performance monitoring

This article off the back of a study which places us 6th as a nation in relation to educational achievement, much to the surprise of most regular national hobby doom-mongers, points to the importance of measuring things. I agree within limits. What very few of those discussing the “to count or not to count” agenda consider is how important spatial considerations are in the mix.

I know I will face many howls of derision when I mention rural proofing, however the issue here is how it is applied not the value of the process itself! Anyway interesting stuff in this article as set out below “Schools, according to the latest Ofsted report, which was released yesterday are getting better. Seventy per cent of schools, according to the report, are now “good”, or better. That’s four per cent more than three years ago, which is, of course, better than four per cent less. But it’s still not good enough. Even the man who wrote the report says it isn’t good enough. He thinks it isn’t “satisfactory” for schools to be “satisfactory”. He thinks his own report could be summed up as “could do better”.

The man who wrote the report, who’s called Michael Wilshaw, and who’s a “sir” outside the classroom too, knows “Ofsted” isn’t the kind of word that cheers a teacher up. He knows it can make teachers forget about the child who’s sitting in front of them, and the things they’re trying to teach them, and the interesting things the child might say. He knows it can make them forget about the stories, and the games. He knows, in fact, that it can make teachers forget about the teaching and think about the test. And he knows that teachers don’t like tests. They don’t like “teaching to the test”, or marking tests, or being put in league tables on the basis of tests.

He knows, because he used to be a teacher, that teachers think teaching isn’t just about tests. In this, they are very much like everybody else. They are, for example, like the people who work in hospitals and care homes, who didn’t decide to train as nurses, or work as healthcare assistants, because they liked ticking boxes on lists.

These people didn’t decide to work on a ward, or in a care home, because they wanted to be put in league tables for how quickly they brought a bed pan, or wiped a bottom. These people think care isn’t about league tables and lists. And they’re right. They’re right that league tables can make you forget about the person you’re meant to be looking after or teaching, and think instead about numbers, and boxes, and lists. And they’re right that you shouldn’t need them. Schools, and hospitals, and care homes, shouldn’t need to be put in league tables. People shouldn’t need to be put in league tables. But, unfortunately, they do.”