Friday 9 October 2020

Winter is Coming- Ofsted's plan to return to full inspection in January 2021

On Friday 9th October, I spoke on behalf of the NAHT's Assessment and Accountability Group about Ofsted's flawed plans to return to full inspection in January 2020. A special thanks to Nick Brooks and  Ian Hartwright for your help. 


Emergency Motion NAHT National Conference 2020

With no end to the pandemic insight, plans for a return to routine inspection from January 2021 look increasingly misjudged. Grading schools - that are currently operating under an alternative, emergency arrangements  - against the education inspection framework will be impossible to do fairly and meaningfully. Routine inspection will distract the attention of schools away from the more pressing priority of re-engaging all children in their learning. Inspectors visiting classrooms across multiple schools risks creating new vectors of transmission, during the winter months when the virus is predicted to be at its peak.  
 
Conference instructs National Executive to oppose a return to ​full inspection in the Spring term, given the extraordinary circumstances created by the pandemic. We accept the need for proportionate and constructive inspection and believe the recommendations within NAHT’s Accountability Commission report, Improving School Accountability, serve as a sound basis for a return to inspection at an appropriate time. 
Speech 
Conference, Madam President – winter is coming, and there is no end to the pandemic insight. Today, new measures have come into place in Scotland, and new restrictions in parts of England are likely to be announced within days. 


School leaders accept the need for proportionate and constructive inspection.  We set out a blueprint for a reformed inspectorate within NAHT’s Accountability Commission report, and this will serve as a sound basis for a return to inspection at an appropriate time.  But now is not the time.


Infection rates are rising exponentially across much of the country, and once again, we are being warned that the NHS is at risk of becoming overwhelmed.
We are told that the very earliest that a vaccine could become available will be the middle of next year. The reality is that the government are a very long way off getting the virus under control. 


This term and next, school leaders will be doing everything possible to keep schools open and address the gaps in children’s learning – we are all facing a deteriorating situation that is resulting in increased staff and pupil absence. A situation made infinitely worse by the dysfunctional test and trace system in many parts of the country. 


School Leaders in the Midlands  have told me about their efforts to bridge the language gap for their EAL pupils, School Leaders in Cumbria have told me about the strain on their workforce, and Schools Leaders in  Hampshire have told me about the social and emotional impact lockdown has had on their pupils. 


Colleagues, we  are working under the most intense pressure to do what is right for our young people, right for our staff and right for our school communities.
Yet, as the country faces up to an ever-worsening public health situation, it is  incredulous to suggest, that this would be the right time for Ofsted to start visiting classrooms across the country. Ofsted has developed a COVID model for inspection, which the NAHT has established is not a visit,  and these lower tariff inspections should continue in the Spring Term enabling OFSTED to address any safeguarding concerns that they have.

However, a return to high stakes inspection of schools, at a time when we are  predicted to be the peak of our winter second wave will irreparably erode any trust between the inspectorate and schools. 

And yet that is precisely what Ofsted intent to do.

Plans to restart full inspection in January 2021 were announced at a time when the country was emerging from the first peak of this pandemic. At that time, we all hoped and prayed that by January 21 schools might be returning to a degree of normality. 
Now, we know better, and yet the Chief Inspector is resolutely sticking to her plans. In place of pragmatism, we have serial misjudgement. An inspectorate seemingly detached from, and disinterested in reality on the ground. 

School leaders have repeatedly urged Ofsted to reconsider their plans to return to full inspection in January. Serving practitioners who inspect for Ofsted tell me that they believe plans to inspect from January are misguided; and Ofsted’s own expert HMI is telling the Chief Inspector that January is too soon and that the Education Inspection Framework is unworkable in the current situation.

But Conference ,Ofsted are not listening – they are tin-eared to the evidence, tin-eared to the profession, and tin-eared to their own workforce.
Conference, this motion calls on the national executive to use all means possible to deliver a common-sense solution in the short term.  And it calls for a better future. 
 
When the pandemic finally passes, we will need a new approach to inspection for the post-Covid world.  When the time is right, we will need a new, proportionate and constructive inspection system that matches our ambition for young people. 
But in the present moment, it is critical that the Chief Inspector displays humility rather than hubris.  Listen to the profession, listen to serving leaders who inspect, and listen to your own HMI.  Now is a time to support schools, their teams and the pupils they serve with a timely announcement confirming that routine inspection will remain suspended from January.

Madam President, I move.