the current inspection workforce,
be full time inspectors with expertise in whichever area they
inspect, from early years to further education and from schools
to children’s services.
- Overhaul the existing inspections regime and introduce a
reformed system based on qualitative assessments of the
performance of schools and other education providers:
- A regular independent, locally-based ‘health check’ for
schools and other education providers;
- These ‘health checks’ will led by local government, with
councils providing this check for neighbouring authorities
where this is appropriate;
- Longer, more in-depth inspections will be carried out by
the new inspectorate to provide a detailed picture of
performance;
- These inspections will lead to a report that will give
parents, school leaders, and other the information they need
about the performance of the school or education provider.
- Abolish the headline grading system currently used by Ofsted/
- Ensure that all schools, including those currently exempt,
are subject to regular health checks and in-depth inspections
where necessary.
- Crack down on unregistered schools and change the legal
definition of a ‘school’ to ensure that they are subject to an
inspection system, introducing a new statutory definition of a
school and giving the new inspectorate the powers it needs to
ensure that every child is safe and receiving a quality
education.
Notes to Editors
According to research from the independent Education Policy
Institute, schools with more disadvantaged intakes are far more
likely to be rated Inadequate, while those with more affluent
intakes are far more likely to be rated Outstanding.
This then becomes a self-reinforcing cycle, with schools with
more affluent intakes far more likely to improve their grades at
later inspections, while those with more deprived intakes
“systematically more likely to be down-graded… even after
accounting for their more unfavourable distribution of previous
Ofsted judgements”.
Ofsted has itself acknowledged that “to date, there remains
little empirical evidence about the validity of inspection
judgements”
72% of teachers surveyed by Ofsted said that “inspection
judgements lack consistency and are too prone to be influenced by
the personal reviews and prejudices of individual inspectors”.
A report by the National Audit Office found that, as of August
2017, 1,720 schools had not been inspected for six years or more,
with 296 that had not been inspected for a decade.
Ofsted’s own data suggests that the number of schools that have
not been subject to a full inspection for a decade could be even
higher. According to Ofsted’s most recent annual report, 4,500
schools were judged outstanding at their most recent inspection
and 17% of outstanding schools have not had a full inspection in
the last 10 academic years – which would be the equivalent of 765
schools.
Of the 305 schools that Ofsted has reinspected, 256 (80%) were
subsequently downgraded, with 74 rated Requires Improvement and
14 rated Inadequate.
Ofsted has estimated that there are around 500 illegal schools
that fall outside of the current inspection system. Inspectors
have said that when inspecting these unregistered schools they
have seen “open sewers, rat traps… exposed electrical work… holes
where children have probably punched plaster walls.
Labour will address this by creating a new, statutory definition
of a school, overhauling current Department for Education
guidance that is open to abuse due to significant loopholes. The
Department has issued guidance saying that 18 hours of teaching a
week constitutes full-time education, but many settings can avoid
this by teaching for just under the 18 hour threshold and
therefore avoiding scrutiny.
The Ofsted grading system has been widely criticised, with the
Association of School and College Leaders, National Education
Union and Headteachers’ Roundtable all calling for an end to the
current grading system.
Teachers are currently leaving the profession in record numbers,
with the current inspection system a driver of high levels of
workload among teachers and school leaders. Department for
Education research found that preparing for Ofsted inspections
was seen as a significant driver of the “increase in unnecessary
and bureaucratic tasks”, with Ofsted’s own research finding that
54% of teachers said that an Ofsted inspect means a “huge amount
of unnecessary extra work”.
- Department for Education, Teachers’ workload diary
survey 2013: Research report (2014), p5
- Ofsted/YouGov, Teachers’ awareness and perceptions
of Ofsted: Teacher Attitude Survey 2018 Report, p24
The National Association of Headteachers have outlined the
principles of effective peer review, which can help to underpin
school-led improvement
https://www.naht.org.uk/news-and-opinion/news/structures-inspection-and-accountability-news/the-principles-of-effective-school-to-school-peer-review/
https://www.naht.org.uk/news-and-opinion/news/structures-inspection-and-accountability-news/improving-school-accountability/
ASCL comment on Labour plans to abolish Ofsted
Commenting on Labour’s plans to
abolish Ofsted if elected, Geoff Barton, General Secretary of the
Association of School and College Leaders, said:
“We welcome Labour’s recognition that inspections are in need of
further reform, but its plan to replace Ofsted with a two-phase
system led by local authorities is a complicated answer.
“It seems that local authorities would be responsible for
first-phase ‘health checks’ and then an inspectorate, presumably
not called Ofsted, would be responsible for more in-depth
inspections if needed.
“Both tiers would require appropriate staffing, training and
investment, as well as clarity about their respective roles and
the trigger points for in-depth inspections.
“We all want an inspection system which works as well as
possible, but the key to this is to look at how we judge
performance fairly and consistently.
“This does not necessarily mean that we need to create new tiers
of bureaucracy.”
