Sources say Powell wants ‘Ofsted to go back to the drawing board when it comes to measuring inclusion in particular’. Photograph: Abstract Aerial Art/Getty Images View image in fullscreen Sources say Powell wants ‘Ofsted to go back to the drawing board when it comes to measuring inclusion in particular’. Photograph: Abstract Aerial Art/Getty Images Schools England school inspections to be overhauled again after barrage of complaints Exclusive: Education secretary sends Ofsted back to ‘drawing board’ as teachers raise serious concerns about new system
Prefer the Guardian on Google School inspections in England will be overhauled for the second time in a year, after a barrage of complaints that the new system was dangerously stressful and damaging teachers’ mental health.
Lucy Powell, the education secretary, will tell the schools regulator Ofsted to “go back to the drawing board” after becoming concerned that inspection changes overseen by her predecessor, Bridget Phillipson, were creating problems for headteachers.
Sources say Powell does not want to scrap the new system of ratings, which score schools from “exceptional” to needing “urgent improvement” in six key areas, but she does want inspectors to take greater account of the social and economic background of each school and its pupils.
Read more Powell’s changes, which will be communicated to Ofsted in the coming weeks, will be the second set of major alterations to the school inspection regime in just over a year, after Labour’s election manifesto pledge to replace the previous inspection framework in the wake of the death of the headteacher Ruth Perry .
One source said: “She wants Ofsted to go back to the drawing board when it comes to measuring inclusion in particular. That’s where most of the problems seem to lie.”
Powell’s changes will mean a significant shift from those carried out by Phillipson, who is now equalities minister and party chair.
The two MPs fought an occasionally bitter contest to become Labour’s deputy leader last year, during which allies of each traded insults and accusations. Andy Burnham promoted Powell, a long-term ally, to Phillipson’s job as education secretary when he entered Downing Street earlier this year.
Powell told an event at last week’s Labour party conference: “I want to see a much stronger emphasis in the current inspection regime on context, much stronger than it is at the moment.
“I think this is one of those areas that it’s not straightforward to sort of move the oil tanker around massively quickly, but we absolutely do need to see reforms there.”
View image in fullscreen Lucy Powell on stage with Andy Burnham at the Labour party conference. Photograph: Victoria Jones/Shutterstock Ofsted declined to comment. The inspectorate has commissioned its own independent evaluation of the new framework, with an interim report due out later this year.
Paul Whiteman, the general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers, said he was encouraged that ministers were listening to the criticism of inspections being raised by parents and experts as well as teachers.
Whiteman said: “We have serious concerns about fairness and comparability. Schools serve very different communities and face very different levels of challenge. Leaders working in areas of greater disadvantage, or with higher numbers of pupils with special educational needs (Send) and disabilities, must not be placed at a systemic disadvantage by an inspection framework t…