Ofsted brings early years inspections in-house (http://us2.campaign-archive2.com/?u=44faaa73d6419d1513179588a&id=9162318722&e=93884f5ff6)

Interesting.

Ofsted brings early years inspections in-house (http://us2.campaign-archive2.com/?u=44faaa73d6419d1513179588a&id=9162318722&e=93884f5ff6) Interesting.

Lol I wondered who'd be first to post about this! :-)

Yup all good they won't be renewing Prospects and Tribal contracts in May 2017. All be done by Ofsted. They are currently training all the Inspectors and have been since last summer in an attempt to make Inspections more consistent.

Congratulations to OBC for starting the conversation in response to inspections discrepancies ...thanks to all those who persevered keeping the dialogue with Ofsted going.

The rest is history but a job well done to all up and down the country...so many more positive changes are being achieved through OBC :thumbsup:

The OBC chairs are meeting on 15 March...hope they pop the champagne :clapping:

Yup all good they won't be renewing Prospects and Tribal contracts in May 2017. All be done by Ofsted. They are currently training all the Inspectors and have been since last summer in an attempt to make Inspections more consistent.

Consistently good or consistently bad? :p

According to Ofsted ...from the articles that have come out after this announcement....Tribal and Prospects have made a contribution in the raising of standards in the EY sector....I nearly chocked on my tea!!

No mention of the avalanche of 'downgarding' that happened years ago and gave OBC a big start...no mention of the training and re-training of inspectors which must be costing ££££

...and it still goes on as inspectors are being re-trained again for another year until their contract expires....what a waste of money when inspections could have been taken over right now or a while back.

Although the news is good about going back to Ofsted...let's for one minute think what this means in terms of costs to Ofsted....

Also the HMCI has a vacancy...anyone interested?

I like Prospects.

So far they've failed to notice how utterly useless I am.
:rolleyes:

I like Prospects.

So far they've failed to notice how utterly useless I am.
:rolleyes:

At last............... I've said something Mrs Bunyip can agree with. ;)

Lol Bunyip!! :laughing:

There are different takes on this decision - I imagine a few Prospect and Tribal inspectors are worried about their jobs!!

We still need to monitor the situation I think - too many childminders are losing outstanding for spurious reasons - we can't take our eyes off the ball things are not going to improve overnight...

It's a step in the right direction though! :clapping:

I like Prospects. So far they've failed to notice how utterly useless I am. :rolleyes:
Speaking of which, I seem to remember a post from you a while back saying that if you received another outstanding you'd be reviewing your practice to see what you were doing wrong. How's that going?!?!?! :rolleyes:

Good news. Do you think this will bring moreconsistency to inspections though

I like Prospects.

So far they've failed to notice how utterly useless I am.
:rolleyes:

With comments like yours Bunyip ...how can we even think of allowing this to go on for another year? :rolleyes:
I would like to see Ofsted banned...no need for one in the rest of the world so why do we need it?
there are better ways of making education/childcare standards rise

For many this is a great decision...what is cooking in the pot though!

It maybe that Cms are being downgraded because the CIF is not about paperwork anymore but teaching?

I like Prospects.

So far they've failed to notice how utterly useless I am.
:rolleyes:

Hahaha, I've just said the very same thing to my husband about me lol.

With comments like yours Bunyip ...how can we even think of allowing this to go on for another year? :rolleyes:
I would like to see Ofsted banned...no need for one in the rest of the world so why do we need it?
there are better ways of making education/childcare standards rise

For many this is a great decision...what is cooking in the pot though!

It maybe that Cms are being downgraded because the CIF is not about paperwork anymore but teaching?

What troubles me is that whether the inspections are about teaching, paperwork or the ubiquitous windmills, they are most definitely not about what 90+% of parents think they are about, let alone what parents actually seem to value when they choose a CM. :mad:

Boring, as I've said this before, but I wish the inspections were not graded. IMHO you're either fit to care for children or not, and parents are far better to decide the quality, individuals and range of activities they like, rather than an Ofstedder with a set of ever-changing criteria.

I have yet to meet any parent who doesn't work in education who has the faintest idea what inspectors come looking for. And of the ones who do work in education, they have very little regard for Ofsted inspection reports...... precisely because they do know what Ofsted look for!

Speaking of which, I seem to remember a post from you a while back saying that if you received another outstanding you'd be reviewing your practice to see what you were doing wrong. How's that going?!?!?! :rolleyes:

Two ways of looking at this.

First, I seem to have had an inspector last November who was very nearly as cracked as me. She asked whether my SEF had been written in collaboration with Mark Thomas or the Ponty Python Team, and seemed to regard that as a compliment (hell, I sure did.) :thumbsup: She liked what she saw here but had to skew her description of it to fit an Ofsted/DofE agenda that she most definitely disliked. She commented that a lot of what I did to help parents might be seen in a negative light by some newer inspectors. eg. I used to do lunchtime preschool collections and drop one child at granny's for lunch. Even though I combined this time with a stop at the park or a walk across public footpaths to see the local farm animals, she thought some of her colleagues would say this was "wasted time" when I should be indoors "teaching" them. She clearly hated this notion as much as I do, but there you are.

I can only assume a few 'old school' inspectors are still out there. I have a certain degree of sympathy for some inspectors who must be suffering very low morale and job satisfaction. Like many public servants, they probably joined up with very laudable aims of helping improve standards and outcomes for children. After many resignations, a mere remnant is left, struggling to live with a goal-orientated agenda of the (so-called)United Kingdom regime. :(

My second reflection is more scientific, even if the maths is a bit rough and ready. I've had 2 graded inspections in 4 years. IIRC they lasted about 10 hours in total. I work 40+ hours per week with children, for about 50 weeks of the year = about 8000 hours of CMing between registration and 2nd inspection.

That means Ofsted have made very wide-ranging and important judgments based on the observation of a mere 0.00125% of my time. This doesn't strike me as a scientifically representative sample.

Put it another way. My average EY child presently attends here 2 days a week TTO. On that basis, I can assume that child will spend approximately 1800 hours with me before he starts school. Since Ofsted consider they can accurately judge my abilities by observing 0.00125% of my work, it is reasonable to extrapolate that I can conduct sufficient observations and assessments of that child in 0.0225 of an hour - that's just over 1 minute and 20 seconds.

Think on't.........................:p

Maybe a stupid question but if they're taking inspections in house, where will all these inspectors come from? Some must surely be coming from prospects or tribal and just being retrained by Ofsted? So will things really change any time soon?
And on the subject of grading I wish they had a grade between good and requires improvement, as a parent I would never have considered a required improvement minder or nursery but if it was still called satisfactory I probably would, and from the stories on here about how one signature on a bit of paper missing can lead to inadequate grading rather than good or outstanding the grading really means nothing! Maybe things would be easier if there was no grade, you were either fit to be a childminder or not, because at the end of the day it totally comes down to the parent in whether they get on with you and trust you to look after their child, none of my parents want them to be 'taught' and couldn't give a stuff about literacy in the garden or whatever else, they just want to know their child is happy and loved while they have to work, and that they have fun and play and feel secure where they are.
Anyway sorry for the slight rant, it just feels with so much emphasis on teaching that Ofsted maybe forget these are really young children and it is far more important a 1/2/3 year old is happy and well looked after.

Bunyip
I wonder what would happen if grades were taken away and the inspection concentrated just on Pass or No Pass?

How much stress would that save?...how much unnecessary paperwork would not be produced 'just in case'?...how much anxiety avoided? how many of those who make lots of money on selling useless documentation would suddenly disappear?

I too will say this again...wish we could go back to pre-Ofsted and have inspections done by Social Services....for those who were registered them we remember them well...and the inspections were focussed on what really matters: children and practice.

You are also correct on your maths...our grades depend on the short time the inspector observes us and ticks her paperwork...every 4 years or so if we are lucky
One could be great all the time but something goes wrong on inspection day
Or one could be useless but on inspection day everything is wonderful and that super grade is given! :panic:

compare that to pre-Ofsted inspections which lasted the whole session and were annual?

As you know Cms agencies are not graded just given Effective or Not Effective...or whatever their judgement is called just to make them different from the rest?
Agencies are also inspected by Ofsted not Tribal/Prospect
and yet many agencies will choose to grade their members...it is obvious that grading has become some form of reward...the consequences of getting less than Good are also scary hence the constant updating of guidance...have you seen the latest?

I wonder why people have little regard for Ofsted?...I could think of a few reasons.
Could be the same reason Junior Doctors do not have high regard of Hunt?

Where will Ofsted recruit when they bring the inspections in house again?
I could hazard a guess but a lot will depend how much their budget is going to be cut and how they will compensate for that which makes me want to hazard a second guess...but I will refrain and wait for the facts to come out.

I have met a few ex Ofsted inspectors...great people! as are the Tribal/Prospects ones I have come across.

All will be very clear very soon....just wait for Osborne to use his axe and cause more havoc!

With comments like yours Bunyip ...how can we even think of allowing this to go on for another year? :rolleyes:
I would like to see Ofsted banned...no need for one in the rest of the world so why do we need it?
there are better ways of making education/childcare standards rise

For many this is a great decision...what is cooking in the pot though!

It maybe that Cms are being downgraded because the CIF is not about paperwork anymore but teaching?

Oh yes and then you get Schemes like they do in Australia (oh yes Agencies!!)

Maybe a stupid question but if they're taking inspections in house, where will all these inspectors come from? Some must surely be coming from prospects or tribal and just being retrained by Ofsted? So will things really change any time soon?
And on the subject of grading I wish they had a grade between good and requires improvement, as a parent I would never have considered a required improvement minder or nursery but if it was still called satisfactory I probably would, and from the stories on here about how one signature on a bit of paper missing can lead to inadequate grading rather than good or outstanding the grading really means nothing! Maybe things would be easier if there was no grade, you were either fit to be a childminder or not, because at the end of the day it totally comes down to the parent in whether they get on with you and trust you to look after their child, none of my parents want them to be 'taught' and couldn't give a stuff about literacy in the garden or whatever else, they just want to know their child is happy and loved while they have to work, and that they have fun and play and feel secure where they are.
Anyway sorry for the slight rant, it just feels with so much emphasis on teaching that Ofsted maybe forget these are really young children and it is far more important a 1/2/3 year old is happy and well looked after.

Many of the current Prospects and Tribal Inspectors were Ofsted Inspectors originally.

Many of the current Prospects and Tribal Inspectors were Ofsted Inspectors originally.

And many of those were the original Social Service inspectors!

...and many may return where they came from...the circle of life!!