Analysis: Split decisions over Ofsted's future

Last month's report by the Education Select Committee, The role and performance of Ofsted, was unequivocal and damning in its judgement of Ofsted. It concluded that the body responsible for inspection and regulation for care and education should be divided, because it had grown too large to be effective and had lost its specialist focus (News, 21 April).

Graham Stuart MP, the committee's chair, said, 'We need a radical shift in how inspection operates in this country, with a more proportionate, specialist and focused approach.'

The report added, 'We are convinced that this division will not only raise the quality of inspection experience, but also the profile of what is currently Ofsted's non-education remit.'

It said an Education Inspectorate, with responsibility for nurseries, schools, colleges, adult education, teacher training and local authority commissioning of schools, should be established, alongside a Care Inspectorate that would encompass adoption services, CAFCASS, children's services and care, including children's homes, and controversially, childminders. The two bodies would share administrative functions and work closely together, particularly on joint inspections of nurseries and children's centres, but would have separate chief inspectors and areas of expertise.

For many in the early years sector there are two key things wrong with this set-up. First, the decision to split education from care is seen as fundamentally at odds with current thinking, even for Government and policy-makers. Education and care are now integrated and the idea of separating them looks a backwards step for many.

As Jan Dubiel, national development officer at Early Excellence, says, 'Splitting Ofsted in this way flies in the face of what the Tickell review of the EYFS is saying, with its reference to life, health and learning in its title, suggesting they have equal value. Splitting it up has the potential to create false divisions between care and education at a point when we understand they go hand in hand.'

Although he agrees that Ofsted may have lost its specialist focus, Mr Dubiel says that splitting education and care is not the solution, and that it would be difficult to distinguish between the two.

Early years consultant Ann Langston agrees. 'I thought we'd exhausted the debate between education and care,' she says. 'When children are being cared for they are also being educated. The decision to split them could dilute the progress we've made - particularly at a time when reports by Frank Field, Graham Allen and Clare Tickell all point to the significance of children's earliest years for their life chances.'

Elizabeth Carruthers, headteacher of Redcliffe Children's Centre and Nursery School, says a split would be a backward step. 'Wherever a child is, they should have care and education. This will recreate all the old arguments about care and education. We don't want education experts and care experts. We want people with a sound knowledge of both.'

However, Neil Leitch, chief executive of the Pre-School Learning Alliance (PLA), does not view the split as an issue and believes reform for Ofsted is long overdue. 'It was becoming unwieldy and we were getting a diminution in the quality of inspection in every area. Anything that puts back a specific focus is good,' he says.

THE PLACE OF CHILDMINDERS

The second proposal attracting criticism is that to separate childminders from all other early years provision, by placing them under care rather than education.

Sue Griffin, former national training and quality assurance manager for the National Childminding Association (NCMA), says splitting childminders from education is ill-informed and an insult to childminders and the families they work with. 'It is coming from a very old fashioned idea about care, that it is separate from children's learning,' she says. 'This would set childminding back to the dark ages of the 1970s and 80s. We in NCMA fought so hard for childminders to be recognised as early years providers on a level playing field with other providers. Childminders play a key role in children's learning - they are not just nappy changers and nose wipers, as was thought in previous decades. It isn't possible to care for children without playing a part in their learning. Parents make positive choices about wanting home-based, not centre-based, experiences for their children. They deserve equal reassurance about the quality of the provision.'

Elizabeth Carruthers thinks that moving childminders into a care inspectorate would devalue the work they do. 'Childminders have so much high level one-to-one interaction with children that is not just care, it is education.'

Ann Langston also fails to see the rationale. 'What is difficult to understand is why childminders should be selected out of the education sector,' she says. 'The thing that seems to differentiate childminding from other provision that would come under the care inspectorate is that childminders are supporting children's learning, as well as their physical and emotional care. This isn't generally the case with the other agencies.'

Many of the witnesses called by the select committee to give their views were unclear about whether Ofsted's role was to support schools and providers to improve. The report concluded that Ofsted was 'hampered' by a perception that it only inspects schools.

'At present inspection's role in improvement is not clear, leading to a variety of views within and without Ofsted's own walls, and thence to inconsistent experiences and expectations of inspection,' it said.

After considering this, MPs decided that the role of the Education Inspectorate should be 'first, to inspect institutions and to provide judgements and recommendations which can drive better outcomes for individual children, young people and learners; and, second, to provide an overview of the education system as a whole. It should not aim to be an improvement agency,' the report said.

