We tell them what we think of teachers
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03 / 06 / 2008 | Author: dnorris
We tell them what we think of the teachers.
School inspections in the U.K have been criticised by the Organisation for Economic Development because they create considerable strain and additional work.
Inspections have been a high profile fact of life since 1988 when educational reforms gave greater powers to school governors and league tables of exam results were published.
School inspections can last from between 2 days to a week and all inspections end with the school being given a grade. The four grades of outstanding, good, satisfactory or unsatisfactory carry as much of a stigma for a school as passing the 11+ once carried for a young pupil.
Ask any teacher who has undergone a successful inspection and they will tell you that the elation is unforgettable. That’s the time when they feel that all their dedication and hard work has been justified. Quite simply it boils down to a healthy dose of recognition.
There have been many instances of schools being recognised for the good work that they do. Nevertheless the age of inspections has brought in its wake a regime of negative criticism. Fear seems to have cast a shadow right through the education system to the extent that there is a shortage of candidates prepared to apply for the post of head teacher. That is a mark of how deep it has gone.
The pupils’ perspective on inspections is interesting.
“The best thing is that the inspectors ask us what we think of the teachers.”
But they are not fooled. They too can see that the exercise is a charade.
“When they came we had to change the time of our break so that they didn’t see us going mad in the corridors. We all had wear black shoes and black ties and tuck our shirts in. The teachers told us not to ask questions in case we asked the wrong ones and we were told to smile all the time.”
Ted Wragg famously told schools to aim low when the first league tables were set up.
“That way you can keep on improving!”
He realised that there would be setbacks. He had had experience of a cohort moving up through a school that could seriously damage one year’s performances. He realised that it was a fact of life in teaching – not an issue to highlight the fact that a school was failing.
Teachers were also astute enough to notice that exams were being simplified so as to make it appear that results were improving year on year.
Now twenty years on the whole reputation of the education sector is in disrepute. The claims and counterclaims are seen to be meaningless. The sheer number of government initiatives has overwhelmed many schools. The speed with which they have been asked to implement them has been seen as a distraction rather than a benefit.
Schools in favourable locations have traditionally outstripped others in poorer districts in the league tables. This is no surprise to teachers and overlooks the fact that many schools are performing well given their overall circumstances and resources.
School governors of a high calibre do not grow on trees. It was always an unrealistic goal to get an even spread of highly competent governors for every school to make sure that they improved.
One of the earliest instruments of a school inspection was the introduction of a document called the self assessment report. Like an annual report at a board meeting it made a good tool for analysing how a school was doing and just like any company manager, armed with such a report any head can see how the school is performing. A public naming and shaming process is not absolutely necessary.
The golden age of school inspectors painted them as benign old birds that descended on a school to quietly spread their wise words in a friendly but constructive way. Everyone knew that they were wily. Everyone knew that they never missed anything and yet they did not spend their time rubbishing the hard work and dedication of a whole profession.
Today’s pendulum has swung too far. Yes there was a need for a National Curriculum. Yes there were some sub standard teachers. But education is a fully interlocking jig-saw puzzle that involves resources, staff and buildings and these only function well when there is an agreed pact between teachers, pupils and parents. Getting to that point isn’t easy and you do not do it by force. Neither do you do it by throwing money at it. You do it by setting a climate of aspiration.
Let’s hope the times are beginning to change and that the OECD rebuke marks the beginning of that change.
