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Report by HM Senior Chief Inspector
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Report by HM Senior Chief InspectorI am pleased to be able to report that HM Inspectorate of Education (HMIE) met all of its main targets in 2003-04. Meeting these targets has required very considerable effort from all of our staff, including the increasingly significant group of people who work with us as associate assessors and lay members. As in previous years, I thank everyone concerned for the high quality of their work and for their commitment to our success.
I indicated in last year's annual report that we had undertaken a major reappraisal of the ways in which HMIE can best serve Scottish education. As a result, in 2003-04 we implemented a very significant set of changes to both our organisation and our ways of working. These changes, which have affected almost every part of our work, are increasingly bearing fruit. The outcome of the review of our accommodation as part of the Scottish Executive's relocation policy has ended a significant period of uncertainty. I am confident that the new office locations, including the new hub office in Livingston, will provide an excellent basis for our future work across Scotland.
The development and introduction of new 'proportionate' models for primary, secondary and special school inspections has been a major focus for us over the course of the year. These new approaches have been received positively and I am pleased to see them becoming increasingly well established. The new models have been successful in identifying both strengths and areas for improvement in a wide range of schools. Greater opportunity for discussion between inspectors and staff, meetings with staff about the main findings of the inspection, and joint feedback on the inspection findings to headteachers, senior staff and the education authority have been particularly well received. The presence of the educational authority at the feedback sessions has allowed it to respond more quickly to the school's needs, to see good practice at first hand, and to identify any wider implications for the authority. This approach represents a further step in establishing a distinctive Scottish approach to quality improvement.
Over the course of the year we have taken forward a new proportionate approach to follow-through arrangements in the school sectors. As part of this process, we have established stronger team working amongst the national network of 16 District Inspectors who are directly taking forward school improvement with their respective authorities. We have worked closely with education authorities throughout and I am pleased that they have responded very positively to these new arrangements, including their more direct role in reporting the progress made by schools following inspection. Closer linkages have been established between the current programmes of inspection of education authorities and community learning and development inspections. Extensive further work is already under way to develop a more proportionate model from 2005 which will contribute directly to developments in the inspection of services for children.
Our work in further education and teacher education has continued to develop. We completed a programme of reviews and other quality assurance activity in further education as part of our agreement with the Scottish Further Education Funding Council and contributed professional advice on a variety of fronts, both within the Executive and in the sector more generally. We have also had extensive engagement with key bodies on teacher education and contributed directly to the second-stage review of initial teacher education.
We have continued to provide strong support to key policy and practice developments. In the area of educational inclusion, we have been following up the Count us in report in a number of ways, including running a major national conference, publishing audit guides on inclusion issues in our How good is our school? series, and mounting a multi-disciplinary review of the Integrated Community Schools initiative. During the year we have also worked in close collaboration with Learning and Teaching Scotland, notably in publishing jointly a suite of publications giving secondary schools advice on how to make more effective use of curriculum flexibility.
Our internal restructuring has been designed to strengthen HMIE as a best value organisation. We are currently preparing for reapplication for the Charter Mark award for excellence in public service. In promoting the Charter Mark more generally in Scotland, Andy Kerr, Minister for Finance and Public Services, launched our Charter Mark guide for pre-school centres and schools in March. The guide was developed in consultation with the Cabinet Office and with support from North Lanarkshire Council. It provides direct support for schools wishing to seek Charter Mark accreditation.
We have maintained a particular focus on staffing issues during the year. Although we have been able to recruit a significant number of new staff, I am concerned that recruitment of sufficient inspectors has proved difficult and that we therefore continue to carry a number of vacancies. Nonetheless, inspection frequency has increased significantly and our aim remains to have inspected all primary and secondary schools in the period 2002-2009.
Despite many temporary appointments, our corporate services staff continue to make an invaluable contribution to our overall effectiveness. Following decisions about relocation, we are achieving growing stability which should help us to build expertise and experience across our staff. As a key part of that process, we have developed a new human resources strategy and a related three-year implementation plan. Early developments have seen improvements in our recruitment processes, induction of staff and approaches to planning.
An important feature of our work has been further growth in partnership working with a variety of agencies, particularly involving other inspectorates and Audit Scotland. In early education, for example, the number of inspections has increased dramatically during the past year and it is a tribute to the staff involved from both the Care Commission and HMIE that targets have been met. This partnership has extended to inspections of residential special schools, where an initial round of inspections of all establishments is almost complete. In the coming year, we will be highlighting best practice in early education and in residential special schools.
2003-04 has been a very demanding year for HMIE. The organisation has embraced and delivered change on many fronts. The year ended with significant announcements by Ministers about multidisciplinary inspections of services for children, with an initial focus on child protection. HMIE has been asked to take the lead in establishing the new inspections which will form an exceptionally challenging area of work for us and our fellow inspectorates in the coming year.
GRAHAM DONALDSON
HM Senior Chief Inspector
June 2004