Thread by @warwickmansell

New: Michaela head told inspectors the school did not teach music in year nine mainly because pupils “are not really interested in the subject”.

Long read piece on the inspection notes on Michaela Community School,which I FOI’d following its recent report.educationuncovered.co.uk/news/166381/mi…

The notes, though heavily redacted, make fascinating reading, revealing multiple ways in which the school was interrogated by inspectors, with a string of conclusions not reflected in the published Ofsted report.

It is worth saying at the start, and as I say in the piece, that the school was praised for what seems like excellent subject teaching in core EBacc subjects which are its focus: maths, English, science and history.

The school also, of course, gets excellent results in the exam subjects its students take.

The notes, though, offer a lot more nuance and information about the nature of provision at the school, which were not captured, sadly, in the published Ofsted report on Michaela and generally seem not to feature in public debate.

The school was questioned repeatedly by inspectors on whether its curriculum, which sees it not having on its subject curriculum the NC subjects of computing and design and technology, and teaching music only to year 8, was too narrow.

The head, Katharine Birbalsingh, told inspectors that “most pupils are not really interested in music but they teach it in depth in Y7 and Y8,” with “limited facilities” also reported as a reason.

The school backed up this line to me when asked to comment about it, including that: “We are an inner-city school with a challenging intake: these children are not exposed to much music when beginning at Michaela.”

But it had provision including peripatetic music lessons, choir, notation teaching and music daily during form time, the school told me.

The inspection notes see inspectors concluding, though, that Michaela’ curriculum in music “does not match the ambition or breadth of the national curriculum.” This did not make the published inspection report.

This is despite Ofsted seeming to be critical of schools nationwide which dispense with music early, in its national report on the subject published in September.

On computing and DT, the notes state KB said: “IT isn’t our biggest thing…we are not a bunch of luddites but we have chosen to give them more English and maths. After 16, they can go and do IT, DT or media for eg.”

The school repeated this to me, when asked to respond, saying DT and IT “are valuable and worthwhile, but for post-16”. The school has not recently had entries in the subjects post-16, but said it would help pupils find places to study them.

The notes also see the school, and seemingly inspectors, conceding that Michaela’s provision for PE was “limited,” given limited facilities. Again, this did not make the inspection report, even though PE was listed as area for improvement in Michaela’s last inspection.

The headteacher, said the notes, had tried taking pupils to the local sports centre, but the facilities were “inadequate”. And tried asking local heads to use their facilities, but this wasn’t possible.

Michaela was also asked about its unusual pattern of its GCSE science entries, with all its students entered for double science rather than triple, including all its “high prior attainers”.

The inspection notes say: “Schools may enter pupils with high prior attainment for double science in order to inflate their performance measures.” There is no record of the school being asked about this directly; inspectors must, then, have either ignored or rejected it as...

...it's not discussed in the published report.

The notes say Michaela responded to questions about 100% double science entry by citing covid, with pupils having missed learning. The notes say: “HT says Covid has made it difficult, that was reason for pupils doing double science.”

School told me: “The local grammar schools take the top slice of children. There are a few of ours every year that take triple science but last year, because of the effects of Covid, none did.”

This analysis, though, suggests almost all Michaela pupils took double science as of 2019. peterejkemp.github.io/demos/michaela/

Michaela’s GCSE offer is also relatively narrow, the notes confirm, with the school having more than a handful of pupils in only the English baccalaureate subjects, RS, art and design and citizenship.

At A-level, Michaela had no entries for creative subjects last year, with its sixth form basically seeing maths and science taken, plus a smattering of French, English Lit, politics and history.

The notes also say that 25%, of 100 parents who responded to the pre-inspection survey, disagreed that there was a good range of subjects at the school. Again, it seems a shame not to have had this explored in the inspection report.

Ofsted’s pre-inspection analysis states: “[Michaela] pupils have achieved highly in all subjects. Is this because they have a potentially narrow curriculum.”

The conclusion must be that inspectors found the answer to this question to be “no”, with the inspectors describing, the published report, Michaela's curriculum as "broad".

