During the first wave of school case-study visits in autumn 2006, the interviewees were asked if they could identify any impacts from the actions that they had taken to implement the report recommendations. Responses showed that it was in the area of assessment, monitoring and tracking that schools considered the impact had been greatest. There were many references to improved assessment systems, more differentiation, closer monitoring of individuals and groups of pupils and better feedback to pupils. The following two examples reflect similar comments made by others:
We are now sharing assessment criteria with pupils in key stage 3. We’re trying to develop work using assessment feedback and increased use of data and there’s more discussion now about individual pupils and their targets.
Staff are more focused on data and analysis. In the past they felt that this was something just for the person who does the performance review.
Governors had also recognised the impact on this area, as this secondary school chair of governors explained:
The ICT assessment and review facility has made a massive difference. We had a meeting recently to look at results, and now we have a huge amount of information compared to the past. We are able to look at trends and comparisons and can see that some departments have not improved at the same rate and we can then look at this in more depth. At this stage, interviewees were still cautious about the extent to which the new methods would produce definite outcomes, although most expressed optimism that this would be so, as in this headteacher’s comment: ‘Rigour of tracking has improved, but we need to have it in place for some time to see if it stimulates improved outcomes – possibly in a year’s time’.
Two other areas of impact cited frequently were those of teaching and learning and classroom culture. Several schools reported having taken up the SEAL (social and emotional aspects of learning) programme, and others had developed circle time techniques, or introduced learning to learn and thinking skills programmes. Again, it was judged too early to be able to predict outcomes, but there was enthusiasm about the difference these changes had made, as these two comments reveal:
The vibrant schools and story-making project have made the children more aware of how they learn. It is benefiting the children, they talk more readily about what they need to do and they have more control over their learning. They are changing from being passive to active. Generally it’s had impact on the way pupils speak to one another, and their questioning technique has improved, so they are more independent now and the more sensitive are braver now.
A number of schools had been given a recommendation about improving attendance and this was often regarded as a very difficult issue to address. Nevertheless, several that had introduced new methods, such as the First Day system, to deal with attendance, were able to report some progress, and this was supported by governors in the schools concerned. In a secondary school, where sixth form attendance had been an issue, for example, it was reported that ‘attendance in Year 13 has increased from 89 to 95 per cent’.
A less tangible impact, but a significant one, was boosting the morale and confidence of staff. The positive effect of this is demonstrated by the response from a case-study school where the inspection led to improved staff confidence (see below).
Case studies: Positive impact on staff morale
One case-study school was a secondary school that had been graded satisfactory and had undergone a series of radical changes. The deputy headteacher, reflecting on the impact of the inspection, stated that: ‘If I had to give a word, I think it would be confidence. Confidence is not measurable, but it makes a massive impact. Those that wanted the school to turn around believed we were on the right lines, and that confidence went through the staff and the students’.
Other areas where schools considered that there had been an impact, but which were mentioned less frequently were:
• improved leadership and management • improved behaviour
• better communication with parents • staffing changes
• broader curriculum • better use of ICT • improvements to food.
Not surprisingly, many schools thought it was too early to be able to evaluate any impact on performance and attainment at the time of the first wave of interviews. Most were confident that there would be better results in the future, but cautioned, for example, that ‘the full extent of the intervention will not be seen for some time’. Some also drew attention to other factors that had to be considered, as in this comment: ‘It’s difficult to say, we’ve only done one round of data analysis since the inspection. Anyway, it depends on the cohort’. In one school that had been graded 4, the deputy headteacher drew attention to the pressures of having a lot of recommendations to implement and how demands on staff could actually hold up progress: ‘It will make a difference when people are in a position to just get on with it, without the constant pressure of being assessed and monitored. Scrutiny can be a good thing, but it is energy sapping’.
Many school interviewees were determined to point out that whatever impact their actions may have had, or were likely to have, this owed little to the inspection itself. As discussed in Chapter 4, this was because schools were already implementing the changes recommended in the inspection, or planning
to do so. Consequently any impact on the school was not perceived as being due to the inspection, as the following comments illustrate:
I want to make it clear that these are the areas we were working on before Ofsted came. We haven’t changed our direction because of Ofsted, and the only reason we would do that is if they pointed something out that we weren’t aware of.
Last summer’s exam results were a great improvement, but the processes needed to make the improvement were already there.
When discussing impact, some schools also emphasised another point made frequently in assessing the relative contribution of the inspection (Section 4.4), that it did not identify areas for improvement, but it did provide impetus, as described by this headteacher: ‘These activities and outcomes would have happened even if we had not been inspected, but perhaps it did get things moving more quickly in some areas’.
A minority of schools reported a negative impact from acting on recommendations, but they made some interesting observations. A secondary school that had been graded 2, said that the emphasis on reading standards had led to improvements there, but at the cost of writing – ‘we’ve cured the reading problem, but now we can’t write’. In another grade 2 school, the deputy headteacher stated that yet more emphasis on target-setting and pupil monitoring was making school improvement more challenging because staff were sceptical about how it was interpreted by Ofsted – ‘there’s been a negative impetus, because it was a disheartening experience and it’s not made selling targets and monitoring any easier for the management team’.
Schools were especially concerned about recommendations that were perceived as going against the ethos of the school, as in a secondary school, graded 4, where changes in sixth form admissions had been particularly uncomfortable (see also Section 4.2):
We were advised by Ofsted to do that [not allow students with poor GCSE scores to take A levels], and in terms of results, it will improve them. The morality side is another issue. There were lots of arguments in the school that we shouldn’t be doing this, but in the end you’ve got to do what’s necessary to stay alive.