Honestly, I don’t know anyone that has a good view of ofsted.
The concept of the body is fine, however they rarely take into account anything other than clinical considerations and box ticking.
School environments shouldn’t be robotic factories, yet that’s exactly how they score them, and thus encourage them to be.
I mean, oversight bodies are usually unpopular with the people they’re overseeing, so this isn’t particularly surprising.
I don’t want to shit on all teachers, but whenever OFSTED did their inspections, there was a vast change in how much my teacher’s behaviour improved. Suddenly, they were all as helpful as could be, super supportive and kind. As soon as they were gone, boom! Back to normal, could hardly be interested, and the most toxic of the bunch went right back to bullying the students that needed the most help. I had a handful of really good teachers, but the memories of the bad ones stuck with me more.
[deleted]
And I’m sure a lot of pupils have an unfavourable view of teachers
I’m an accountant and have a dim view of the statutory auditors that come and bother me every year to make sure I’m not committing fraud and ripping off the shareholders. And I’m sure the auditors have a dim view of the Financial Reporting Council for doing exactly the same thing. And the FRC probably don’t like Parliament poking around in their affairs.
You’re not meant to like your auditor/regulator.
Inspections are a good thing.
As a parent of a 3 year old. I’d rather have some inspection in place so i know my kid isn’t in a shit hole while i’m at work.
So underpaid staff being expected to hit targets see the targets as stressful?
Yes. Because it tells some teachers they aren’t very good.
I’m surprised by the amount of people here defending Ofsted. I’m not a teacher and I don’t work in a place with a regulatory body (although I have had to watch my dad deal with them as he trains gas engineers and I occasionally have to watch over the exams) but I can distinctly remember that whenever Ofsted inspections were happening, school got a lot worse. Teachers would dish out extra homework, lesson’s got worse in quality as the teachers became more robotic, teachers were much more irritable, and the inspectors were bastards. I remember them grilling students about stuff that we were in the middle of learning so that we could give a barely half an answer about because we were missing knowledge and then they acted like we were idiots because we weren’t subject matter experts on stuff we were still learning.
​
A regulatory body for teachers is perfectly reasonable but from my own experience actually being near them and listening to teachers who have to interact with them, they are far too rigid for such a fluid system. At best, I think Ofsted should focus on safeguarding standards and leave the actual teaching alone. If a school is performing inadequately at teaching its students, their will have hard data that can actually be used to show that. Sending in inspectors for a week that terrorise students and teachers isn’t going to improve teaching standards and just makes everyone miserable for a bit.
​
Personally I feel Ofsted is just an extension of what’s wrong with education in this country. We demand more uniformity in our schools and keep on putting more work onto teachers without actual support for those demands. Students come in too many shapes and sizes for what Ofsted and the Government demand in education and teachers aren’t paid enough for the responsibilities that are being thrusted upon them.
Because it’s just another thing on top of all the other things I’m underpaid and overtimetabled to do.
Oversight bodies are always going to be unpopular. But OFSTED are so detached from what actually makes a difference in education it makes the WHOLE CYCLE so stressful and demoralising.
It’s not the actual inspection (although the opaque nature of the questioning is 100% designed to intentionally create negative narratives), it’s the sometimes YEARS of Mocksteds which focus on the irrelevant initiatives that detract from actually making progress.
I’ve just left teaching after 13 years because the system is now designed to please OFSTED and whatever the whims of the latest out of touch education secretary are. It’s no longer about inspiring young minds.
Speaking to my teaching assistant to children with special needs mum, teachers want / schools need a regulatory body. The main problem is the one word Ofsted places on a school. They even provide words to the subcategories, so why not just publish that and the report rather than a single word
Next we will find out that students have unfavourable views of exams.
Now do a comparison with how many students have favourable opinions of exam boards.
I suspect you’ll get similar results.
OFSTED visited my old school recently and the head teacher threw a fit. Claimed they did a suprise inspection under false pretences (accusations of students getting bullied) and did a massive open letter claiming they were going after them because it was a public school.
Looking at Ofsteds review they said “needs improvement” or whatever the equivalent is. The only thing that wasn’t listed as outstanding was the upper administration and senior staff. Recently they decided to turn the school into an academy for that nice payday funnily enough
90% of school kids have an unfavourable view of exams and teachers. Go figure.
No one wants their work to be marked. No company likes it when the tax inspectors visit.
But we can forgive kids for this immature approach because, they’re kids. We should expect more from teachers than this – and, just like they’d tell the kids, they’d do better if they used their time and energy preparing for Ofsted inspections rather than turning their noses up.
Schools are going to be inspected and we’re going to expect schools to meet a particular standard. That’s never going to change – you can’t downvote it away or block it like you can on social media.
I mean, yeah, “people don’t like those who hold them to account”. That’s pretty natural tbh. I’m sure those who commit crime have unfavourable views on the police also. I certainly have unfavourable views on my boss.
Add parents to that mix too
Ofsted has got too big for its boots
When you read Ofsted’s national I section reports, or their national subject reports, they are often excellent and really valuable. When you read Ofsted’s inspection policies they are sensible and well thought through.
Then when you hear the loved experience of teachers who have been through it, it is often genuinely traumatic and causes utter misery.
The problem isn’t the existence of an oversight body (which is fine), or ofsted’s policies (which are fine). It’s the poor quality of many individual inspectors- combined with the ridiculous amount that rides on a one-word judgement – that makes the whole process so damaging.
