Published: The Scotsman, 22 January, 2010
The first a school knows of a forthcoming inspection is when a large white box arrives by courier with labels taped all around it adorned with the letters HMIe (Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Education). There is no mistaking what you are about to open, what the contents will be and what the impact will be on your school’s community.
In November 2006, such a box arrived in my school’s reception and my stomach quite literally turned over – indeed, it did several rotations. I felt the blood draining from my face and I sat in my office (with a ‘do not disturb’ sign hanging on the door) whilst I contemplated how to break the news to my staff, pupils, parents, Board of Governors and my wife!
The first thoughts that spring to mind are ‘damage limitation’ because every Head knows that no teacher and by definition no school really wants to be ‘inspected’, judged and reported upon with a published report available to all. It is human nature to immediately assume that you are going to do badly, that the newspaper headlines will read “Independent School Fails Inspection Spectacularly”, that you are going to end up publicly humiliated and on a jobseeker’s allowance.
The widely reported and tragic suicide of Irene Hogg highlights the significant worries that perpetuate throughout school staffrooms and management teams when an inspection is announced, the period of frantic preparation prior to their arrival, the week of inspection and the long wait for the publication and public digestion of the final inspection report.
However, all of my fears were hugely unfounded. Of course, it is uncomfortable to be scrutinised and there are some drawbacks to be being judged over such a short period of time once every seven years, but those issues aside, I actually enjoyed the process immensely. I found the inspection team to be approachable, supportive, caring, keen to advise, keen to listen and above all they gave me the opportunity to evaluate their performance and allowed me to counter any of their critical findings by using my own evidence to support my school.
The final report described their experiences over the course of the week, but also contained the school’s evaluations and these permeated the published inspection report.
HMIe come in for considerable and often unwarranted criticism because their attendance is largely unwelcome and stressful but the process allowed my school to take a long hard look at itself and in doing so, we improved. If the process improves the education of Scotland’s children then it is necessary. However, we do have to ensure that the process becomes less stressful whilst maintaining the necessary rigour. The new inspection model, recently introduced, has, in many ways, sought to remove the stress and allow schools a greater input into the final report. This is to be welcomed.