School league tables - RGS

[HalsGal]

Do you mean in terms of results? I didn't read it that way, but I can see why you may have thought it suggested that.

[anotherdad]

No, agreed, but what can they do if Ofsted aren't inspecting?

Publish their annual self-assessment reports, perhaps?

[MrsChubbs]

I agree with Guest55 that as many of the grammars have not been inspected for some time and, then under the old regime, that it is difficult to argue that their grading of outstanding is up to date. However, given that Ofsted is driven by results, your results are outstanding versus the national, therefore your teaching must be outstanding, therefore your leadership must be outstanding, therefore your governance must be outstanding means that their grading would be unlikely to change unless they have a safeguarding issue. I would not be surprised if RGS and John Hampden aren't expecting a visit from Ofsted given they have both appointed new Heads recently, even if not a full blown inspection.

[Guest55]

Ofsted's logic re the link is flawed imho - parents will pay to cover poor teaching.

[anotherdad]

Ofsted's logic re the link is flawed imho - parents will pay to cover poor teaching.

Indeed they will pay. At my daughter’s school, several of her year group have private tuition in some subjects. For a few it’s because they perceive the teaching quality to be below-par for a particular subject, for another few it’s because arguably they should not have qualified (having been extensively tutored to do so) and they’ve consistently struggled, in one case, all the way from year 7 to 13!. My daughter has, in some years, had to work much harder to teach herself a subject or concepts of a subject because she’s had an inexperienced or just a poor teacher. She’s fortunate that her mother and I have been able to help and that she’s a good independent learner but others have struggled.

Ofsted can be politically influenced to make the “right” judgements, so it’s not inconceivable that some grammar schools can be confident of the right result or left alone for longer than is reasonable. In the further education sector in the last couple of years there have been at least two high-profile inspection reports that were sat on for far longer than they were supposed to be. It doesn’t inspire confidence in the final report or the impartiality of the findings.

[BiscuitEater]

I entirely agree that most of the grammars should have been inspected more recently than they have been. It's part of the government's (entirely willful) decision to confuse good end results with good teaching. The fact that grammar schools are filled with bright enough, financially comfortable children from supportive families who put a high value on education and that may make teaching to get the "good" result easier doesn't seem to compute.

Given my cynicism around the KPIs in education, I also think the progress 8 score is pretty meaningless (though it will put the wind up many parents because ZOMG LEAGUE TABLE).

If the iGCSE is crap and therefore all students having it are failing to get into their desired universities (and that's a measurable outcome that actually means something to me), then ALL schools offering it should be put on notice and there should be a massive comms push warning people that only the new GCSE will be accepted by UK universities. Without that, it is just a wee bit too easy to view the exclusion of the iGCSE as a way to back the adoption of latest set of DoE curriculum changes with a great big stick.

Somewhere, a civil servant is looking at the rate of adoption of the new curriculum and saying, "Phew, job done." Which is the point.

[ToadMum]

I entirely agree that most of the grammars should have been inspected more recently than they have been. It's part of the government's (entirely willful) decision to confuse good end results with good teaching. The fact that grammar schools are filled with bright enough, financially comfortable children from supportive families who put a high value on education and that may make teaching to get the "good" result easier doesn't seem to compute.

Given my cynicism around the KPIs in education, I also think the progress 8 score is pretty meaningless (though it will put the wind up many parents because ZOMG LEAGUE TABLE).

If the iGCSE is crap and therefore all students having it are failing to get into their desired universities (and that's a measurable outcome that actually means something to me), then ALL schools offering it should be put on notice and there should be a massive comms push warning people that only the new GCSE will be accepted by UK universities. Without that, it is just a wee bit too easy to view the exclusion of the iGCSE as a way to back the adoption of latest set of DoE curriculum changes with a great big stick.

Somewhere, a civil servant is looking at the rate of adoption of the new curriculum and saying, "Phew, job done." Which is the point.

What the Department does or doesn't count for domestic league table purposes is one thing - but I don't think that UK universities are going to refuse to accept iGCSEs, given that that would impact hugely on those applicants who have been educated in British / International schools in other countries.

[BiscuitEater]

Bingo, Toadmum. It's not enough of a problem for international universities to change, it's not enough of a problem for university entry, ergo it's not really a problem.

I can see why teachers who've worked hard to meet the internal curriculum change deadline would be miffed, though.