The Ofsted Big Conversation
In May 2013, June O’Sullivan started the conversation on Nursery World’s Linkedin page, due to her concerns about the new Ofsted approach to regulation and their aggressive tone. In response to this nearly 400 comments were received with practitioners contributing a whole host of stories and concerns about Ofsted. So it was decided to take action and try to engage Ofsted, get them on board, share the sector’s concerns and consider solutions.
The ‘conversations’ have been supported by Early Years practitioners, organisations, trainers and consultants. They were hoped to be a collaboration of those passionate about EY and an invitation to share experiences, support one another and vitally – engage Ofsted! A gathering place for all those interested in the fairness and quality of Ofsted inspections.
Over the weekend of the 13th and 14th September Ofsted Big Conversations took place across the country, an agenda was set for us all to follow with a number of questions to focus our discussions and hopefully find some ways forward and suggestion sector led solutions for the issues that seem to be of concern for the sector.
The evening in Weston Super Mare was very passionate, and it was highly apparent that childcare was not just a job for any of those present, with comments regularly coming back to the impact on the children and families, as well as other staff and management in settings. The Ofsted Big Conversation gave a welcome platform for expression of concern, but also some very positive ideas and suggested guidelines for improvement
We were part of a group of 20 practitioners from across 3 counties, the meeting took place in ‘The Campus’ (http://www.the-campus.org.uk) a community facility and children’s centre in Weston Super Mare. Childminding was well represented; there were a number of group providers as well as us from a development and support agency and even an Ofsted trainer, so we were lucky to have a breadth of knowledge and experience.
Although we knew we needed to try and answer the questions and suggest how we would like to see the inspection process change and improved, inevitably is was hard to stay focussed when listening to the vast experiences (unfortunately mainly negative) that practitioners had had with Ofsted over the last few years. It was great that people had a space to vent their frustrations as this led to discussion about how to affect change in the sector.
Prior to the meeting we looked at 10 questions, then collated these into 7 responses suggesting actions that could be taken;
1 Ofsted dual roles of regulation and improvement – Can we all agree what this should look like?
Two words during this discussion kept reoccurring – consistency and transparency. There were definite concerns about how Ofsted can regulate their own advice? And at present, providers feel they are well supported through their LAs and support agencies, who understand local and individual issues and can advise accordingly – will this more personal support that recognises our individuality in the sector be lost? Will this then have an impact on parental choice and diversity in Early Years? There was already a feeling that inspections outcomes can be influenced by inspector’s individual opinions, if the advice from one area of Ofsted is not agreed with by the inspector how will this affect the outcome?
We want to see: clearly defined roles; separate teams; differentiated training; external and independent QA of each role (with sector representation); each role to be a positive one supporting morale within the profession;, the knowledge and skills of existing LA staff is not lost; clarity of information around the level of support re quality improvement settings can expect.
2 Ofsted rationale for complaint initiated inspections which go back over 10 years – Can we agree what this should look like in the future?
We did discover that the inspectors that visit settings on the back of complaints are from a different department from those who carry out ‘normal’ inspections. Again, information and transparency about this would be useful to providers, as there were concerns that one department’s knowledge of the sector might be wider than the other. A guarantee that all inspectors come from an EY background and have an understanding of all areas of the sector including childminding and specialist nurseries such as Steiner and Montessori.
Also, we want assurances that any inspection that is triggered for whatever the reason can result in any outcome. There is fear that an inspection triggered by a complaint can only result in a ‘satisfactory’ outcome – we want to know this is not the case and that settings can retain their grades if their practice at the inspection reflects this.
We want to see: greater transparency regarding how the decision to re inspect has been made when it is due to a previous complaint that has already been investigated and a full inspection taken place, reasons for inspections clearly presented to the provider; exact reasons for a reduction in grade; separate investigations of complaints to better support quality improvement; complaint driven inspections not being grade determined by no children present.
3 Ofsted Quality Assurance Process – Can we agree what this should look like in the future?
There was definite confusion regarding which organisation carries out the QA process on inspection reports and outcomes. Feedback suggested that providers who have followed up a change in Judgement or even the publishing of an inspection report that has taken longer than the Ofsted targets on timescales, have been told conflicting information on where their reports have been held up and who has been responsible for the QA process that has affected their outcome given in feedback at the end of an inspection visit.
We want to see: greater transparency – who is QA’ing, what is the QA process, how may are QA’d; figures relating to outcomes of QA to feed in to inspector training (see also Q4); specific reason for grade change from informal feedback to post QA; clarity if any QA process has upgraded an outcome?
4 Ofsted inspector training and support – Can we agree what this should look like in the future?
The question here really focussed on how 2 organisations (Tribal and Prospects) that act on behalf of a third (Ofsted) can retain the consistency needed across the board to ensure everyone feels they are treated in the same way at inspections, and have equality of opportunity to reach the higher outcomes.
We want to see: inspectors with specific breadth of knowledge inspecting settings e.g. Childminders, specialist nurseries and pre-schools; QA on the consistency of training; all inspectors trained by the same organisation.
5 Inspector decision making and feedback – Can we agree what this should look like in the future?
Whilst we all acknowledged, informal feedback and outcomes are not official, it is difficult to understand how an outcome can drop so significantly when the report goes through QA.(sometimes 2 grades). Is it better that inspectors give no outcome judgement at the end of a visit, but agree the outcome will be shared formally, within agreed timescales and Ofsted stick to these timescales rigorously?
We want to see: greater transparency about the decisions re grading – why not higher, why not lower; inspectors not having to ask permission to give outstanding (this infers there are quotas and create unease within the sector); feedback to be a 2 way process.
6 Significant indicators – What constitutes a managerial judgement?
This was the point that we all realised the importance of reading the Ofsted guidance and keeping up to date with any changes – the clarification in the guidance from Ofsted re significant events is comprehensive in places, but it was felt that this could be even more explicit.
We want to see: Greater clarity around the term significant; terms such as other, significant, is likely, regular etc all to be quantified (see ‘Records, policies and notification requirements of the Early Years Register’ Ref 120412).
7 New inspection regime in November – What will this entail and how much information will we expect in the light of heavier emphasis on keeping children safe and teaching and learning?
There were concerns about the amount of publicity and information that would be given to the public about another change to the regulations, and parents not understanding that this could lead to a ‘blip’ in outcomes as we have to change our practice again. Also, a clear explanation of the change from ‘satisfactory’ to ‘need for improvement’ as a judgement. Where will the emphasis on play come from?
We want to see: Clear information to parents that inspections are taking place under a different criteria of grading – possibility of stating this at the top of the published reports; there is greater differentiation within ‘requires improvement’ for minor and major improvements; consideration given to the suggestion that outcomes should all be ‘meets requirements’ or ‘does not meet requirements’ a simple pass or fail.
- the satisfactory judgement will be replaced by ‘requires improvement’
- ‘inadequate’ settings are likely to be re-inspected after 6 months
- if an ‘inadequate’ setting fails to improve sufficiently and is found ‘inadequate’ again after re-inspection; Ofsted may take steps to cancel that setting’s registration.
- there will be re-inspection within a year for those which ‘require improvement’ with the expectation that the setting will get to ‘good’ within two years
- those that fail to improve after two years are likely to be judged ‘inadequate’.
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