Minding the Gaps: How inspections in 2023-24 differed by region

I have posted in the past about SSAT’s Inspection Tracker, on attendance, the Oliver effect and how the 23/24 inspection ‘need to improve’ areas mirrored the outcomes of the Big Listen.

In the past week, I have been looking at the regional variations in the 2023-24 inspection data with some interest and so I wanted to share them with you. Hopefully you will find them fascinating too. Three things to note ahead of this post:

• The proportions in our tracker are by ‘need to improve’ comment not by school or grade. All schools have at least one comment but some have many more and those found to be RI or inadequate tend to have more comments, so they are over-represented.
• There are 9 regions: East, East Midlands, London, North East, North West, South East, South West, West Midlands and Yorkshire/Humber. Identifying patterns for each of them involves holding a wide range of schools together, not always comfortably.
• Although there are interesting trends in the regional data, this might reflect as much upon the schools that were inspected in the past year as anything else. It might not.

Caveats aside, let’s have a look at what the data from inspections in 23/24 are telling us about regional differences and challenges now that the vast majority have been published.

Regional differences in the number of ‘need to improve’ comments

The first thing to note is that, so far, there have been 12,496 ‘need to improve’ comments published in inspection reports in 2023-24. This figure includes 1123 schools who had ‘no identified needs’ because they are, or are likely to become, graded as outstanding. Divided equally across all nine regions this would equate to almost 1400 comments per region.

The East of England (1372), the South West (1325) and Yorkshire and Humberside (1383) have roughly the proportion of comments one would expect. The North West (1980) are by far the most over-represented region, followed by the South East (1778) and the West Midlands (1606). Perhaps the most striking region in terms of the number of comments identified in reports this year is the North East with 675, half of the mean.

Of course, there are differences in the overall number of schools in each region that account for some of the differences (the North East has 12 local authorities within it versus 23 for the North West and 33 for London). The East of England, however, covers one fewer local authorities than the North East but racked up almost double the number of ‘need to improve’ comments at 1194.

Regional differences in gradings

Another regional difference is with regard to the overall outcomes for schools. Nationally the proportion of ‘need to improve’ comments for outstanding schools was 8.3% across 2023-24. For London schools, the figure was a whopping 20.3%, suggesting that outstanding is a much more common outcome for London schools. By contrast, the figure was only 4.8% in the North East and South West, and 5.2% in the East Midlands.

At the other end of the inspection outcome scale, only 4.1% of comments nationally were for schools judged to be inadequate but the proportion was much higher for schools in the North East (5%) and South West (5.8%). In the North West the figure was the largest, at 6%.

The North West also had the highest proportion of ‘requires improvement’ comments at 25.9% (when the national figure is 19.1%). The South West (25%) and East Midlands (22.6%) were also significantly higher than national, indicating a greater prevalence of the requires improvement grade in these areas.

So, the inspection data indicates that several regions have a far higher proportion of ‘need to improve’ comments linked to negative inspection outcomes. But are these reflecting previous inspection outcomes? Or are schools in these regions improving despite their grading?

Regional differences in progress

The table below shows the proportion of ‘need to improve’ comments for previously inspected schools, showing whether they improved their overall grading, remained static or declined. As with the previous table, some of the differences are significant given the sample sizes at play.

As we have picked up on negatives already, let’s continue the theme with the proportion of ‘need to improve’ comments for schools that have worsened since their previous inspection. Nationally, this stands at 22.9% (note: declining schools generally have more comments than improving schools). Only two areas had a significantly higher proportion, indicating more schools in decline: the North West at 34.3% and the South West at 30.1%. This indicates that the comparatively negative judgments of schools in these regions is due (at least in part) to the fact that they are more likely to have been downgraded in the 2023-24 inspection schedule.

We can also look at the other end of the scale and note that the North West and South West are less likely to represented in comments for improving schools. This is also true of the North East and of the South East (which we have not mentioned previously). The areas with the biggest proportion of comments for schools improving their inspection grade are the East Midlands (20.6% versus 13.6% nationally), the East of England (18.5%) and the West Midlands (16.4%).

As we know, inspection gradings are changing both this year and next to reflect the findings from the Big Listen consultation process and the changed priorities at Westminster. Maybe there will be less focus on outcomes from inspections and more focus on what schools need to improve going forward. For this reason, the most interesting aspects of our tracker are those which show regional variations in the actual substance of the ‘need to improve’ comments. What can these tell us about the inspectorate’s focus across the different regions of the country?

Regional differences in inspection framework focus

In all regions, as would be expected, the Quality of Education facet of the inspection framework accounts for the majority of ‘need to improve’ comments. Nationally, the proportion of school recommendations for this facet is 75% (although this figure is only 60% for secondaries against 80% for primaries). As you can see below the regional differences all fall within +/-5%. The London region has the highest proportion of comments focused on the Quality of Education, with Yorkshire and Humberside having the lowest proportion at 71% of all comments.