But it is hard to see how Michaela’s offer is as broad as the national curriculum, given the subjects missing.

Indeed, Michaela came close to admitting this when asked to respond, stating: “We believe in depth over breadth.”

But this becomes important when looking at Ofsted’s grade criteria. These state that, for a school to be rated “good”, its curriculum should be “either the national curriculum or a curriculum of similar breadth and ambition”.

It is hard to see how a curriculum without computing, IT, seemingly without much PE, with music taught only until year 8 and with a much narrower range of GCSEs than is usual could meet that "breadth" criterion.

At the very least - sounding like a stuck record, sorry - the nature of that offer should surely have been discussed in the published Ofsted report.

But none of the above – the detail in music, the “limited” nature of PE, the lack of IT and DT teaching, the small number of GCSEs, made the published report, which of course saw the school retain its outstanding verdict.

Many will see this as a very good school, and, to repeat, the detail of the notes suggests very good teaching in core subjects. But the nature of provision, against Ofsted’s criteria, should surely have been probed publicly by the inspectorate.

This really does seem to be a case study in how useless single-word Ofsted judgements on schools, backed by short reports which do not present the detailed evidence, can be. The picture on Michaela is more nuanced than Ofsted has stated publicly, as its own evidence shows.

But, aside from the consideration of curriculum breadth, the notes had other interesting bits.

The notes state several times a concern about some pupils not having been taught about “consent” in personal, social and health education.

The deputy head was asked about this, said the notes, and replied: “Those pupils missed it during covid. [We] are going to cover this next term.”

One former HMI, @Julespg , said that blaming gaps in the curriculum on covid, and this being allowed by inspectors, would enrage other schools, who had been told the pandemic could not be used as an excuse.

Asked about this, the school told me: “Pupils are taught a thorough PSHE curriculum including consent and homophobia. It is possible that a few pupils were not listening properly.”

At Michaela, teachers are not told which pupils have special educational needs, the notes state, unless they have an EHCP, as “leaders assert that QF [quality first] teaching addresses the needs of pupils with SEND.”

This may sit oddly with a statement in Ofsted’s published report simply saying: “Leaders have put robust systems in place to identify pupils with SEND. They provide additional support if necessary.”

Inspectors also look at the school’s “referral room,” finding 15 pupils “in there, all in booths, facing the wall. Working in silence…pupils eat their lunch in there as well.” (Of course, Michaela is not alone in having pupils in internal exclusion rooms, working in booths).

Notes give some info on reasons a pupil could be in there. They state: “If a pupil kisses teeth when given a detention will prob go in there for a day. Very longest is 5 days – work independently.” Low nos of external exclusions.

Notes also say that pupils “do not…have access to work experience or independent advice and guidance”. This, though, again does not make Ofsted’s published report – despite the latter seemingly being a requirement in schools.

Section on staffing suggests Michaela runs a largely happy ship, with all 70 responses to staff survey positive.

However, staff turnover for 2020-21 was 16%, which the notes said was in top 20 per cent of schools nationwide. (Where are Ofsted’s comparison figures, I wonder?)

I put this to Michaela. It said: “On average, teachers stay at Michaela four or five years. Sometimes, teachers may choose to leave the school at start of joining because we are a very different school so not every teacher feels the school’s ethos fits their way of doing things.”

Finally, the notes offer another insight into Michaela’s distinctive ethos, stating several times that pupils chant the school poem: Invictus by William Ernest Henley. poetryfoundation.org/poems/51642/in…

I think it’s a strange one for children to recite repeatedly, though views, as on so much about this school, will clearly vary.

You can read the inspection notes, disclosed to me by Ofsted under FOI, here: dropbox.com/scl/fi/op1hl96…

Right, this may have been possibly my longest twitter thread ever. If you want still more detail, reminder that the piece on my website about this is here: educationuncovered.co.uk/news/166381/mi…

Oh, one further quick point to take away from all of this: Ofsted is not telling it like it is. No wonder the current inspection regime is under such scrutiny.

Here's a searchable version of the inspection notes: docs.google.com/document/d/114…