1. Knowing our Parents Ian Rowe General Manager, GL Performance
Associate Governor – Newminster Middle School

2. Ofsted Annual Report, 2010/11
“Most commonly, the governing body knew too little about the school because monitoring was not rigorous or because over-generous self review judgements were accepted without sufficient challenge: at times of change and in an inherently challenging sector, they accepted too much on trust.”

3. New Ofsted Inspection Framework
“Self-evaluation is now well established in schools, providing the basis for planning for development and improvement. Inspection takes account of and contributes to a school’s self-evaluation.”
“The quality of its self-evaluation is a good indicator of the calibre of the school’s leaders and managers and of the school’s capability to improve.”
When schools are first informed that they are to be inspected, they will be asked to provide Ofsted with a summary of their self-evaluation. This should include evidence from school stakeholders.

4. New Ofsted Inspection Framework
“Inspections will give greater consideration to the views of parents, pupils and staff as important evidence.”
Ofsted will draw on pupils’ and parents’ views to inform inspection judgements and they will strive to inform inspection activities by gathering the views of pupils and parents who have a significant interest in the school.

5. Parents – the key stakeholder?

6. Parent Power
The Government is transforming the relationship schools have with parents.
The thoughts and views of parents have never been more important in shaping the way schools are run.
The SEN Green Paper emphasised the need for more parental choice in where and how their children are educated.
The Bew Review for KS2 assessment called for a wider range of data to be made available to parents.
The results of the new mandatory phonics screener at the end of Year 1 will be shared with parents.
As part of the new Ofsted framework, parents have been given the power to trigger a school inspection.

7. ParentView Ofsted launched the ParentView website in October 2011:
The website enables parents to share their views on their child’s school and it covers a range of topics, including quality of teaching, bullying, behaviour and levels of homework.
The responses to the 12 closed questions that make up the questionnaire will help Ofsted decide which schools to inspect, and when.

8. Understanding your parents – An effective survey

9. “Evaluating parental opinions is not easy”
“Response rates are usually poor and I have to question the quality of our data”
“Recording and analysing the data can take days – normally during the school holidays”
“What do my results really mean?”

10. An effective parental survey – Start with the end in mind
What evidence do you need for your self evaluation?
What evidence do you need to challenge assumptions from ParentView?
What changes are you planning to implement?
Are they the right ones?
What changes have you implemented?
Were they successful? .

11. An effective parental survey –
Importance verses satisfaction
Identify any disconnect

12. An effective parental survey
Importance v satisfaction
Qualitative v quantitative
Reliability
Feedback
Focus groups
Repeat annually .

13. Improving response rates
Advertise
Paper verses Online
Pupil power
Get teachers on board
Incentivise
Get the timing right
Feedback
Take action

14. Analysis Allow time and resource to enter the data
Use the expertise at your disposal
Understand and have confidence in your data
1 to 5 scale – standard error of the mean
True / False – standard error of the proportion
Read the qualitative results!

15. Be aware of parental bias
Results
Be aware of parental bias
Kirkland Rowell Surveys 2011

16. Results Gender Analysis Year Group Analysis
Weighted / Standardised data
Historical data

17. The customer is always right?
Don’t be alarmed by the results – you are measuring perception

18. Thank you Ian Rowe E: Ian.rowe@gl-performance.co.uk T: 0191 296 8270W: