The NNPCF met with Sir Martyn Oliver, His Majesty’s Chief Inspector at Ofsted on 12th September 2024, and were joined by Yvette Stanley, the social care lead and Lee Owston, the education lead for Ofsted.
We welcomed the meeting with Sir Martyn to discuss the recently published Ofsted Big Listen, and how parents and carers, Parent Carer Forums and the NNPCF can be involved in the upcoming plans, ensuring that there is strong coproduction across the work.
Sir Martyn reassured the NNPCF that there is a strong focus on the most vulnerable pupils, with a focus on support and accountability for both schools and local areas. Whilst some inspections have been put temporarily on hold, we were pleased to hear that accountability and the importance of Local Area SEND inspections remains a high priority, demonstrated by Local Area SEND inspections being continued as planned. We also discussed how Local Area SEND inspections can often highlight non-inclusive school practice but the individual school inspections in the area are rated Good and Outstanding creating a contradiction and distrust around local provisions and how this needs to be addressed.
The NNPCF was reassured that coproduction with all stakeholders will be taking place over the next year to support the development of the report cards for both individual schools and Local Area SEND Inspections. The aim of the report cards is to provide more explicit information on schools and local areas, which the NNPCF has been assured will provide an increased focus on SEND provision, along with enabling national trends to be picked up earlier and addressed. It is therefore vital that Parent Carer Forums feedback their experiences of SEND area inspections and families experiences of school inspections to support our conversations nationally.
Our understanding is that Local Area SEND Revisits will recommence in Spring 2025, following the anticipated publication of the monitoring handbook which will have been updated.
We welcome the conversation and continued conversation, along with looking forward to coproducing with Ofsted.