Ofsted: Improving the way Ofsted inspects education: report on the responses to the consultation

Initial teacher education (ITE) inspection: toolkit, operating guide and framework

• The early reference to avoiding the creation of documentation or additional activity solely for inspectors’ benefit is an anticipated but nonetheless welcome reminder – acknowledging the very real workload impact of any inspection, however well-intentioned.
• A clear working definition of an “inclusive provider” is now included. Importantly, this distinguishes between a provider’s responsibility to create an inclusive environment for trainees and the expectation that trainees are prepared to foster inclusive classrooms. This distinction, previously unclear in the draft toolkit, is now much improved.
• We welcome the recognition that a trainee may not always disclose additional needs – an important clarification strongly advocated for by NASBTT.
• We remain cautious about the use of qualifiers such as “typically” in descriptor statements, which risk inconsistent interpretation. While this language is not new in ITT documentation, robust inspection training and quality assurance processes will be critical to ensuring consistency in feedback and outcomes.
• The revised formatting of the toolkit usefully reinforces the expectation that most providers will sit within the categories needs attention, expected standard, or strong standard, with urgent improvement and exceptional as outliers. This subtle but important change clarifies how grades will be framed.

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