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Improving Scottish education - A report by HMIE on inspection and review 2002-2005

Appendix: Note on evidence sources and the use of terms

Evidence base

HMIE views as expressed in this report arise from consideration and reflection on a range of factors. These include:

• the summaries of findings from the inspection and review process relating to the publication of reports on individual establishments and services across all sectors over the last five, four or three years, depending on the sector involved*;
• the findings from inspections of educational establishments contributing to the production of aspect reports across all sectors, and HMIE commentary on those findings as published in such aspects reports;
• information drawn from surveys (for example of stakeholders’ views on inspection);
• reflections on the basis of ongoing interactions with a very broad range of key players in the education process (such as Scottish Executive staff, Directors of Education and other local authority personnel, staff from other education agencies, headteachers, principals, teaching and non-teaching staff, researchers and others involved in higher education);
• reflections on the basis of discussions both internal to HMIE and involving others taking part in inspection processes such as associate assessors, lay members, representatives of agencies engaged in joint inspections (such as the Care Commission, or Audit Scotland); and
• HM Inspectors’ knowledge in terms of research findings, theory and provision in relevant sectors and in specific contexts.

*Inspection details as follows:

Further details

Further details on many aspects reported on in this report are available in HMIE reports
or from the HMIE website (www.hmie.gov.uk). Publications are listed in the Reference and Bibliography Appendix associated with this report on the website. Of particular interest may
be the reports on:

• the findings of the first cycle of inspections of the education functions of local authorities;
• the findings of the first cycle of inspections of Community Learning and Development across all local authorities; and
• the annual analysis of college reviews of each year and an overview of findings across all years of the review cycle to date.

Use of terms

Terms describing people

• ‘parent/s’ should be understood as including foster carers, residential care staff and carers who are relatives or friends. It should also be understood as referring to one or two (or more) adults in the parent role
• ‘learner’ is used generically to refer to school pupils, young people in college, or young people or adults in the community learning and development (CLD) context. The word ‘participant’ is also used in the CLD context, where the word ‘learner’ may not be so appropriate
• ‘young people’ is used to refer across any sector to that group of individuals aged around
  14 to 18; occasionally the term is used in the 5 to 18 context
• ‘pupil’ is used exclusively in the context of schools
• ‘children’ is used in the pre-school context and in parent-children relational contexts
• ‘teacher’ or ‘teaching staff’ are used across all sectors to refer to those adults in teaching situations who have a teaching qualification
• ‘non-teaching staff’ or ‘support staff’ are used to refer to other adults in the teaching situation who support the teaching process. They may have a professional qualification. The term includes nursery nurses, nursery or classroom assistants, auxiliaries for children, pupils and young people with additional support needs, technicians, resource auxiliaries and others
• ‘staff’ is used to cover both the above groups
• ‘headteacher’ is used for school contexts and for nursery schools in the pre-school sector
• ‘centre manager’ is used in the pre-school sector to refer to the person in overall charge in voluntary or private centres as relevant
• ‘head’ is used generically to refer across all educational establishments and services
• ‘senior staff’ or ‘senior managers’ refers to senior promoted staff and may include the head, headteacher or centre manager
• ‘inspectors’ relates to personnel engaged in inspections or reviews and includes HM Inspectors, associate assessors and other members of inspection or review teams

Qualitative and quantitative terms

The evaluative words: ‘very good’, ‘good’, ‘fair’ and ‘unsatisfactory’ are as associated with the four quality indicator levels in How good is our school? and in other sector inspection documentation, prior to the introduction of the six-point scale in August 2005. The levels are described as follows:

The following standard terms of quantity are used in all HMIE reports:

Other quantitative terms which may be used in this report are to be understood as in common English usage.

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