NAHT
Call us: 0300 30 30 333
Home Menu

Structures, inspection and accountability

 
NAHT_Structures_Inspection.jpg

School leaders understand the need for public accountability. Parents, politicians and the wider public want to be sure that schools are doing their very best for the children they serve.

However, we also recognise that the current low-trust accountability system is based on a narrow range of measures that drive a range of perverse incentives and unintended consequences and that the current high-stakes inspection system all too often instils fear and stifles innovation. 

NAHT is committed to securing fairer methods and measures of accountability, so that pupils’ performance and school effectiveness are judged using a broad range of information, including the school's broader context and performance history, rather than a narrow focus on data.

Ensure published performance data are calculated and used fairly

  • Press the government to take action to ensure understanding across the sector of changes to primary progress data from 2020
  • Engage with the DfE to ensure that the reception baseline assessment is a valid baseline for progress 
  • Work with the DfE to ensure the methodology, publication and use of performance data is accurate, proportionate and appropriate.

 

Press for a transition from vertical high-stakes approach to accountability to a lateral system with greater ownership by the profession itself

  • Further develop, articulate and argue the case for a new approach to school accountability, building on NAHT's Commission, and working with other partners
  • Campaign against a hard accountability measure on exclusions
  • Make the case and lobby for a wholly independent complaints process for appeals against Ofsted inspection judgements
  • Lobby for the publication of all training materials for inspectors to ensure transparency and equity
  • Lobby Ofsted for greater transparency regarding the experience, skills and training of inspectors for specific phases and settings
  • Monitor members' experiences of the new inspection framework, holding Ofsted to account for the consistency, reliability and behaviour of inspectors, particularly around curriculum and the quality of education judgement.

 

Ensure any changes to school structures or systems benefit all pupils within a local community

  • Continue to oppose any form of forced academisation
  • Continue to oppose any expansion of grammar schools
  • Promote and advance local accountability, transparency and democracy in school structures and governance so that schools are best able to serve their wider local community
  • Make the case for centrally coordinated place planning to ensure all new school provision meets demand
  • Promote the full variety of school collaboration from Trusts to informal collaborations. 

The principles of effective school-to-school peer review

Peer review between schools should be the norm, not an exception, and should be at the core of school improvement.

Our newly published report outlines the nine key principles for effective school-to-school peer review. The report is the result of convening peer review programme providers, including Ambition Institute, Challenge Partners and Education Development Trust. The report has been produced alongside the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) who checked the references and sourced some additional evidence that the group drew on in their development of the key principles.

NAHT deputy general secretary Nick Brook, who led the review, said: “Peer review could be the driving force of the school improvement system. Emerging evidence shows that schools can improve faster and more sustainably by working together. Today's report outlines nine key principles that would return teachers and school leaders to their rightful place in the system, putting them in the driving seat when improving the life chances of all young people. Peer review and collaborative working must become the norm in all schools, not an exception.”

The report proposes nine principles for effective school-to-school peer review:

  1. Committed to better outcomes for all – There is a shared responsibility to establish improvement across all schools and not just one’s own, including the sharing of good practice identified in reviews. The desire for mutual gain is imperative for success.
  2. Action focused – Peer review is set up with the intention of acting as a result of the review, whether to address a deficit or to get even better. Peer review provides evidence of strengths and areas for improvement but is not a standalone activity.  Reviews must be part of wider processes that provide sustained support for evidence-based improvement.
  3. Rigorous and objective – The team should always consist of peer leaders with the professional distance to give a truly honest appraisal of where the school is in its journey and the experience to insightfully present evidence.
  4. Structured and robust – The approach used in the review should have a clear structure so that the evidence collected is impartial, defensible and is action-focused, with all actions owned by the reviewed school.
  5. Expert and evidence led – The reviewers should be given the training and support to be(come) experts in peer review; their diagnosis of school performance should be rooted in evidence, as should any suggestions about potential actions.
  6. Done with, not to, the school – Peer review drives more transparent and honest self-review, should engage as much of the school workforce as possible and always be reciprocated.
  7. Open and trusted – The reviewed school is able and willing to expose its vulnerabilities, in order to elicit new perspectives on the challenges it faces.
  8. Builds deeper relationships – Peer reviews lead to abiding collaborative partnerships which can evolve over time to enable stronger, closer working in local clusters. There is also an opportunity to share more widely as part of a national drive for improvement.
  9. Commitment to continuous improvement – Peer review itself should always be kept under review and providers of peer review programmes must have embedded structures and processes to evaluate the effectiveness of the process and commit to continuous improvement.

NAHT’s new School Improvement Commission met for the first time at the end of October, with at least an interim report due to be published at the end of this academic year. 

You can read the report in full below. 

 

First published 21 September 2019

Related articles

;