WEA Education Blog

Ofsted reliance on 'data and tick-box systems' criticised

Ofsted has come under criticism on the front page of today's 'Guardian' from a number of sources. The points made are around recent school inspections and the application in inspection of judgements around safeguarding and how these are translated into overall judgements on providers.

Whilst the criticisms come from schools and local authorities, the most telling one may be from Mike Tomlinson, the former Chief Inspector. He is quoted as saying:

"The question needs to be asked and answered as to whether Ofsted has the appropriate skills and experience to carry out its agenda,"

and

"Inspection systems that rely too heavily on data and tick-box systems is not what we need. I worry we are heading that way."

These concerns may inevitably surface in inspections of adult provision, too. The understandable emphasis on safeguarding may be accompanied by a standardising data approach to judgements that is intended to speed up inspections and reduce their costs. This is the same issue with the Framework for Excellence where judgements will be made (or, at least, hypotheses will be developed) from very generic, sketchly and largely FE college focused surveys. 

There may be a danger that the perverse outcomes recently emerging from an overemphasis on qualification success rates could be replicated in the areas of learner views and safety. This would be very unfortunate considering the importance of both these issues for good provision and the interests of students.

Common Inspection Framework for FE & Skills published

Ofsted has published the revised common inspection framework for 16+ learners. You can download it (16 sides) here.

No surprises but it is worth noting that Adult Community Learning (ACL), which briefly became Personal & Community Development Learning (PCDL) now seems to be down as 'informal adult learning'. This makes the implementation of the proposals in the 'Learning Revolution' White Paper particularly important to Adult Education providers like the WEA.

Peer Review Development Group lessons for self regulation

I attended the review session of a Peer Review and Development Group formed by three local authority adult education services: 

Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire and the WEA’s Southern Region. The group, which has met for well over a year, reported on the developments they had shared around self assessment, observation of teaching & learning and RARPA (Recognising & Recording Progress and Achievement on non-accredited learning).

It has been a very successful piece of work – which covered the period where all four had been inspected by Ofsted. It reinforced the value of honest self assessment and effective observation in driving improvement and there was a genuine and significant effort to respond to comments from Ofsted in each provider’s inspection about RARPA. Alongside that, it was an excellent piece of reflective continuing professional development by the colleagues involved.

However, for me, it also raised questions on the whole direction of self-regulation and the extent to which providers, working honestly to improve, need to be ready to challenge demands made by regulators and inspectors.

The RARPA situation is a particular case that I have written about before. The LSC's original statement on RARPA says that it intends to 'put the experience, aspirations and success of learners at the heart of what we do’. In reality we know that decisions by the Information Authority at the request of Ofsted have made the learner central only in the way a fish is central to the activities of an industrial fishing fleet. If the reductionism of regulators' view of RARPA continues, how can anyone be sure the approach is valued by tutors or learners? Whilst the last couple of years has at last shown we are at the limits of managerialism, ‘outstanding’ practice in RARPA seems now to require more extensive moderation than some GCSEs with none of the 'currency' provided by the qualification. The confirmation that Ofsted will not inspect provision that has no public funding suggests that this is either about driving non-accredited learning out of the hands of people on modest incomes or about finding ways to get through tick-box AKA ‘light touch’ inspections.

The implementation of the Learning Revolution gives us the opportunity to challenge the sorry slide in the direction of RARPA and refocus attention on devising great teaching and learning experiences for adults that they recognise as being of value.

 

 

RARPA and inspection, whatever next?

Recognising and Recording Progress and Achievement (RARPA) in non-accredited learning developed out of work established by the WEA in the 1990s called 'learning outcomes'. That dealt with the accusation that adult education, without the rigour of external qualifications, could be studied with no evidence of learning.

RARPA is based on a five stage process that covers basic good practice in teaching and learning. In recent years RARPA has become a condition for receiving public funding for non-accredited learning provision (see NIACE toolkit here). There is no doubt that the systematic implementation of the staged process as a standard has improved provision in the WEA. Not least because it helped some tutors develop and others to decide to leave.

