'Ofsted is wrong to drop one-word rankings for schools - many parents need them'
Last week, the government announced that Ofsted - the government body responsible for inspecting schools - would be dropping its controversial one-word rating system with immediate effect. Education specialist Amber Allott gives her thoughts on the changes.
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00:00Hello, my name's Amber Allitt and I'm a journalist specialising in education.
00:04So last week the government announced that it would be dropping Ofsted's overall skill
00:08grading system with immediate effect.
00:11In the past, state-funded skills would be given one of four overall grades after an
00:15inspection, summarising what inspectors found overall.
00:19These were Outstanding, Good, Requires Improvement and Inadequate.
00:25This system has long been controversial and it has been accused of being needlessly reductive,
00:30but I actually disagree.
00:32Any grade given in any situation in life is a little reductive by its very nature, but
00:37having an overall grade is more accessible and can help families get an idea of some
00:42really important information about their child's skill at a single glance.
00:45You've got to consider that more detailed information about inspections and what inspectors
00:50have found is already freely available online for any families that are really interested.
00:55But the problem with this is that these full reports can often be full of jargon and can
00:59be really time-consuming to sift through for the information you actually need.
01:03Now the government has confirmed that it will be overhauling the actual grading criteria
01:07for schools by next year, but even with this set to change, schools will still need to
01:13be re-inspected and make enormous changes if they fail to meet any of the expected standards.
01:19Maintaining it in technical terms and in giant paragraphs doesn't really change that, it
01:24just makes the information that little bit less accessible to average parents and families.