When they announced the scrapping of deep dives in ungraded inspections, one of the key messages from Ofsted was that this would reduce the focus on subject leaders and put the onus back on senior leaders.
In his blog, Lee Owston, National Director for Education, said, “We’re also aiming to reduce the burden on subject leaders. Headteachers and senior leaders have said that they sometimes feel out of the loop with deep dives because they’re not part of that process.”
That begs the question, why are Ofsted, therefore, keeping deep dives on graded inspections if they acknowledge the problem? Since deep dives started, we’ve known it is a model better suited to secondary heads of department rather than primary subject leaders, especially those colleagues leading non-core subjects.
‘Consistency’ and ‘Ofsted’ have not always been used in the same sentence (except with the prefix in- on the former), so there you go. If you missed it last year, look at the research findings in ‘Are some school inspectors more lenient than others?’ Bokhove, Jerrim, and Sims 2023. (Basically, if you get a female HMI, they could be harsher in their judgements than a male inspector). https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09243453.2023.2240318#abstract
Even in ungraded inspections, subject leaders are still very likely to be involved in conversations with an inspector, but rather than being one-to-one with an inspector, this is more likely to be in a conversation between an inspector and a group of subject leaders.
Again, according to Lee Owston, when talking about ungraded inspections, “…while we will still want to have conversations with subject leads, they won’t be as intensive.”
The model for ungraded inspections appears far more fluid. As always with Ofsted, things will take a while to settle down, but a typical ungraded inspection timetable might well include the inspector meeting with subject leaders as a group to discuss subject leaders’ roles and responsibilities. As ungraded inspections begin in early October, we’ll soon know more about what this looks like in practice, so watch this space.
These ‘less intensive’ discussions could well help an inspector corroborate evidence already gathered from other inspection activities to ensure there is consistency across the school or within a subject.
So rather than subject leaders thinking they are completely off the hook regarding inspection, they are still highly likely to be involved. They can breathe a slight sigh of relief that it should not feel as intensive or as focused on them alone. Given that their development and ongoing work isn’t for Ofsted anyway, they can continue championing their subject and carrying on with all their good work.
One piece of advice I give subject leaders is to consider the impact they have in their role. This is useful for inspection preparation but also helpful when meeting governors or someone like me doing school improvement work. Subject leaders cannot always list two of three key differences they have made for pupils in their subject, even if they have been in post for a considerable time. Partly, this is because we are always moving on to the next thing in school, and once something is in place, we forget about it and work on the next issues. The other reason is they have not had time, or taken the time, to reflect on the difference they make for pupils. It can be useful to do this, if for no other reason than as recognition and a ‘pat on the back’ for all the hard work.
It is also helpful to do this for inspection. Ofsted focuses on impact, as the last of the three ‘i’s moves to the forefront of their thinking.
It will help subject leaders breathe a further sigh of relief if they can succinctly summarise the impact they have made and why pupils’ outcomes have improved as a result.
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