20 comments
Honestly, I don’t know anyone that has a good view of ofsted.
The concept of the body is fine, however they rarely take into account anything other than clinical considerations and box ticking.
School environments shouldn’t be robotic factories, yet that’s exactly how they score them, and thus encourage them to be.
I mean, oversight bodies are usually unpopular with the people they’re overseeing, so this isn’t particularly surprising.
I don’t want to shit on all teachers, but whenever OFSTED did their inspections, there was a vast change in how much my teacher’s behaviour improved. Suddenly, they were all as helpful as could be, super supportive and kind. As soon as they were gone, boom! Back to normal, could hardly be interested, and the most toxic of the bunch went right back to bullying the students that needed the most help. I had a handful of really good teachers, but the memories of the bad ones stuck with me more.
[deleted]
And I’m sure a lot of pupils have an unfavourable view of teachers
I’m an accountant and have a dim view of the statutory auditors that come and bother me every year to make sure I’m not committing fraud and ripping off the shareholders. And I’m sure the auditors have a dim view of the Financial Reporting Council for doing exactly the same thing. And the FRC probably don’t like Parliament poking around in their affairs.
You’re not meant to like your auditor/regulator.
Inspections are a good thing.
As a parent of a 3 year old. I’d rather have some inspection in place so i know my kid isn’t in a shit hole while i’m at work.
So underpaid staff being expected to hit targets see the targets as stressful?
Yes. Because it tells some teachers they aren’t very good.
I’m surprised by the amount of people here defending Ofsted. I’m not a teacher and I don’t work in a place with a regulatory body (although I have had to watch my dad deal with them as he trains gas engineers and I occasionally have to watch over the exams) but I can distinctly remember that whenever Ofsted inspections were happening, school got a lot worse. Teachers would dish out extra homework, lesson’s got worse in quality as the teachers became more robotic, teachers were much more irritable, and the inspectors were bastards. I remember them grilling students about stuff that we were in the middle of learning so that we could give a barely half an answer about because we were missing knowledge and then they acted like we were idiots because we weren’t subject matter experts on stuff we were still learning.
​
A regulatory body for teachers is perfectly reasonable but from my own experience actually being near them and listening to teachers who have to interact with them, they are far too rigid for such a fluid system. At best, I think Ofsted should focus on safeguarding standards and leave the actual teaching alone. If a school is performing inadequately at teaching its students, their will have hard data that can actually be used to show that. Sending in inspectors for a week that terrorise students and teachers isn’t going to improve teaching standards and just makes everyone miserable for a bit.
​
Personally I feel Ofsted is just an extension of what’s wrong with education in this country. We demand more uniformity in our schools and keep on putting more work onto teachers without actual support for those demands. Students come in too many shapes and sizes for what Ofsted and the Government demand in education and teachers aren’t paid enough for the responsibilities that are being thrusted upon them.
Because it’s just another thing on top of all the other things I’m underpaid and overtimetabled to do.
Oversight bodies are always going to be unpopular. But OFSTED are so detached from what actually makes a difference in education it makes the WHOLE CYCLE so stressful and demoralising.
It’s not the actual inspection (although the opaque nature of the questioning is 100% designed to intentionally create negative narratives), it’s the sometimes YEARS of Mocksteds which focus on the irrelevant initiatives that detract from actually making progress.
I’ve just left teaching after 13 years because the system is now designed to please OFSTED and whatever the whims of the latest out of touch education secretary are. It’s no longer about inspiring young minds.
Speaking to my teaching assistant to children with special needs mum, teachers want / schools need a regulatory body. The main problem is the one word Ofsted places on a school. They even provide words to the subcategories, so why not just publish that and the report rather than a single word
Next we will find out that students have unfavourable views of exams.
Now do a comparison with how many students have favourable opinions of exam boards.
I suspect you’ll get similar results.
OFSTED visited my old school recently and the head teacher threw a fit. Claimed they did a suprise inspection under false pretences (accusations of students getting bullied) and did a massive open letter claiming they were going after them because it was a public school.
Looking at Ofsteds review they said “needs improvement” or whatever the equivalent is. The only thing that wasn’t listed as outstanding was the upper administration and senior staff. Recently they decided to turn the school into an academy for that nice payday funnily enough
90% of school kids have an unfavourable view of exams and teachers. Go figure.
No one wants their work to be marked. No company likes it when the tax inspectors visit.
But we can forgive kids for this immature approach because, they’re kids. We should expect more from teachers than this – and, just like they’d tell the kids, they’d do better if they used their time and energy preparing for Ofsted inspections rather than turning their noses up.
Schools are going to be inspected and we’re going to expect schools to meet a particular standard. That’s never going to change – you can’t downvote it away or block it like you can on social media.
I mean, yeah, “people don’t like those who hold them to account”. That’s pretty natural tbh. I’m sure those who commit crime have unfavourable views on the police also. I certainly have unfavourable views on my boss.
Add parents to that mix too
Ofsted has got too big for its boots
When you read Ofsted’s national I section reports, or their national subject reports, they are often excellent and really valuable. When you read Ofsted’s inspection policies they are sensible and well thought through.
Then when you hear the loved experience of teachers who have been through it, it is often genuinely traumatic and causes utter misery.
The problem isn’t the existence of an oversight body (which is fine), or ofsted’s policies (which are fine). It’s the poor quality of many individual inspectors- combined with the ridiculous amount that rides on a one-word judgement – that makes the whole process so damaging.