Commenting on the Ofsted report into the reliability of its new
short inspections, Chris Keates, General Secretary
of the NASUWT, the largest teachers’ union in the UK,
said:
“Ensuring that inspection is as reliable as possible is essential
if parents, teachers, school leaders and the wider public are to
be able to have confidence in the effectiveness and fairness of
the accountability system.
“We welcome the fact that Ofsted has recognised that reliability
is an important issue and that it has made some efforts to
address this through some of the changes it has made to
inspection methodology and the selection and training of the
inspector workforce.
“Nevertheless, whilst inspection reliability in relation to short
inspection is important, Ofsted also needs to demonstrate how it
will ensure reliability of longer Section 5
inspections, where the risks to schools are often far higher
due to the wider range of factors that are taken into account in
forming overall judgements.
“A deeper challenge to reliability is the weight given to
inspection outcomes when making judgements about the overall
quality of provision by schools.
“Currently, inspection only provides a partial reflection of
schools’ contribution and achievements. Entirely justifiably,
teachers and school leaders remain concerned that inspection
outcomes do not always give credit for the full extent of
schools’ achievements, especially those that are not readily
captured by pupil performance data.
“Ofsted must now take this opportunity to engage with teachers
and school leaders to ensure that inspection can be reformed
further so that it accurately reflects the full value that
schools add to the quality of children and young people’s lives
and their future prospects.”