And what of other areas of the framework? Comments related to Behaviour and Attitudes are much higher than the national average for the North East and South East (both 13% versus 10% nationally), and also for the East of England, and for Yorkshire and Humberside (12% for each). Personal Development concerns are particularly noticeable in the East Midlands (9% against 5% nationally) but far less frequent in the South East (2%) and South West (3%). Leadership and Management concerns are far more likely to be raised in schools in the East of England and the West Midlands (11%) than they are nationally (9%) or in the South East (7%).

These are interesting insights, but where the data really gets interesting is down among the weeds. Taking account of the different ways in which lead inspectors frame their ‘need to improve’ comments, our tracker has this year identified 56 distinctively different areas of focus which, to a greater or lesser extent, cover all the intentions behind the comments.

Some regional differences in specific needs for schools

With 56 different ‘needs’ and nine different regions, this section of the post will pick out some of the most interesting data for each region in the form of bullet points covering each element of the EIF. In each one I will state the proportion for the region first and nationally second. Note that the proportions are, in this case, of all comments within that aspect of the framework.

East of England

• QE – Support for SEND students more likely to be highlighted (9% versus 7%).
• BA – Attendance least often raised as a concern (34% versus 50%).
• PD – Extra-curricular provision likely to need improving (39% versus 17%).
• LM – Stakeholders more likely to be disengaged or upset (24% versus 16%).

East Midlands

• QE – Phonics and reading less likely to be a problem (6% versus 10%).
• BA – High level misbehaviour concerns more likely (6% versus 3%).
• PD – Fundamental British values more likely to be an issue (25% versus 14%).
• LM – Subject leadership consistency needs addressing (19% versus 12%).

London

• QE – Curriculum implementation most likely to be an issue (19% versus 15%).
• BA – Issues with application of behaviour policy (41% versus 19%).
• PD – Statutory PSHRE requirements not fulfilled (17% versus 3%).
• LM – Governance less likely to be a need (10% versus 18%).

North East

• QE – Early Years curriculum effectiveness problematic (5% versus 3%).
• BA – Attendance much more likely to be a need (60% versus 50%).
• PD – Equality and diversity likely to come up more often (8% versus 2%).
• LM – Subject leadership less of a concern (4% versus 12%).

North West

• QE – Recall of prior learning more likely to be an issue (10% versus 6%).
• BA – Attitude and engagement feature less prominently (2% versus 5%).
• PD – Knowledge of other cultures a more common issue (25% versus 20%).
• LM – Governance highly likely to be a need to improve (33% versus 18%).

South East

• QE – Teacher knowledge more often an issue for schools (6% versus 4%).
• BA – Attendance highly likely to be mentioned as a concern (60% versus 54%).
• PD – Knowledge of other cultures and British values a relative strength (13% versus 31%)
• LM – Monitoring and evaluation more often problematic (21% versus 18%).

South West

• QE – Assessment systems most likely to come up as a need (23% versus 19%).
• BA – Attendance less often identified as a problem (42% versus 50%).
• PD – Extra-curricular offer comes up more regularly as an issue (26% versus 17%).
• LM – Subject leadership likely to present greater challenges (17% versus 12%).

West Midlands

• QE – Curriculum planning least likely to be problematic (9% versus 11%).
• BA – Attendance concerns mentioned much more frequently (56% versus 50%).
• PD – Careers and pathways education highly problematic (25% versus 11%).
• LM – Monitoring and evaluation processes frequently mentioned (27% versus 18%).

Yorkshire and Humberside

• QE – Assessment processes least likely to be seen as a concern (15% versus 19%).
• BA – Highest proportion of comments on pupil misbehaviour (19% versus 14%).
• PD – Knowledge of other faiths and cultures very often an issue (33% versus 20%).
• LM – Safeguarding processes are more likely to be mentioned (15% versus 9%).

It should be noted that these are only a small number of some of the more interesting ‘need to improve’ comments and are not necessarily the biggest levers for change in those regions. There are, perhaps, more significant cross-regional patterns (around attendance and personal development, for example), but those are perhaps for another day and another blogpost.

Conclusions – Regional differences in 2023-24 inspections

This post has outlined four levels of regional differences between the outcomes presented by our inspection tracker. The first is that different regions have been represented in inspections conducted last academic year to very different degrees. The second is that some regions are more likely to have seen negative inspection outcomes or to have seen a greater proportion of their schools downgraded from previous outcomes: some have seen both. The third is there are regional differences in how the four elements of the inspection framework have been applied that are, in places, quite striking. And finally, this post has outlined a selection of the ways in which the specific ‘need to improve’ comments have been used significantly more or less often in some regions than in others.

If this post has been of interest, please do consider signing up to our ‘Readiness for Inspection’ event on Thursday 10 October at 4pm. The webinar will include more emergent themes, trends and microtrends in inspection thrown up by the data from our tracker. We will contextualise this with some of the important messages coming out from Ofsted in recent weeks.

And if you are interested in a more bespoke conversation about the insights from our inspection tracker, regional or otherwise, please get in touch.