However, along the way in wider policy terms it has become both marginalised from developmental discussion as the skills strategy has dominated and, at the same time, highly managerialised and integrated into the regulatory and funding compliance superstructure. It is clear now that the Ofsted is not completely happy with the arrangement. Over a year ago one lead inspector's view when briefing inspectors was reported as: "RARPA: it's not working, is it?"

One aspect of this is that the recording process and the use of that to create data and 'evidence' has become the main driver. Apparently, in a recent study on formative assessment, almost all tutors in non-accredited provision knew what RARPA was but many didn't know the Staged Process. This has two effects: one is it reduces the possibility of great teaching and learning, exchanging the best for the most compliant; second, it places summative assessment on a pedestal thus losing the first four stages and reinforces the State perspective of recent years that qualifications are all!

From this summer, this will be taken to the extreme where LSC funding Adult Safeguarded Learning provision will have to return individual 'achievement' data to the LSC so that comparative judgements can be made on non-accredited learning in inspection.

"Completion of achievement data [for non-accredited provision] will be voluntary from 2008/09 and a requirement from 2009/10." Ofsted guidelines for Adult & Community Learning Inspections.

This is really taking the whole issue of non-accredited learning rapidly in the wrong direction.

The key is in the classroom and the relationship between the tutor and the students as a group and individually. Proper, imaginative teaching and good formative assessment combined with respect and interest in students need to be central. Nothing new in that. The Black Report Download Blackbox exposed this danger in schools years ago:

"Teachers’ feedback to pupils often seems to serve social and managerial functions, often at the expense of the learning functions."

and

"The giving of marks and the grading functions are over-emphasised, while the giving of useful advice and the learning function are under-emphasised."

This month's NIACE events on reporting research into Formative Assessment reinforced the problematic gap that is emerging between issues in the classroom and the industrial harvesting of outcomes to inform inspection and account for funding. In that, good, straightforward teaching practice which includes effective questioning of students, appropriate feedback and self or peer assessment by students were shown to be key techniques to help people progress.

We need to get this back into the classroom. We need to see it as part of a process where the student is as important as the subject and the interaction between them, mediated by the tutor is the interesting bit. We don't need to offset reduced cost inspections by introducing statistically unreliable data - and put the cost of that on providers.

Maybe the new White Paper can give some hope. In theory the burgeoning industry of 'simplification', 'bureaucracy reduction' and 'self-regulation' should have prevented this; in fact it seems accelerating the vanillaisation of adult learning. We can't afford an inspection system that is reduced to the equivalent of a chap coming round to read the meter. A new commitment to informal adult learning should place the student at its heart and sweep away the managerialism and survelliance of the regulatory superstructure. Then let that be properly inspected - beyond a quick glance at a web-portal of meaningless achievement stats.

Ofsted concerns on quality in Adult Community Learning

The Ofsted Chief Inspector's Annual Report for 2007-08 has been published. You can get the full document here.  
The section on Adult and Community Learning probably most relates to the WEA's work. It prints to a single page and you can get it here: Download ACL page in CIAR 07-08
It's a bit worrying. Overall inspection grades are only satisfactory and are declining, ESOL is weak and Family Learning is less good than previously. There are clearly concerns in Ofsted that ACL is a sector that's really beginning to struggle.
Within that picture, the WEA's inspection last March looks good, although we are still only satisfactory in Skills for Life including ESOL. There is a feature on the WEA in the current Ofsted magazine 'Talisman' which you can get here: Download WEA in talisman 71
The concerns raised by Ofsted are ones we need to look at hard ourselves: falling learner numbers, little reliable progression data, planning and monitoring of progress in non-accredited courses.

