So much for Ofsted listening, as the education watchdog continues with questionable approach to ratings - Jayne Dowle

Professor Waters, a French literature specialist teaching at the University of Reading, slammed the government’s statement, published on Thursday in response to an inquiry into Ofsted by MPs on the Commons education committee, describing it as “woefully inadequate”.

In particular, she lambasted the Education Secretary, Gillian Keegan, accusing her of going “to great lengths to be seen to be listening”, then failing to act.

And isn’t this just typical of this excuse for a Conservative government? Place-marking politicians in charge of huge offices of state, with the power – literally – of life and death over other people. When they say they take on board what the public say, when they say they care about the suffering of others, their subsequent actions do nothing whatsoever to back this up.

The same could be said when it comes to the cost of living, crippling energy bills and mortgage rate rises in particular, or the shameful treatment of carers being bullied into returning every penny of benefits overpaid, thanks to inept, badly-managed civil servants.

How many other individuals feel pushed to breaking point right now? The government couldn’t even hazard a guess, and wouldn’t care to take steps to help even if it did know.

“This is not the time for more delays and lip service,” Waters said. “It is time to act, to save lives, and create a system in which parents and teachers can have confidence.” And who could really argue with that? Many, it would seem, especially those in the corridors of power.

An inspection report following an Ofsted visit in November 2022 found Ms Perry’s school, Caversham Primary School in Reading, to be ‘good’ in every category apart from leadership and management, where it was judged to be ‘inadequate’.

Inspectors said school leaders did not have the ‘required knowledge to keep pupils safe from harm’, did not take ‘prompt and proper actions’ and had not ensured safeguarding was ‘effective’

The result? The school, judged as ‘outstanding’ at its previous inspection in February 2009, was downgraded to ‘inadequate’ overall, a highly-questionable judgement, many observers felt. It has since been re-inspected, in June 2023, and rated ‘good’.

But it was too late for mother-of-two Ms Perry, who had experienced no prior mental health issues. Her husband branded the Ofsted inspector ‘a bully’ with ‘an agenda’ and her death resulted in an outcry, bringing calls from teaching unions and others to scrap damning one-word Ofsted judgements – ‘outstanding’, ‘good’, ‘requires improvement’, ‘inadequate’ – and overhaul the whole system.

The government insists it will stick with the system, claiming there were “significant benefits” to retaining the overall effectiveness grading approach.

It said Ofsted’s four headline grades provide “a succinct and accessible summary for parents”. They also enable ministers to look at inspection outcomes across England.

Let’s be realistic. In the faltering days of this Conservative government, we can’t expect a major change. It will stick with what it knows.

Shadow Education Secretary, Bridget Phillipson said in March 2023, at the annual conference of school leaders’ union ASCL, that a Labour government would consult on scrapping Ofsted’s current grading system and replacing it with a new “report card” for schools if it wins the next election.

Pledging to bring about a “wind of change to our education system”, she said this would focus on constructive ways to improve performance, rather than damning schools into the wilderness.

Good luck to her with that, should Labour get the keys to Number 10. I fear that the time for contemplation, nuance and a personalised approach to helping schools tackle their issues is over.

I’m no conspiracy theorist, but at the same time as Professor Waters spoke so eloquently to reporters, voicing the sense of powerlessness felt by many, another Ofsted-related news story quietly appeared in the teaching profession’s digital newspaper FE Week – on April 24 - with the headline, ‘Ofsted to explore how AI can help it make better decisions’.

Whilst Ruth Perry’s death continues to devastate her family, those very mortal emotions still raw, a technological agenda is steadily gathering pace in the background.