Office for Standards in Education (Hansard, 30 July 1997)

§ Mr. Blunkett

As foreshadowed in the White Paper "Excellence in Schools", the chief inspector has agreed to implement a programme of changes arising out of Ofsted's analysis of information collected about contracting, the process of inspection and reports, with a view to securing possible further improvements in consistency, quality and value for money. Ofsted plans to introduce in the year beginning September 1997a quality standard for contractors which each will have to satisfy in order to gain inspection contracts. This will place considerable requirements on contractors and, where these are not met, Ofsted may cease business with them or reduce their level of activity until satisfied that they have improved. This action will be central to Ofsted's drive to improve the overall quality of inspections; contracting arrangements which further reduce bureaucratic procedures and paperwork. These arrangements will also reduce the period of notice to schools of inspection and mean that all schools know the exact date between one and one-and-a-half terms in advance; a requirement that team inspectors may inspect subjects or aspects only where they have the relevant expertise and training. Ofsted will organise approved training and accredit inspectors. They will have a register of team members and, with new legislation, the power to remove them from this register if they prove to be incompetent; a requirement that the names of team members and the subjects and aspects inspected in a school are included in the published reports. This will increase their accountability and enable Ofsted to identify weak ones; a requirement that inspectors should give oral feed-back to all teachers; a limit on the proportion of any one day that a teacher can be observed by an inspector. The upper limit will be 75 per cent. of the day with 50 per cent. as the norm. This should reduce the pressure on teachers in small primary schools particularly; a requirement that head teachers receive a profile for each teacher of the quality of teaching observed by inspectors. Each teacher will receive the data on their own teaching. This essential management of information should aid schools in identifying very good teachers, those needing further support and those whose competence is seriously in doubt; a requirement that the second inspection comments on progress made by the school since the previous inspection. Much of the information will come from the school and its own review systems; further guidance on judging standards by providing benchmark descriptors of what is expected of work judged "excellent" through to "very poor", for all subjects; annual data summaries for each school, including aggregate inspection data from the previous inspection. Copies of all the summaries will be sent to LEAs along with a summary of data for all the LEA's schools; an external person to review handling of complaints about inspection where the complainant remains unhappy with the outcome of the complaint.

In addition, the chief inspector has agreed to review Ofsted's contracting procedures with the involvement of an external party.

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I believe that this substantive set of actions will further improve inspection. The chief inspector has assured me that he will continue to review the evidence and make further improvements where these are called for.