There has been a decline in non-accredited provision and some of these issues may be a symptom of trying to see ACL as all part of one FE system when the other elements of that sector are now self-defining well away from the areas of ACL strength. The Informal Adult Learning proposals are due out from Government soon and it will be interesting to see how these quality issues are considered in a policy framework which has placed considerable distance between the main 'Skills' agenda and provision which is often assumed to have few tutors let alone high quality.

WEA Inspection report published

The Inspection report into the WEA in England has been published on the Ofsted website click here.  The report confirms a strong WEA.

The report describes the overall effectiveness of WEA provision as good and identifies provision in the subject area of Health, Public Services and Care as outstanding. It also confirms that the WEA has strong capacity to improve further.

The report is very timely given the current review of Specialist Designated Institututions and the Informal Adult Learning consultation. I recognises that the WEA works in hundreds of local communities, including the most disadvantaged, with a continued commitment to maintaining high quality learning opportunities for adults at a time when many providers and the general policy direction is thought to have moved away from community based and part-time provision.

The report recognises the high proportion of new learners the WEA reaches each year and its excellent links with partners to reach priority target groups successfully. The democratic principles of the WEA continue to make a significant contribution to the Association’s work in local organising, regional and national decision making and governance.

WEA General Secretary, Richard Bolsin, said: ‘Everyone who has been working to support the WEA over the last few years will be delighted by the outcome – even though we entered this inspection with a sense of confidence. From a management and educational standpoint we’re very pleased with the result, particularly the fact that it fully supports our own pre-inspection judgements through self-assessment. I am greatly encouraged that this report also recognises the contribution of volunteers as a strength of the WEA. This is particularly welcome, given that it is our voluntary movement which makes the WEA unique.’

The six key strengths identified in the report are:
•    good development of learners’ skills and knowledge;
•    strong leadership;
•    excellent partnerships;
•    good performance management to promote involvement;
•    very good responsiveness to community needs;
•    the role and contribution of volunteers across the organisation.

The report also states that the WEA has, ‘maintained all of its key strengths since the previous inspection and rectified most of the weaknesses.’

Provision in Health, Public Services and Care is described as outstanding with ‘very good teaching and learning’, ‘highly flexible and responsive range of courses’, and ‘very strong partnerships to promote inclusion.’

The key areas for improvement are judged to be:

• Insufficient participation of men
• Insufficient sharing of good practice
• Under-developed arrangements to monitor and report learners’ success on non-accredited courses
• Inadequate formal arrangements to monitor learners’ progression

A wide range of WEA work is commended throughout the report including:
•    the WEA’s national Helping in Schools programme;
•    a Chester-based project helping to rehabilitate adults with alcohol and drug dependency;
•    a community fitness and health education group in Guru Nanak Gurdwara in Stoke-On-Trent;
•    citizenship courses in Sheffield bringing disparate groups together to find common ground.

We will contact WEA tutors with more details from the report and examine how the Tutor Network can look at some of the issues in  particular subject areas along with actions taken by individual WEA regions.

Now that the report is published, please pass on this good news to anyone with an interest in the WEA.

Draft Ofsted report received

Just back from holiday and today we've received the draft report from Ofsted on the inspection of the WEA. We have to check it for factual errors before Monday. The actual report is not published until 29th April so we can't give details here but we should be very pleased with the outcome and, in particular, a vindication of a number of key issues for the WEA: reaching disadvantaged adults, working in partnership, development of voluntary activity and good teaching.

It is vital for the WEA to maintain its distinctive mission and have the standard of its work confirmed by external examination. This Ofsted inspection has done that.

Next week, in Birmingham, the Association Management Team is meeting and will consider the lessons we can draw from this inspection and how they fit into the context of the Government's review of Informal Adult Learning and the LSC's review of the Specialist Designated Institutions.

This report will help our case. We also need to take this opportunity to be clear about what the WEA has to offer over a longer time period than we have recently felt able to consider. The Association's voice is respected and we need to use it to shape the future for adult education in a time of great difficulty.

