LEA frameworks for the assessment of schools: an interrupted picture

Abstract

Summary There have been major changes and developments in recent years in strategies for monitoring and evaluating schools. This paper is based on a survey of chief inspectors and describes the extent and variety of local education authority (LEA) approaches to the evaluation of schools during 1990/91. This was an important year because it immediately preceded a major shift in government policy on inspection. Results from the survey showed that only a small number of LEAs had substantial programmes of whole‐school inspections, or ‘full inspections’, in place. However, when other forms of inspection were taken into account a much more extensive picture of LEA evaluation activity emerged. This represented a substantial increase compared to the situation in the pre Education Reform Act period of the mid‐to‐late 1980s. The extent to which LEAs were pursuing vigorous policies for monitoring and evaluating schools based on ‘inspection’ modes is shown to depend on what exactly is counted as examples of such activity. The majority of LEAs had opted for an approach based on ‘inspection in [several] forms’. Although inspection of some kind was the dominant approach, a few LEAs also maintained some measure of support for school self‐evaluation. The findings of the survey are considered in the light of the government's current and previous policy on school inspection.

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