Primary teachers’ experiences of Ofsted inspections: ‘driving the joy out of education’

Abstract

Research has long suggested that Ofsted, the school inspection service in England, has a negative impact on teachers and school leaders. Concern over this issue intensified following media reports linking the suicide of a primary headteacher, Ruth Perry, to a negative Ofsted report in early 2023. Existing analysis of the inspection policy is largely based on empirical work with secondary teachers. Using a Foucauldian framework, this paper examines in-depth how primary teachers experience Ofsted, based on data collected through a survey and focus groups in 2023, in the wake of the media storm. We argue that primary teachers experience Ofsted in multiple negative ways, linking inspection to increased pressure and stress and higher workloads both during and between inspections; this constitutes panoptic performativity. However, they also experience additional pressures arising from the use of a generic inspection framework which does not take into account the smaller staff teams in primary schools. They find the use of inspectors without primary expertise problematic, as the gendered perception of primary schools as lower status is revealed. We conclude that the inspection system is seen as unfair and inappropriate by primary teachers, and any future reform of inspection needs to be taken into account.

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