After Ofsted

Well, the Ofsted colleagues have been and gone and a whole week has passed since they left. What can we say about it? Not much of the detail as that is provisional and pending the publication of the report (late April). Nevertheless, it has been a positive experience and a genuine examination of what the WEA tries to offer in terms of adult education.

Inspections of the WEA are Olympic scale operations - even in the new lighter touch approach - and managing them successfully demands enormous attention to detail by lots of people across the WEA. I want to thank all of those people here: The regions that were directly visited, the other regions who supported them, the staff involved in the whole process, the volunteers and partners and the tutors and students that met the inspectors.

I know, from sitting in on the inspectors feedback, how impressed they were with the scale, reach and commitment of everyone in the WEA to our provision and our mission. The expertise of our tutors was praised, the WEA's commitment to meeting the needs of disadvantaged communities and the role of volunteers in supporting this work, governance and scrutiny and in helping maintain provision in areas where other providers no longer go.

As soon as the report is finalised I will link it to this blog.

Ofsted Inspection starts

The Ofsted inspection of the WEA starts today. A team of inspectors, led by Richard Moore, will be looking a the WEA over the rest of this week. Most visits to classes will be in NW, Yorkshire Humber, West and East Midlands, Southern and London.
There are three 'base-rooms', in Manchester, Birmingham and Slough. By Thursday, the whole inspection team will come to Birmingham to finalise its judgements. On Friday afternoon the WEA will receive the Inspection feedback, although the outcome can't be made public until the report is published in a few weeks.
At 11am today Inspectors will have their initial team briefing in six locations.  The WEA has a standard presentation that they will all receive. It's attached here if you'd like to see it (Download march_10th_presentation_to_ofsted.ppt)
Good luck to everyone involved in this inspection across England!

Ofsted visit to WEA in March

With the imminent visit of Ofsted to the WEA in England, I thought it would be worth summarising what is different to what we were used to with the former Adult Learning Inspectorate.

In many respects inspection is the same. It will focus on teaching and learning - especially learning. It will look for evidence from observations, interviews (with students, tutors, staff, partners and volunteers), reports and data. It will be rigorous and ask 'so what?' questions - i.e. 'so what difference does that make for the learner?' The inspectors all have a background in Adult Community Learning (although one interesting area is how that links to Personal & Community Development Learning).

On the whole they won't know the WEA and we'll need to briefly ensure they understand our educational strands and the role of partners, students and volunteers in planning and organising provision they see and in the governance and shaping of the WEA's direction.

Ofsted will grade the WEA in broadly the same way: 1-4 (outstanding to inadequate). It will look for evidence of improvement.

The inspections are smaller. In 2004 we had 45 inspectors for three weeks (675 Inspector days) and the reinspection in 2005 was around 170. This inspection will be for one week with around 80 inspector days looking at Humanities, Arts, Skills for Life, Health, community learning and our community involvement work.

To make judgements with fewer inspectors means the Ofsted team will look for evidence that our own systems are leading to improvements: the Observation of Teaching and Learning, the success rates on accredited courses, the support to learners and the reliability of our own self-assessment process.

Of course, we want to show the WEA as it is and what its distinctive role is locally, regionally and across the country.

It's a very complex inspection process when compared to colleges, local authorities and workplace learning providers. To help with this our longstanding system of nominees in every WEA region is coordinating this process with regional and national colleagues and this network has been vital to improving the work of the WEA over the last four years and is a really supportive and effective peer network - the kind of thing the QIA now advocates as part of 'self-regulation'.

The stakes are high. Ofsted inspection outcomes are a key element in future funding and the 'Framework for Excellence'. I'm confident that our assessment of our own progress is fair. I'm the nominee nationally for the inspection and have been working with the Lead Inspector, Richard Moore, in preparing for the visit. Richard produced a short  powerpoint summary of this for the Preparation meeting and I attach that here:
Download powerpoint_presentation.ppt