'The Children's Care Inspectorate should more actively support service improvement, including a focus on the quality of practice and the effectiveness of help. This is largely because many of the remits it will inspect, such as childminders and adoption agencies, may not have easy access to the partnership-based improvement model which applies to schools, not least because of the size and scope of their activities.'

But according to Sue Griffin, the idea that childminders do not have access to improvement models is 'nonsense'. She says, 'What about networks, the quintessential improvement model, designed for that very purpose? For me personally, having worked very hard with colleagues to develop childminding networks and get accredited childminders included in funded provision and the EYFS, I would grieve deeply if (the split) came to pass.'

INSPECTORS' EXPERTISE

But one point on which MPs and commentators agree is the extent to which many inspectors lack specialist knowledge. Elizabeth Carruthers says inspectors often fall short of an in-depth knowledge of how children learn through play and how care and education are linked.

'One inspector we had was more concerned about hygiene and the fact the carpet was dirty, rather than understanding that it was dirty because children were able to go outside, if they wished, most of the day and play. The carpet was muddy as they tracked inside and outside,' says Ms Carruthers.

'The EYFS is play-based, but I feel that many inspectors lack an understanding of play at a deep level. I feel they don't understand the extent to which children are learning through play. They don't go beyond the superficial.'

In a PLA survey carried out 18 months ago, the ability of inspectors to judge settings consistently was highlighted as a major concern by providers. Neil Leitch says, 'There needs to be a greater move towards consistency. It feels like a lottery - you could have the same criteria and performance and two different inspectors could rank a setting differently. If Ofsted wants to see every environment as it operates, why give any notice? Too few inspectors have experience of the type of setting they inspect. Grades can often be different, based on the experience of the inspector. Continuity of assessment is critical for Ofsted to have credibility and to diminish animosity among providers.'

However, he thinks nurseries should also have an opportunity to call inspectors in for re-inspections, which he says the PLA and other providers had called for, in cases such as where nurseries are new or have changed ownership.

With inspections occurring infrequently, Mr Leitch says this would become critical for providers, particularly as eligibility for funding - for example, two-year-old places - is becoming more dependent on whether nurseries are rated good or outstanding. He suggests that nurseries could fund such interim inspections themselves and should be able to call inspectors in when they have made improvements.

Ann Langston says the committee's recommendation about the role of the Care Inspectorate suggests it would have a dual function - to support and promote improvement as well as to regulate providers of childcare.

'If the split happened, it would mean that inspectors would have different responsibilities, which would have implications for the training of the inspectors themselves. And in that case, as Lord Hill of Oareford sums up in the report, it would be about "the right people performing the right bits of inspection".'

However, creating two inspectorates and 'starting from scratch' could be positive for Ofsted, adds Ms Langston. 'This is an opportunity for there to be clarity about the roles and functions of the new inspectorates, which should lead to greater transparency and consistency in judgements and reports.'

Claire Schofield, director of Policy, Membership and Communications at the National Day Nurseries Association, questions how the split would impact upon nurseries and the children and families using them. She says, 'The review did raise some relevant points around the skills of inspectors and the need for them to have the right skills to make informed judgments. Relevant experience of the service being inspected is important, and we would welcome clear requirements in this area. In addition, while clear information is important to parents, we would also like to see more communication for families about identifying high-quality provision - an inspection report can be highly useful, but changes such as a new manager or a change in ownership can significantly change settings.'

Meanwhile, it remains to be seen what changes will go ahead. The Government has said it plans to respond to the MPs' report later this year.

THE INSPECTOR'S POINT OF VIEW

Jon Richards, Unison national officer for Ofsted, says early years inspectors are facing increasing pressure with their new employers to meet targets in the number of inspections they carry out. The union mainly represents social care inspectors but also includes early years inspectors who now work for Prospect Services and the Tribal Group, since childcare inspections were privatised last September. Unison has canvassed its members about whether they think care and education should be split. Responses have been mixed:

For

'I fully support the proposal. Having worked as a social care inspector in Ofsted since 2007, I still remain convinced this is a very educationally focused organisation that fails to fully grasp the complexities of social care. I concur with the committee's view that having a single children's inspectorate has not worked anywhere near well enough to merit its continuation.'

Against

'The creation of a single inspectorate was welcomed by all and the erosion of a single point of access and the easier liaising between sections of that organisation will erode public confidence, a cohesive service and more importantly, the best outcomes for children and young people. I do not believe Ofsted has all the answers, but we are the only official NGO trying to secure the best possible outcomes for children and young people in a holistic manner.'

FURTHER INFORMATION