| Parental Involvement in evaluating Schools |
| |
| Scotland: Taking account of parents' views |
| |
Alan Armstrong
HM Inspector of Schools, Scottish
Office Education and Industry Department |
| |
In Scotland, the need to take
full account of the views of parents when evaluating the effectiveness of
a school is clearly recognised. This case study examines three important
ways in which parents may become closely involved in evaluating their children's
school, through:
- independent inspection and evaluation
of schools by Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools (HMI);
- the work of School Boards; and
- individual initiatives by education authorities
and schools.
|
| |
| The indicators of quality used
by HMI to evaluate how effectively a school involves parents in the education
of their children are also outlined. These indicators should be used by
schools in self-evaluation, which may also involve parents themselves. The
results of such evaluation should lead to the identification of priorities
for further improvement. |
| |
| Independent inspection and evaluation by HM Inspectors
of Schools |
| |
Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools
(HMI) provide a rigorous and independent audit of:
- the overall quality of education;
- standards of pupils' attainment;
- the effectiveness of individual institutions;
- arrangements for assuring quality; and
- value for money.
|
| |
| The Senior Chief Inspector is
the senior professional adviser to the Secretary of State for Scotland on
all aspects of education. |
| |
| Each year, HMI inspect and publish
reports on a wide range of educational establishments including pre-5 centres,
primary, secondary and special schools, further education colleges and community
education. They are involved in assessing the quality of teacher education. |
| |
Inspections monitor schools'
performance, help to raise standards and improve quality in education in
Scotland. Importantly, inspections are designed to tell parents about
the quality of their children's school and the standards being achieved.
They also tell:
- teachers about the effectiveness
of their work;
- headteachers about how well their
schools are performing;
- education authorities, school boards
and school governors about the overall quality of their schools;
and
- the Secretary of State for Scotland
about the performance and needs of the Scottish education system as
a whole.
|
| |
| Inspections evaluate existing
performance and identify points for action where improvement is needed.
All parents receive a copy of an inspection report on their children's school. |
| |
| Views of parents and the wider
community are important in the inspection process. Parents are involved
in a number of ways, as outlined in the following sections. |
| |
| Questionnaire to parents |
| |
Before most types of inspection,
a parental questionnaire is issued to a random sample of parents and the
results are taken into account during the inspection. The questionnaire
seeks parental views on a wide range of questions about:
- the school;
- the child's and parent's experience of
it; and
- the role of the school in its local community.
|
| |
| Parents can also provide written
comments if they wish. All comments are confidential to HMI and any parent
who is not included as part of the random sample can request a questionnaire.
The issues raised by parents are discussed with the headteacher and followed
up during the inspection. The following table shows an example of a questionnaire
and the results of a sample of 100 families. Seventy parents returned a
questionnaire. |
| |
|
|
| |
| To ensure that parental issues
are clearly identified in an inspection, it is important to compare the
views of parents in one school with those of parents nationally. A 'baseline'
score has therefore been compiled by aggregating all parental responses
since 1994. There are separate baselines for primary and secondary schools.
The table below sets out the results in a questionnaire for one school compared
to responses nationally. The black area at the end of each bar represents
a statistical confidence interval and it is unwise to comment on
differences between school and national figures if the black areas overlap. |
| |
|
|
| |
| In this school, parents were
particularly positive in their responses to questions 10 and 16. However,
they expressed notable concern in responses to questions 4, 8, 9, 12, 17
and 18. |
| |
| A summary of the responses to
the parents' questionnaire is included in the published school inspection
report. Parents' views about the work of the school are therefore clearly
and openly expressed. Inspection evidence often confirms the views of parents.
Where HMI find that parental concerns or praise is unwarranted, the report
makes clear the reasons for the Inspectors' final evaluations. |
| |
| Lay members of the inspection team |
| |
| Most types of school inspection
include a lay member in the inspection team. Lay members are very often
parents themselves with children who are at other schools, or are now adults.
Lay members need to have a genuine interest in education but must not have
been employed in education, for example, as a teacher, lecturer or community
education worker. Their agenda focuses on how the school and its pupils
interact with parents and the local community. Lay members help HMI to ensure
that parents' views are taken fully into account during the inspection.
They undertake special training for their work. |
| |
The lay member's programme of
activities in schools often includes:
- discussions with the chairperson of the
School Board;
- attending School Board meetings;
- considering the results of the parental
questionnaire;
- interviewing the headteacher and other
staff;
- taking part in important HMI inspection
team meetings;
- contributing to particular HMI evaluations
of the school's work; and
- commenting on the draft report.
|
| |
| Meetings with parents |
| |
In addition to issuing the parental
questionnaire, HMI or the lay member of the inspection team usually meet
parents' representatives in small groups or individually. The school may
be invited to nominate parents and often select those who:
- are members of the Parent-Teachers' Association;
- have children who are new to the school;
- act as helpers in classroom or with administration
in the school; or
- have had very positive experiences of
the school's work.
|
| |
| Occasionally a parent may request
a meeting with a member of the inspection team to discuss a particular issue. |
| |
| Commentary on the draft report |
| |
| The Inspection reports are written
primarily for parents and avoid the use of educational jargon by using
plain English. Before publication, the Chairperson of the School Board
is invited to comment on the draft report, particularly on the extent to
which it addresses the concerns raised by parents and the Board. The views
of the Chairperson are taken into account by HMI, along with those of the
education authority and school, in finalising the report for publication. |
| |
| School Boards |
| |
| In Scotland, a School Board is
an advisory and consultative body. Parent members are in the majority. At
May 1998, 82% of primary schools and 97% of secondary schools had a School
Board. Schools keep their Boards well informed about the work of the school.
