No-notice Ofsted inspections will be introduced. They have finally come to pass, ironically brought about not by an insistence on academic standards but by panic induced by fear of extremism. Why is no-notice so threatening for schools? Isn’t it arguably easier, less traumatic, than letting worry build for 12, 24 or 48 hours?
Logically, it should be, but the idea’s supporters (including the chief inspector and now the secretary of state) would be disingenuous to make any such claim. Indeed, it would be wilfully false to deny that schools nowadays live under a cloud of anticipatory inspectoral terror.
The stakes are enormously high, the cost of failure colossal. Pressure on heads is immense: as a result we continue to face a supply crisis for leadership positions in many parts of the country. Teachers, harried and buffeted by the inspection process and its consequences, succumb to stress and illness.
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