Ofsted was criticised as 'not fit for purpose' in 2007 by the House of Commons Education Select Committee. The committee also highlighted their concern about "the complex set of objectives and sectors that Ofsted now spans and its capacity to fulfil its core mission". Other criticism came from the
Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL) which said "Ofsted is over-reliant on number crunching, using test data which are fundamentally unsound" and added that the organisation was "ripe for overhaul". In the Court Agreement between DfE and Summerhill School, Independent Schools Tribunal IST/59, inspections would include two advisors from the school and one from the DfE to ensure the fairness of the process. The school had campaigned for all schools to be similarly inspected, ensuring openness and accountability for the process. In August 2013, 18 of the 24 newly launched
Free Schools were graded Good or Outstanding by Ofsted; however, with over 100 state schools being downgraded from an Outstanding classification that year, the consistency of Ofsted grading was once again brought into question, leading to numerous 'How to get a Good Ofsted' guides being created. A 2014 report by the think tank
Policy Exchange indicated that many Ofsted inspectors lack the knowledge required to make fair judgements of lessons and that judgements are so unreliable, "you would be better off flipping a coin". A 2014 poll of teachers, carried out by
Teacher Support Network, revealed that over 90% of teachers felt Ofsted inspections had a neutral or negative impact on students' results. In response to criticisms about the increased workload inspection frameworks caused, Ofsted pledged it would not change its inspection framework during the school year. Wilshaw also dismissed speculation that Ofsted itself was responsible for teachers' heavy workload (in excess of 60 hours per week) describing it as 'a red herring'. However, a 2015 poll by the
NUT found that 53% of teachers were planning to leave teaching by 2017, with the extra workload from Ofsted's 'accountability agenda' a key factor in seeking a job with a better work/life balance. The Ofsted complaints procedure has also been heavily criticised for opacity and a strong bias in favour of the inspectors. Geoff Barton, after writing an article strongly critical of Ofsted's use of raw data rather than inspection reports to determine grades, noted that: the Ofsted complaints procedure too often seems constructed around a deep and dutiful need for self-protection. Thus an inspection system that demands transparency from schools refuses to release its own inspection notes, When challenged, it dares us to resort to a Freedom of Information request and then rejects those same requests because they don't conform to a definition of "public interest". In 2015, an inspector revealed that inspection judgements can be arbitrarily over-ruled by senior figures, commenting on a case where a school had been downgraded: We couldn't understand this rationale at all. It turned out that Ofsted had made a brief visit to the school some time before the inspection and had come up with some sort of unreported provisional judgement. So all that evidence we had gathered meant nothing and essentially this team of experienced inspectors was not trusted to make a judgement. However, Barton argued the letter lost some of its force and all of its credibility for being published on the day 40% of inspectors were sacked for not being up to the job. On 8 January 2023, Ruth Perry, head at Caversham Primary School in
Reading, Berkshire, killed herself while waiting for the publication of a report that downgraded her school from outstanding to inadequate. Perry's family said she had described the previous November's inspection as the worst day of her life. The National Education Union, school leaders' union NAHT and the Association of School and College Leaders called for inspections to be halted, and a petition calling for an enquiry into the inspection received more than 230,000 signatures. HM Chief Inspector of Education, Children's Services and Skills (the head of Ofsted),
Amanda Spielman, rejected the calls to halt Ofsted inspections. As a reaction to the news of Perry's death, heads at some schools have worn black armbands during inspections or removed references to Ofsted from their websites. In 2015, headteacher Carol Woodward killed herself following an Ofsted inspection that downgraded her school to inadequate, and in 2013 headteacher Helen Mann hanged herself when Ofsted advised that her plans to transform the curriculum were not happening quickly enough and her school would lose its top level rating. A second Ofsted report into Caversham Primary School, published in July 2023, rated the school as good. On 7 December 2023, senior coroner Heidi Connor said the inspection "lacked fairness, respect and sensitivity" and was at times "rude and intimidating", where the inquest ruled that the Ofsted inspection "likely contributed" to the death of head teacher Ruth Perry. Ms Connor said a prevention of future death notice will be issued and she "very much hopes" the results of the inquest will be used by the Education Select Committee's inquiry into Ofsted and how it works. ==In popular culture==