Links between Boards and their schools are generally supportive and productive. |
| |
| School Boards must receive an
annual report from the headteacher. In the best examples, these reports
are comprehensive, detailed and evaluative. Many schools use the results
of their self-evaluation, which may have involved Board members in the evaluation
process (see below). The Board's good knowledge and understanding of the
school's work gained from regular meetings and updates provided during the
academic year make it well placed to respond to the headteacher's report. |
| |
To improve the Board's role further,
the Scottish School Board Association, as the national representative body
for Boards with a well-developed local network, acts as a facilitator and
co-ordinator for the training of Board members. The training includes topics
such as:
- effective meetings;
- effective communications;
- the appointment of senior promoted staff;
and
- help for headteachers in working with
School Boards
|
| |
| Individual initiatives by education authorities and schools |
| |
Building on the steps outlined
in School Boards above, some schools make their annual report available
to all parents. In particular, the report may refer to the school development
plan, and progress in implementing the plan and achieving the targets set.
Effective schools also involve parents in identifying priorities for development
and in working with the school to develop policy. For example, parents'
representatives may take part in school working groups closely linked to
development plan targets such as:
- developing a whole-school homework policy
and related advice for pupils and parents;
- improving ethos; and
- ensuring more regular and informative
communications between the school and home.
|
| |
| Every three years, HMI publish
a Standards and Quality report which assesses how well schools are performing
in key aspects of their work. The report is based on the outcomes of HMI's
programme of independent inspections. Schools are now being encouraged to
produce their own standards and quality reports, and to share them with
parents. School standards and quality reports should follow the format
of the national report. The tools to help this process are explained in
the following section. |
| |
| The response from schools has
been encouraging. Many are collecting evidence on a regular and systematic
basis. One education authority which contains 137 primary schools and 24
secondary schools is encouraging and supporting all its schools to prepare
regular standards and quality reports. |
| |
| Evaluating how well a school involves parents |
| |
| External evaluation |
| |
| HMI reach their evaluations based
on evidence gathered during an inspection. They use their professional judgement
to weigh up strengths and weaknesses. Performance indicators (PIs) help
them to reach their evaluations. PIs describe 'benchmarks of quality' and
provide a framework for consistent and reliable evaluation. The 33 PIs used
for inspection have been drawn up on the basis of HMI's long experience
of inspecting schools. |
| |
| There are two PIs closely associated
with evaluating parental involvement in their children's learning. |
| |
- Communication with parents, which is concerned
with the following themes:
- quality of procedures for communicating
with parents
- quality of information given to parents
about each child's progress
- quality of information given to parents
about the work of the school
|
| |
- Partnership with parents and the School
Board, which is concerned with the following themes:
- encouragement to parents to be involved
in their children's learning and the life of the school
- responsiveness of the school to parents'
views and enquiries
- effectiveness of links between the school
and School Board.
|
| |
| The quality of what is observed
within each theme is judged against four levels of performance:
4 very good (major strengths)
3 good (more strengths than weaknesses)
2 fair (some important weaknesses)
1 unsatisfactory (major weaknesses).
|
| |
| To help evaluation, each theme
in a PI is illustrated at two levels - Level 4 very good, and Level
2 fair - indicating specific features to look for. For example, the
Level 4 illustrations for the themes of Partnership with parents and the
School Board are as follows: |
| |
| Level 4 very good |
| |
- Parents are involved in supporting their
child's learning, for example, in homework. They support the life of
the school in a planned and purposeful way.
|
| |
| Steps are taken to involve them
in, for example, classroom activities, homework, participation in out-of-school
visits and other extra-curricular activities. |
| |
- Positive steps are taken to ascertain
parental views of aspects of the school's work and appropriate action
is taken in response to these and to enquiries from parents.
- The headteacher has well developed links
with the School Board. The school actively encourages Board members
to be knowledgeable about and involved in the life of the school. The
partnership generates substantial benefits and is valued by all concerned.
|
| |
| As part of the HMI initiative
to promote quality improvement in Scottish schools, PIs have been published
in How good is our school? Self-evaluation using performance indicators
(HMI Audit Unit, 1996). This document explains to schools how they can use
PIs in their own self-evaluation. |
| |
| Self-evaluation |
| |
In developing systematic self-evaluation
based on the approach outlined in How good is our school?, schools
can ask themselves three basic questions which are at the heart of the process
of evaluation:
- How are we doing?
- How do we know?
- What are we going to do now?
|
| |
| By using the same performance
indicators as HMI in inspections, schools can develop their own quality
assurance procedures and evaluate their standards and quality of provision.
This helps to identify strengths and development needs, priorities and targets
for improvements. |
| |
| In undertaking self-evaluation,
effective schools take account of the views of their parents, pupils, staff
and local community. For many years, schools have sought parents' views
by using questionnaires and acting on their results. However, too often
such questionnaires focused on general issues such as pupils' enjoyment
of school, accommodation and resources. Systematic self-evaluation has ensured
that key areas of school provision are included. The most effective schools
have noted the value of involving parents in evaluating all aspects of their
work, and sharing with parents in standards and quality reports the results
of their evaluations. |
| |