>>much maligned
Yes, by teachers and their unions. Parents generally like it and choose schools based on its ratings which are generally credible.
Yes, by teachers and their unions. Parents generally like it and choose schools based on its ratings which are generally credible.
Edit: to make it more clear, parents may seem to like this ofsted thing at a point when they don't have any other source and they don't know better.
For instance, in the case of that headteacher, I personally know that her school was one of the most highly regarded, with the best results, in town. The headteacher even acted as a consultant to other schools and had been at that school for about 15 years.
Then one day, and one day only, Ofsted comes and decrees that the school is OK but that the "leadership" is poor, with tragic consequences. The outpouring of support from parents was huge and anger towards Ofsted very real.
If I were a parent, I would assume Ofsted scores to be useless. Why? Because I know teachers and what they experience about the Ofsted process, which is Kafkaesque and officious.
It is much easier to look at the exam results, visit the school, ask people in an area what the kids are like at the bus stop —- are they well-behaved or are they scary? —- and ask young adults who recently left school what the teachers are like.
But assuming the kids were nice, yet the school was rated "inadequate" - you would choose that over a school rated "outstanding"? I can tell you're not a parent.
Yes. I know of a school locally to me that is rated inadequate that the parents adore, that I would choose over the next nearest independent day school which turns out weird aloof little Stepford children.
As for the snarky intentional bullshit misreading: “recently left school” in the UK means “completed school” as well, as in “recently left school for university” or “recently left school for college”. Engage your brain when I am talking about young adults and it should be clear I was talking about school leavers. They are the right people to ask if a school is good or not, because they are the ones most recently impacted by its actual performance.
By the way, well done for being able to tell I am not a parent. Perhaps you deduced that from the opening sentence where I said “I am not a parent”? That was a tricky one, so clever you :-)
Do carry on putting your politics over your children's future.
Not sure what you mean by politics.